IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolec/v178y2020ics0921800919312868.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Ecological Economics Beyond Markets

Author

Listed:
  • Bliss, Sam
  • Egler, Megan

Abstract

Non-market practices and institutions make up much of every economy. Even in today's most developed capitalist societies, people produce things that are not for sale and allocate them through sharing, gifts, and redistribution rather than buying and selling. This article is about why and how ecological economists should study these non-market economies. Historically, markets only emerge when states forcibly create them; community members do not tend to spontaneously start selling each other goods and services. Markets work well for coordinating complex industrial webs to satisfy individual tastes, but they are not appropriate for governing the production or distribution of entities that are non-rival, non-excludable, not produced for sale, essential need satisfiers, or culturally important. Moreover, we argue, markets do not serve justice, sustainability, efficiency, or value pluralism, the foundations of ecological economics. We sketch an agenda for research on economic practices and institutions without markets by posing nine broad questions about non-market food systems and exploring the evidence and theory around each. By ignoring and demeaning non-market economies, researchers contribute to creating markets' dominance over social life. Observing, analyzing, theorizing, supporting, promoting, creating, and envisioning non-market economies challenges market hegemony.

Suggested Citation

  • Bliss, Sam & Egler, Megan, 2020. "Ecological Economics Beyond Markets," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 178(C).
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:178:y:2020:i:c:s0921800919312868
    DOI: 10.1016/j.ecolecon.2020.106806
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921800919312868
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1016/j.ecolecon.2020.106806?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    As the access to this document is restricted, you may want to search for a different version of it.

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Philippe Martin & Thierry Mayer & Mathias Thoenig, 2008. "Make Trade Not War?," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 75(3), pages 865-900.
    2. Delang, Claudio O., 2006. "Not just minor forest products: The economic rationale for the consumption of wild food plants by subsistence farmers," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 59(1), pages 64-73, August.
    3. Reyes-García, Victoria & Menendez-Baceta, Gorka & Aceituno-Mata, Laura & Acosta-Naranjo, Rufino & Calvet-Mir, Laura & Domínguez, Pablo & Garnatje, Teresa & Gómez-Baggethun, Erik & Molina-Bustamante, M, 2015. "From famine foods to delicatessen: Interpreting trends in the use of wild edible plants through cultural ecosystem services," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 120(C), pages 303-311.
    4. Church, A. & Mitchell, R. & Ravenscroft, N. & Stapleton, L.M., 2015. "‘Growing your own’: A multi-level modelling approach to understanding personal food growing trends and motivations in Europe," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 110(C), pages 71-80.
    5. Lysenko, Dmitry & Schott, Stephan, 2019. "Food Security and Wildlife Management in Nunavut," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 360-374.
    6. Magee, Christopher L. & Devezas, Tessaleno C., 2017. "A simple extension of dematerialization theory: Incorporation of technical progress and the rebound effect," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 196-205.
    7. Halimani, T.E. & Muchadeyi, F.C. & Chimonyo, M. & Dzama, K., 2010. "Pig genetic resource conservation: The Southern African perspective," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(5), pages 944-951, March.
    8. Poe, Melissa R. & Levin, Phillip S. & Tolimieri, Nick & Norman, Karma, 2015. "Subsistence fishing in a 21st century capitalist society: From commodity to gift," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 116(C), pages 241-250.
    9. Elinor Ostrom, 2010. "Beyond Markets and States: Polycentric Governance of Complex Economic Systems," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(3), pages 641-672, June.
    10. Michelini, Laura & Principato, Ludovica & Iasevoli, Gennaro, 2018. "Understanding Food Sharing Models to Tackle Sustainability Challenges," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 145(C), pages 205-217.
    11. Strutton, David & Vitell, Scott J. & Pelton, Lou E., 1994. "How consumers may justify inappropriate behavior in market settings: An application on the techniques of neutralization," Journal of Business Research, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 253-260, July.
    12. Ruth Yeoman, 2014. "Conceptualising Meaningful Work as a Fundamental Human Need," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Meaningful Work and Workplace Democracy, chapter 1, pages 8-38, Palgrave Macmillan.
    13. Sierra, Rodrigo & Rodriguez, Fabian & Losos, Elizabeth, 1999. "Forest resource use change during early market integration in tropical rain forests: the Huaorani of upper Amazonia," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(1), pages 107-119, July.
    14. Martinez-Alier, Joan & Munda, Giuseppe & O'Neill, John, 1998. "Weak comparability of values as a foundation for ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(3), pages 277-286, September.
    15. Jason Hickel, 2016. "The true extent of global poverty and hunger: questioning the good news narrative of the Millennium Development Goals," Third World Quarterly, Taylor & Francis Journals, vol. 37(5), pages 749-767, May.
    16. Roessler, Regina & Drucker, Adam G. & Scarpa, Riccardo & Markemann, André & Lemke, Ute & Thuy, Le T. & Valle Zárate, Anne, 2008. "Using choice experiments to assess smallholder farmers' preferences for pig breeding traits in different production systems in North-West Vietnam," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 66(1), pages 184-192, May.
    17. Ruth Yeoman, 2014. "Conceptualising Meaningful Work as a Fundamental Human Need," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 125(2), pages 235-251, December.
    18. Bekele, Wagayehu & Drake, Lars, 2003. "Soil and water conservation decision behavior of subsistence farmers in the Eastern Highlands of Ethiopia: a case study of the Hunde-Lafto area," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 46(3), pages 437-451, October.
    19. Ricardo, David, 1821. "On the Principles of Political Economy and Taxation," History of Economic Thought Books, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought, edition 3, number ricardo1821.
    20. Philippe Martin & Thierry Mayer & Mathias Thoenig, 2008. "Make Trade Not War?," Review of Economic Studies, Oxford University Press, vol. 75(3), pages 865-900.
    21. Andrei Shleifer, 2004. "Does Competition Destroy Ethical Behavior?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 94(2), pages 414-418, May.
    22. Alejandro Argumedo & Michel Pimbert, 2010. "Bypassing Globalization: Barter markets as a new indigenous economy in Peru," Development, Palgrave Macmillan;Society for International Deveopment, vol. 53(3), pages 343-349, September.
    23. Spash, Clive L., 2019. "SEE Beyond Substantive Economics: Avoiding False Dichotomies," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 1-1.
    24. Gudeman,Stephen, 2016. "Anthropology and Economy," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107130869, September.
    25. V. Ernesto Méndez & Martha Caswell & Stephen R. Gliessman & Roseann Cohen, 2017. "Integrating Agroecology and Participatory Action Research (PAR): Lessons from Central America," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(5), pages 1-19, April.
    26. Michael J. Sandel, 2013. "Market Reasoning as Moral Reasoning: Why Economists Should Re-engage with Political Philosophy," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 27(4), pages 121-140, Fall.
    27. Levine, Jordan & Chan, Kai M.A. & Satterfield, Terre, 2015. "From rational actor to efficient complexity manager: Exorcising the ghost of Homo economicus with a unified synthesis of cognition research," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 22-32.
    28. Princen, Thomas, 1997. "The shading and distancing of commerce: When internalization is not enough," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 20(3), pages 235-253, March.
    29. Mary Mellor, 2006. "Ecofeminist political economy," International Journal of Green Economics, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 1(1/2), pages 139-150.
    30. Franzen, Margaret & Eaves, James, 2007. "Effect of market access on sharing practices within two Huaorani communities," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(4), pages 776-785, September.
    31. Lois Morton & Ella Bitto & Mary Oakland & Mary Sand, 2008. "Accessing food resources: Rural and urban patterns of giving and getting food," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 25(1), pages 107-119, January.
    32. Goddard, Jessica J. & Kallis, Giorgos & Norgaard, Richard B., 2019. "Keeping multiple antennae up: Coevolutionary foundations for methodological pluralism," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 165(C), pages 1-1.
    33. Gerber, Julien-François & Scheidel, Arnim, 2018. "In Search of Substantive Economics: Comparing Today's Two Major Socio-metabolic Approaches to the Economy – MEFA and MuSIASEM," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 144(C), pages 186-194.
    34. Nielsen, Martin R. & Meilby, Henrik & Smith-Hall, Carsten & Pouliot, Mariève & Treue, Thorsten, 2018. "The Importance of Wild Meat in the Global South," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 146(C), pages 696-705.
    35. Trosper, Ronald L., 2002. "Northwest coast indigenous institutions that supported resilience and sustainability," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 41(2), pages 329-344, May.
    36. Samuel Bowles, 1998. "Endogenous Preferences: The Cultural Consequences of Markets and Other Economic Institutions," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 36(1), pages 75-111, March.
    37. Zhang, MunkhDalai A. & Borjigin, Elles & Zhang, Huiping, 2007. "Mongolian nomadic culture and ecological culture: On the ecological reconstruction in the agro-pastoral mosaic zone in Northern China," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 62(1), pages 19-26, April.
    38. Schulp, C.J.E. & Thuiller, W. & Verburg, P.H., 2014. "Wild food in Europe: A synthesis of knowledge and data of terrestrial wild food as an ecosystem service," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 105(C), pages 292-305.
    39. Helmut Haberl, 2001. "The Energetic Metabolism of Societies: Part II: Empirical Examples," Journal of Industrial Ecology, Yale University, vol. 5(2), pages 71-88, April.
    40. Vatn Arild & Bromley Daniel W., 1994. "Choices without Prices without Apologies," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 129-148, March.
    41. Smith, Adam, 1776. "An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of Nations," History of Economic Thought Books, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought, number smith1776.
    42. Clive L. Spash, 2019. "Substantive Economics and Avoiding False Dichotomies in Advancing Social Ecological Economics," SRE-Disc sre-disc-2019_05, Institute for Multilevel Governance and Development, Department of Socioeconomics, Vienna University of Economics and Business.
    43. Berman, Matthew & Kofinas, Gary, 2004. "Hunting for models: grounded and rational choice approaches to analyzing climate effects on subsistence hunting in an Arctic community," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 49(1), pages 31-46, May.
    44. Spash, Clive L., 2012. "New foundations for ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 77(C), pages 36-47.
    45. Barthel, Stephan & Isendahl, Christian, 2013. "Urban gardens, agriculture, and water management: Sources of resilience for long-term food security in cities," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 86(C), pages 224-234.
    46. Farley, Joshua & Schmitt, Abdon & Burke, Matthew & Farr, Marigo, 2015. "Extending market allocation to ecosystem services: Moral and practical implications on a full and unequal planet," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 244-252.
    47. Kallis, Giorgos & Norgaard, Richard B., 2010. "Coevolutionary ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(4), pages 690-699, February.
    48. Generoso, Rémi, 2015. "How do rainfall variability, food security and remittances interact? The case of rural Mali," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 114(C), pages 188-198.
    49. Justin Schupp & Jeff Sharp, 2012. "Exploring the social bases of home gardening," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 29(1), pages 93-105, March.
    50. Kallis, Giorgos & Gómez-Baggethun, Erik & Zografos, Christos, 2013. "To value or not to value? That is not the question," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 94(C), pages 97-105.
    51. Jens Alber & Ulrich Kohler, 2008. "Informal Food Production in the Enlarged European Union," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 89(1), pages 113-127, October.
    52. Calvet-Mir, Laura & Gómez-Baggethun, Erik & Reyes-García, Victoria, 2012. "Beyond food production: Ecosystem services provided by home gardens. A case study in Vall Fosca, Catalan Pyrenees, Northeastern Spain," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 74(C), pages 153-160.
    53. Cooper, Nigel & Brady, Emily & Steen, Helen & