ECON 295: Introduction to Sustainable Development Washington and Lee University Spring 2018 Professor: James F Casey Email: caseyj@wlu.edu Class: MWF 9-12, Wilson Hall 2019 Office Hours: MWF 12-1 and TR by appointment Office Location: Holtkamp 119 Course Description In September 2015, the world adopted a set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) for 2015-2030 to replace the Millennium Development Goals when they expired in 2015. These SDGs set targets for reducing poverty, protecting the environment, and increasing equality of opportunity for those who may have had less than equal opportunity in the past – These are the three pillars of Sustainable Development. The primary objective of this course is to provide an introduction to the concept, theories, and potential outcomes of sustainable development. In addition to this, we will take a case study approach and look at policies and programs that have aimed to address each of the
I thought that this was an interesting article particularly due to to the authors emphasis on incentive structures. With an issue such as global climate change, any tangible decline in greenhouse gas emissions will necessitate a large amount of cooperation both between nations and between firms, and it seems like the driver for this cooperation will be a strong clear incentive structure. With proper incentives, firms will be willing to reduce emissions and face higher abatement costs. Command and control certainly would not work in a situation such as this, and as the author notes, neither would a tradable permit system. One drawback of this article, in my opinion, was that the author never really revealed how such an incentive program would look or operate. Additionally, I thought the last point he made was really important, which is the education of the public on the issue and changing consumer preference away from emissions heavy activity is also immensely important. It seems that the two go somewhat hand in hand in that once consumers learn about the issues of climate change and the implications it holds, consumer preferences start to shift away from this behavior. Despite this, achieving this in BRICS nations where the countries need generally emissions heavy economic growth to lift citizens out of poverty will be difficult. A country such as China, which is currently the largest producer in PV cells, is showing that it is possible.
ReplyDeleteI agree with Peter that this is an interesting article and the discussion about incentive structures is definitely one of the most powerful points. I agree, we need to have strong and clear incentives, but as the author points out, this will only be effective if we have large-scale collaboration and participation. In order to get such a large group of entities on the same page, there typically needs to be a 3rd party, ultimate authority figure both setting the goals and introducing the incentives. Unfortunately, that is something our world lacks. Countries have this internally, as governments look out for the best interest of the nation above individuals, but internationally, there really is no entity that has the best interest of the planet above individual nations in mind. While I initially would say this is not feasible and not necessarily desirable, I would like to talk about the pros and cons of this. Things are getting to such a dire point and our president is still putting "America first." If countries continue to act in their own interest, which they likely will, there will not be this radical shift in action like the author calls for. It would be interesting to discuss this further in class.
DeleteOne idea that I really appreciated from this piece is the story of developed countries, developing countries, and the potential impacts of each on global climate change. Currently, developed countries such as the United States and members of the European Union produce the highest amounts of carbon emissions per capita; this has been the case for many decades. These countries have rightfully been cast under the spotlight as top emitters, and as a result many of these countries have become leaders in climate research and have begun working to reduce emissions, on both a person-by-person and national scale. Obviously there is much left to be done, but in general it appears as if the World's leading developed countries are on the downward sloping end of the Kuznets curve.
ReplyDeleteWhat really interested me was the author's perspective on developing countries and their evolving role in the climate change narrative. While the developed countries are on the downward end of the Kuznets curve, developing countries such as India and Brazil are becoming increasingly industrial, and their emissions are increasing year by year. These developing countries are not scrutinized as heavily for increased emissions because the economic growth that comes from it is pulling millions of people out of extreme poverty. It would be hypocritical for the US to tell a country like India to stop increasing its emissions, because India is simply following the same path to prosperity that the US and Western Europe took. At the same time, these developing countries are home an extremely large portion of the global population--if emissions per capita for these developing countries ever became equal to that of the united states, the climate change problem would become exponentially worse. Thus, I think the only measure that can be taken (other than international agreements) is for developed countries to truly lead by example: to cut back on emissions to a point that would not be catastrophic if the developing countries of the world were emitting at the same level.
