Prof. Robert Costanza Discusses Ecological Economics (January 25th)

Our economy is frequently defined as one of unpaid costs.  (Think: Garret Hardin and the tragedy of the commons.)  Nature or natural resources are considered either inexhaustible and/or the byproducts of their use, such as polluted air and degraded water quality, are externalized costs borne by society, i.e., no one.   Our economic model perfectly well explains the climate crisis.  Treating our atmosphere and our oceans as open sewers has resulted in both global warming and helps to explain the planet's ongoing and accelerating biological annihilation, or the sixth mass extinction.  The field of ecological economics attempts to, in two words, internalize externalities.   

During this 30-minute interview Professor Costanza begins by briefly describing the field of ecological economics.   The interview progresses to his discussion of the valuing nature, here costal wetlands, he explains common asset trusts, the development of more rational measures of economic development (beyond GDP) such as the Genuine Progress Indicator and of course provides comment regarding the climate crisis (including the use of motivational interviewing in defining climate goals).   

Robert Costanza is Professor of Ecological Economics at the Institute for Global Prosperity (IGP) at University College London (UCL).  He is also currently a Senior Fellow at the Stockholm Resilience Centre in Stockholm, Sweden, and Honorary Professor at the Australian National University, an Affiliate Fellow at the Gund Institute at the University of Vermont, and a deTao Master of Ecological Economics at the deTao Masters Academy in Shanghai, China.   Previously, he taught at the Crawford School of Public Policy at the Australian National University.  He has also taught at Portland State University, was Gund Professor of Ecological Economics and Director  of the Gund Institute for Ecological Economics at the University of Vermont, prior still he was Director of the University of Maryland Institute for Ecological Economics and Professor at the University of Maryland's Center for Estuarine and Environmental Science at the Chesapeake Biological Lab.  Professor Costanza is a Fellow in the Academy of Social Sciences in Australia (ASSA) and the Royal Society of Arts (RSA) in the UK, and is an Overseas Expert in the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).  He is co-founder and past-president of the International Society for Ecological Economics and was founding chief editor of the society’s journal Ecological Economics. He currently serves on the editorial board of ten other international academic journals.  He is also founding co-editor in chief of Solutions a unique hybrid academic/popular journal and editor in chief of the Anthropocene Review.   He currently serves on the editorial board of eight other international academic journals and is past president of the Intl. Society for Ecosystem Health.  He is a Senior Fellow of the Stockholm Resilience Centre, a Senior Fellow of the National Council for Science and the Environment and a Distinguished Visiting Professor at Lincoln University in New Zealand.

Professor Costanza's UCL webpage is at: https://www.ucl.ac.uk/bartlett/igp/news/2021/oct/spotlight-professor-robert-costanza.

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