This article posed a number of areas of uncertainty and questions for me. First, when he discusses the current breakdown of poor/rich countries contribution to emissions, what is driving his hypothesis that poor countries will come to dominate the global emissions in the next 25 years? Second, throughout this piece, he continually stresses the need for global cooperation, yet I consistently wonder what role and effect varying type of governments across the world will have. Will it prohibit cooperation entirely on this large of a scale that he calls for? Clearly, party politics is a major factor slowing the push for advanced environmental policy in the United States so I would expect this to only be exacerbated when you begin dealing with the coordination between different type of governments from capitalism to socialism to communism etc .
ReplyDeleteIn terms of developing countries coming to dominate emissions in the coming years, I think it has to do with the Kuznets curve. Right now, America and most of the West is probably slightly past the turning point on the Kuznets curve, meaning we're starting to improve the environment by investing in greener technology now that we have the money to do so. The author is saying that as these developing countries begin to experience growth, they will come to dominate emissions as the West has over the past 50 years. He mentions this briefly, but I think the key is to get these developing countries to "leap" over the middle part of that Kuznets curve. If 1st world countries can harness the power of green technology, as well as transplant them to developing countries, we can allow these developing countries to not so heavily pollute the environment. It's fair that the responsibility falls on us to do this. We're the ones who gained from polluting the environment, we're now not allowing developing countries to pollute, so we should help them achieve that.
DeleteThe developing-developed world disparity exemplified by the “it’s all your fault anyway” mentality of developing countries toward the US reminds me of the Acemoglu and Robinson’s Why Nations Fail. While I agree that a lot of the language here is vague (what is the “shared vision” that the author keeps talking about? Is it simply not all dying?) there is still room for governments to recognize their histories of extractive institutions and work toward some sort of parity. The poverty – sustainability that we’ve studied before and that reappears here is, I think, oversimplified in many ways. It is right for the governments of India and China to ask of the United States: “why should our people live in abject poverty as we adhere to standards you haven’t had to follow for hundreds of years?” If we could define what this “shared vision of long-term goals” actually looks like, we might be able to start working in the right direction toward a global strategy that recognizes the differing stages of development in which carbon-emitting countries find themselves.
DeleteWhile reading this article, I had some similar questions as Emma. To her first point, what stood out to me was that even though there are almost 200 countries in the world, Stern generalizes them into poor and rich countries, and I think in an issue this global, there should be more specific classification in his hypothesis and explanation. Even when he talks about the United States, or China and India specifically, he is still being to broad in my opinion when talking about developing countries. In terms of global cooperation, I would have liked for Sterns to go into more detail on how incentives would vary from country to country considering each country needs different things and since it is hard to enforce irresponsible environment practices, countries might not change if the incentive doesn’t fit its needs. In other words, I think global cooperation is an extremely difficult problem because countries produce different types of environmental problems and react to different policy implementations.
DeleteI enjoyed Stern's article very much. I found it to be realistic and concise in terms of it's discussion of global greenhouse gas emissions. For example, I appreciate that instead of calling for the end of the world, Stern notes that a mere 1% contribution of global GDP would serve to stabilize emissions. This paper reminds me very much of Solow's piece and, more specifically, Solow's discussion of rents on non-renewable resources. Solow uses England and Norway and their shared discovery of oil in the North Sea to demonstrate that some countries may soak up the rents from their discoveries (as England did under Thatcher) and others may choose to re-invest these rents into green technology, as Norway chose to do. In the present day, China and India are rightfully annoyed that we would try to stymie their economic growth by imposing pollution limits. Nevertheless, they must understand that when looking at both economic and environmental capital, they might seriously harm their own future GDP if pollution and greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise at the current pace (Stern also notes this). So, I don't think it's unreasonable for the US and Western Europe to help support emission reduction efforts in these and other developing countries. The US has polluted and polluted, and not paid its rent dues as its economy has flourished over the past century. As Norway chose to invest rents from its North Sea oil discovery into green tech and knowledge, the US and other developed countries should continue to partake in projects such as Kyoto's Clean Development Mechanism. Norway's use of rents to invest in technology has yielded the world's first all-electric autonomous ship, which is set for production by 2020; if the US and other countries continue to set aside money to support environmental projects as well as less-developed countries, the results could be hugely beneficial for the future economic growth of the world.
DeleteI agree with Stern that economics can play a vital role in solving climate change because it is the most effective way to translate findings from the natural sciences to the policy world. Because of the global nature of the problem, Stern and the economic community clearly state the need for a global treaty in order address the collective action problem, he backs this up by stating that "action by individual countries is, however, not enough, and it will prove more costly." He cites benefits from mutual cooperation surrounding lower carbon tech innovations. While economics has the ability to provide the most efficient outcome, this definition of efficient is still based on traditional measures of GDP and wellbeing derived from income. Alternative measurements from a capabilities approach could prevent such narrow thinking on what deems a policy successful.
ReplyDeleteI was least familiar with his discussion surrounding the actual mechanisms of enacting policy proposals. In a global framework, the policies are only as effective as the weakest link, and poor governance structures in the developing world may inhibit the effectiveness of any future policy. This may require expertise from the political science field.
This comment on incentives stood out to me: "but you also have to tell good stories and come up with good examples and develop actions and practices that are going to give you support for all these measures". I think this is key in inducing the global collective action that Stern discusses earlier in the article. It reminds me of our discussion today in class about the swift reduction in use of CFC's after the Montreal Protocol. While the marginal abatement costs was certainly low, part of me wonders how much of a role the immediate effects of ozone depletion played in convincing world leaders to take action. An increase in skin cancer seems like a very immediate and tangible risk when compared with rising sea levels. If I live in the midwest and am outside in the summer often, when considering entirely selfish motives it is much easier to be afraid of developing skin cancer in 20 years than coastal cites (far away from me) flooding in a century due to rising sea levels. Those attempting to find a way to spur collective action need to find a way to tell a story about the effects climate change will have, particularly on those who feel they won't be at risk. Professor Kahn discussed this in his chapter when addressing the fact that Canada and Russia may actually benefit from climate change as it will allow them to access resources that were previously out of reach because of cold climates. However, he also mentioned that both countries could be the destination of refugees fleeing areas particularly affected by climate change. These types of scenarios and stories need to be more effectively communicated if collective action is the goal.
ReplyDeleteI found the statistic that temperature increases could lead to costs of 20% of global GDP to be alarming. I am curious how this statistic was estimated. I was equally surprised that the cost of stabilization was as low as 1%. This is a very small price to pay for preventing the future disruption of increased temperatures.
ReplyDeleteThe dilemma caused by increased emissions from developing countries is also troubling. The idea of impoverished countries reducing their emissions seems hard to imagine. Richer countries would most likely have to provide some sort of economic incentive for developing countries to reduce emissions. However, giving the lack of political will in the U.S. to reduce our own emissions, this is unlikely. Instead, the best bet may be to incorporate these countries into some sort of accord that caps their emissions at some reasonable level, while still allowing them to experience reasonable growth.
One of the main keys to the global reduction of emissions will be the development of new technology. I was surprised that the author called technology a public good. Wouldn't the patient system in effect privatize these innovations, at least for a period of time? Indeed, firms will need some sort of economic incentive to truly spur research and development.
As others have mentioned, convincing developing nations like India to reduce emissions would be a huge challenge. That being said, I can't help but take a cynical approach to the problem of global cooperation and say that maybe the US should just focus on itself. I do not think the US should pull out of global agreements on climate change. We should still be leader in this arena, but maybe it would be a better use of our time to lead and educate by example and focus on how we can reduce our own greenhouse gas emissions. It's possible that spending too much time trying to educate and persuade other countries may be wasted time. Nonetheless, we have a long way to go in terms of the kind of across the aisle cooperation that would be needed to design strong policies. But in the meantime, as Stern suggests, we could start small and focus on educating Americans on climate change and changing tastes and preferences.
ReplyDeleteI found the idea that the failure to take action against global warming to be very interesting and very true. With the increasing global population, climate change has the potential to cause crop failures thus resulting in difficulty in global crop productivity. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2013 summary for policy makers does a great job in pointing out the global temperature increase as well as how climate change has also affected precipitation levels on a global scale. On page 8 of their report they show which areas of the globe are suffering from a reduction in precipitation as well as areas that are in fact getting more precipitation than normal. While more rain may sound like a good thing, the sources of these rains are from extreme climatic events that actually harm crops. By failing to stop climate change, global food industries may suffer.
ReplyDeletehttp://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/assessment-report/ar5/wg1/WG1AR5_SPM_FINAL.pdf
The production function’s illustration of the interdependence between Gross Domestic Product and environmental quality helps answer some of the sentiments of climate change action representing an anti-growth phenomenon that Stern mentions. The allocation of capital to environmental resources may decrease productivity in the short-run, but positive externalities associated with higher quality environmental resources will eventually boost productivity and lead to an increase the environmental quality curve. The costs of taking action are not evenly distributed as Stern mentions, which makes it more difficult to achieve significant political support from nations that have their industries entrenched in non-renewable energy. Many of the author’s points about developing countries being an important piece of the climate puzzle were relevant when he wrote them, but I think serious developments have occurred in recent years. Countries in Africa are “leapfrogging” coal and planning to make use of renewable energy, much like their rapid advances in communication technology to mobile phones. This speaks to the economic viability of renewable energy compared to coals, as they are choosing the cheapest method to produce energy, which just so happens to be renewable energy. There are challenges to widespread adoption in developing countries because of the lack of infrastructure and political coordination, but economic support for climate-friendly initiatives is present in some developing regions not fixed on non-renewable energy production. This has positive implications for global coordination and climate agenda, but the element of developed nations assisting developing nations with climate issues seems like an issue the US won't address any time in the near future.
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ReplyDeleteAs I was reading this article, one giant issue that I think Mr. Stern has overlooked is the necessary means through which these market or regulation structures will be put in place. In any form these market systems or regulatory structures will by definition be multi-national and need to have strong enforcement or oversight capabilities as he mentioned. The difficulty obviously is then getting from where we are now to a world system that can facilitate that kind of oversight. The means of achieving that goal is international relations.
ReplyDeleteFrom a international political perspective I can't imagine countries like China, India and Brazil stomaching significant headwind in GDP growth in order to reduce carbon emissions. As the article mentioned and as we have spoke about in class before, the "developed" world (US and Western Europe primarily) have been responsible for a significant chunk of the existing pollution and have been able to grow in a cheap and quick manner at the environment's expense. How then do we reconcile that reality with developing countries desire to lift their populations out of poverty? Here is where Mr. Sterns suggestion that consumers in rich countries will have to bear some of the cost of reduced carbon emission in developing counties is a viable and strong solution. Imagine a system of "green" consultants that help advise and or develop sustainable methods of growth in conjunction with growing countries that is subsidized by the government through taxes on dirty energy production. A system of incentives and international cooperation like this would essentially be a dual edged sword against carbon emissions. Taxes in the US and Europe on inefficient energy sources would incentivize a transition to cleaner energy sources and lower MAC, while providing a laboratory for new carbon capture or carbon reduction technology that could then be implemented in power stations in the developing world whose cost would be subsidized by the tax revenue in the US/Europe. Unfortunately this system is a far far cry from the current system of government subsidy of coal for instances and would require a complete 180 from the current political appetite for clean energy production and tax structure
My favorite quote from this article is “Action need not be anti-business or anti-growth – in fact, failing to act is anti-growth, since it risks the future of growth itself”. Today’s society denies or refuses to understand the existence of the global warming problem because they do not want to deal with it. They do not want to incur any costs, and they rest easy thinking their lives will be not affected by this problem anyways. Even if they accept the issue they say “it will not happen in a million years”. Besides the selfish and lack-of-sustainability side of this claim, they are wrong. This article starts by looking at the consequences in less than 20 years, which is the future for these people that think they will not be affected.
ReplyDeleteAnother issue that the author brings up is the contribution to global warming from developing countries. Obviously, today’s contribution are insignificant compared to the big economies, just because their output is so small. But as they develop they will pollute more. And in the future, as we get closer to the consequences of global warming, and the developed world urges the developing world not to pollute, the developing countries will probably argue “you’ve had your time, it is our time”.
I agree with Ezequiel in that a lot of people don’t acknowledge the severity of global warming either because they don't think they will be affected by it or they don't want to incur any costs. This takes us to the 'free rider' issue we discussed in class when talking about the use of common resources. As we read in one of the articles, most people are not willing to change their habits/ way of life for better environmental outcomes. Although I do think that the 'free rider' problem is a big part of it, I also believe that a huge part of the problem is caused by ignorance. Before taking this class, I personally knew very little about the severity of the damage that we are causing to our environment on a daily basis, let alone someone who is not educated.
DeleteEzequiel's comment about developing countries contributing to global warming made me think of the environmental Kueznet's curve. As we learned in class, in the early stages of economic growth, pollution emissions increase and environmental quality declines but beyond some level of income, the trend reverses so that high income levels lead to environmental improvement. For this reason, I believe that it is in everyone's best interest to support developing countries through research and new technologies in order to allow them to still develop while causing less damage to the environment.
When the article first called both rich and poor countries to action, it described in detail how developing countries have huge amounts of emissions, etc. My immediate thought was China. They pulled millions of people out of poverty, it would be absurd to tell them (and in general, other developing countries) that they needed to stop doing what they’re doing. Because of this, I had some issues with the author’s logic. However, he later shifted and explained that he didn’t expect low income countries to take the full brunt of environmental policies. His mention of Kyoto’s Clean Development Mechanism in particular was interesting because I hadn’t previously heard of it, but think it could potentially be a really good idea. It also reminds me a little bit of our discussion on the privatization of water, but in a much more structured and less controversial form. The sentence “Climate change is the biggest market failure the world has ever seen,” sounded exactly like what we said yesterday regarding the EPA. Yes, there are plenty of reasons why it is a market change, but now asymmetric information is a large contributor to that in ways it maybe wasn’t before. I like the idea of stopping deforestation (of course, who wouldn’t), but would have liked to read some more concrete examples of how we stop that. I couldn’t help but think of intro to environmental studies with Kahn, when we watched the movie about Chico Mendes!
ReplyDeleteI thought Nicholas Stern’s piece in the Boston Review was fairly discouraging but nevertheless fascinating. One of his lines, “Climate change is the biggest market failure the world has ever seen,” struck me as particularly negative. Yet, if this claim is indeed true, what could be a more compelling call to action? I think the key policy element that Stern touches on is the mechanism for international cooperation, because it seems as if, absent a truly global effort, lesser initiatives to combat climate change may already be for naught. I realize it is not exactly parallel, but I kept thinking about different global arms control deals while reading this section of the article. For the most part, the world has come to an agreement that weapons of mass destruction, whether nuclear, biological, or chemical, are categorically bad and warrant regulation at the international level. Countries that violate agreements on these weapons – Syria, North Korea, Iran, to name a few – face severe backlash from the international community in the form of sanctions usually. These agreements all have teeth, vis-à-vis these sanctions, which seems to be the missing component to current international climate deals like Kyoto, for example. I don’t pretend to know how we could fairly determine who gets to emit what and at what quantity, but it is reassuring to know that there are rough frameworks out there for deals of a similar nature and importance.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading this article, I couldn't help but think of the economic problem of free riding that will inevitably occur across the globe if some countries implement effective policies to reduce emissions and take better care of the global atmosphere than others. This problem highlights the need for global cooperation and joint action in improving the quality and cleanliness of Earth's atmosphere. When the United States decides not to enter the Kyoto Protocol or the Paris Accord, we are not acting in globally responsible ways, especially considering when much of the developing world looks to us as an economic success story. Donald Trump decided to abstain from the Paris Agreement because he thought if would impede the health of American businesses. What he and other politicians ignored was the fact that there will eventually be no American business if the United States continues to ignore the immensely pressing issue of global warming. Like we mentioned in class, the quality of the environment is an essential input to economic growth and production. If a country all of the sudden experiences a massive series of floods due tied to climate change which eliminates vast agricultural areas, mass starvation and political and social unrest are bound to follow. Political leaders ought to have the long term in mind when implementing any sort of policy that might affect the environment or the global climate.
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ReplyDeleteThe article was a lot more questions than it was answers, which reflects where we are in developing climate change policy. There is not one straightforward, perfect solution to implementing economic policies that will "save the world." While this is frustrating, it also creates a variety of possibilities for how to do so. One of Stern's focus points on how to do so is on carbon- free electricity. The route of biofuels and other renewable fuels is an obvious one, but the route of capturing the carbon generated from other power sources and putting it back into the ground is one many people are not familiar with. A combination of both would be ideal, but how do we do this? Like Stern said, we need global collective action. Easier said than done. As the leaders of the free world, the US should be at the forefront of renewable energy and carbon sequestration techniques. We should have monetary policies that shape the private sectors into environmentally conscious businesses. With our current incompetent president, there is little to no hope for this. But even with Obama in office, the political biases prevented many policies from even making it to the floor, and especially from passing. If it is this difficult to get environmental legislation passed, even with a president's support, how in the world are we going to get all the nations in the world to agree? We need to set aside our biases and come together. When we come together, who pays? That's a great question that Stern brought up- should developed countries who are responsible for most of the emissions up to date pay? should developing countries that will be responsible for most of the future emissions pay? In a sense, it really doesn't matter. We are all paying the price if nothing is done. Humanity won't exist to pay anything at all if nothing is done. The bottom line is: we all pay.
ReplyDeleteWhile research and science are fundamental to building a framework to combat climate change, I agree with the author’s claim that economics should be the heart of fighting climate change. Advancing technologies can physically reduce carbon emissions but if no market for these technologies exist, then ideas such as carbon capture and storage won’t be implemented. Relating back to last week’s reading, utilizing CCS at coal plants is the only viable option to reach climate change goals within the coal industry. While the technology has been developed, the coal industry won’t deploy the technology without incentives. Only government policy can aid in the transition of CCS technology from research and development to utilization in markets. Stern states that climate change is the largest market failure in the world and emphasizes that strong policy is necessary to fix it, thus economics is key. When the cost of coal pollution (and ultimately climate change) is well understood, economics can guide policy into implementing subsidies or tax credits to promote the use of CCS.
ReplyDeleteThis article discusses, among other things, what I've always seen as the largest barrier to an international agreement on climate change, namely the position developing countries are in. Carbon emissions really are a global problem and unless everyone does something about it, the problem won't stabilize. Unfortunately, developing countries turn out to be the losers. Developed countries by definition have already gone through industrialization and poured carbon into the atmosphere to their heats content because people really didn't know better. Now that we know better and know we have to do something, countries that haven't gone through industrialization are stuck in a catch 22. Either they leave masses of their own people in poverty, or basically screw over the rest of the world. It's a tough position and I don't know the solution. The author of this article tries to give a few suggestions about rich countries trying to bear some of the costs that would otherwise fall on poor countries, but that will take a level of international cooperation that has never perviously existed. The issue of global warming is really quite depression since we know the magnitude of the problem but for some reason still refuse to do anything about it.
ReplyDeleteStern makes clear and concise arguments throughout this piece, and manages to convey economic ideas surrounding climate change in a very understandable way. He shared some projections at the beginning of this piece about the future of climate change, namely that if we continue polluting at the same rate until 2035 we'll be "outside of human experience". This piece was written in 2012, and I am curious if this projection is still accurate. Are current projections pushing that date further away or bringing it in closer? The proximity of that development is unsettling, and I'm interested to know how it has changed over the last six years. I also enjoyed his argument that fighting climate change is not anti-growth, but actually pro-growth in a way, considering that climate change itself "risks the future of growth". It's simply a short-term vs. long-term argument, but he delivers it in a way that makes it clear that we'll be much better off in the future given immediate action.
ReplyDeleteStern mentions how new investments into sustainable energy, agriculture, ect. open up the door for new markets. He brings up how people in developed countries can "deliver flows of finance to support low-carbon strategies of economic development, including through the Kyoto’s Clean Development Mechanism." This is one way to actively invest in reducing emissions, but people in developed countries also need to take responsibility for passively investing in fossil fuels. Negative SRI screening, eliminating non-socially responsible investments, is a way to bring about social change, while still producing good financial returns. Many universities are shifting to exclude investments that don't align with their principles. First established to avoid controversy, it's one method of not only actively invest in sustainable technology as Stern mentions, but avoiding investing in "sin" companies that contribute to global warming. Stern brings up this idea of avoiding controversy with his cigarette analogy By voicing investors changing preferences towards the types of investments and the implications they have, real change can occur. Stern emphasizes the need for global cooperation, but on a smaller scale, the capital that large pension funds and endowments have to invest is not insignificant. This is a relatively growing area, being explored further in the aftermath of recent gun violence by those hoping to remove investments in fire arms from their portfolios. This goes well with Stern's idea of going against business-as-usual, which rarely connects environmentalism with capital investments, where there is real opportunity to do so.
ReplyDeleteNicholas Stern offers a decent albeit vague framework for the broad, large-scale goals that countries should strive for and how the attainment of these goals will affect our future. Stern categorizes countries and their respective responsibilities by whether the country is rich or poor and whether they are a large GHG emitter or not. He states that “big emitters now are the United States and Western Europe; China is also quite big”. This categorization as a large or small emitter is based off a country’s total GHG emissions though.
ReplyDeleteIf we take into consideration per capita emissions, countries including Qatar and Saudi Arabia top the list and are followed by the U.S and European countries. China and India, both large total emitters, rank much lower on the list of emissions per capita (https://data.worldbank.org/indicator/EN.ATM.CO2E.PC?year_high_desc=true). As Stern argues that policies should be expanded to encourage rich and high emitting countries to help developing countries (such as in Kyoto’s Clean Development Mechanism), I wonder how the classification (and resultantly, duties) of a country’s emissions will be balanced between the two values of total and per capita emissions. The presence of low total, high per capita (Qatar, Saudi Arabia), high total, high per capita (U.S), high total, low per capita (China, India), and low total, low per capita emitting countries can complicate the ways in which international agreements are developed because it extends beyond total emission numbers.
I really appreciated the author’s emphasis on collective action. When talking about pollution you mostly hear about the 5 largest countries who have contributed the most harmful emissions. However, this author points out the role that developing countries will play in the future. While they put out low level emission today, those levels will rise in the future due to their lack of regulation. I think the author makes a good point, that it’s the role of large, wealthy countries today, to help set the tone for the future. Throughout American history, we’ve viewed the US as the world’s policemen, stepping in when action is necessary. I think the author makes a good argument for the US’s involvement in discussions about climate change and pollution but also emphasizes the necessity for participation from all countries. Without collective cooperation from the US and other countries, the costs of pollution reduction will be too high. “Poorly constructed policy” and a lack of participation from other countries will prevent progress from being made.
ReplyDeleteI found Nicholas Stern's stance on economics being the central focus behind Global Climate change compelling, but it did not completely sway me to take on his view as well. He mentions the price of stabilization rising drastically, more than ever seen before, however he did not go into details about what would cause this price to rise. Overall I would have appreciated more hard numbers and economic predictions in order to truly believe his case. He did bring up great points that I have constantly considered about which countries would take on more costs. Obviously climate change is a global problem but historically first world countries have been the driving factor behind greenhouse emissions and therefore should be expected to bare more costs. However, as Stern mentions the world would also need developing countries to limit their emissions as well, and for those who can't afford green initiatives currently that could cause a slowing of their economic growth, all for an issue that they had little to do with. I find this aspect of Global Climate Change very interesting and would love if Stern went into more detail about how exactly some Kyoto initiatives are promoting large companies to invest in developing countries green technology. I think that this idea needs to be largely used and could produce substantial progress in reducing future emissions!
ReplyDeletePrevious readings and class discussions have focused on the ways economists recognize market failure. I gathered a similar conclusion from Foster’s argument; his policy suggestions were compelling not because they were simple and wide-reaching, but because he noted the multitude instances where they could fail. His discussion of forecasts and long-term commitments reminded me of Daniel Kahneman’s work on correlation and regression. More often than not, we underestimate the uncertainty of future events, opting to generalize current observations. Environmental policy suffers from this trend when it favors short-term cuts over long-term improvements. Short-term cuts are attractive, and therefore politically feasible, but a cohesive response to the threat of climate change requires a wider scope of reasoning.
ReplyDeleteI particularly liked the quote, “climate change is the biggest market failure the world has ever seen, and strong policy will be necessary to correct it.” I don’t think many people realize that. They just see it as another environmental issue that they can let others take care of, but they’re framing it in the way that shows us how it will affect your money and that’ when people really start paying attention. I also thought it was insightful to insist that there is not just this impact of growth that shapes the environment, but the environment without a doubt shapes economic growth. The relationship is intertwined and far more complicated than one might expect to see. This article is interesting in that it’s calling urgency to the issue and saying exactly what is wrong and what can be fixed. I do think that global cooperation is a much bigger issue that we can handle at the moment, but it’s a nice thought he points out. Institutional structures are key players in that. Incentives are the policies through those means of institutional structures.
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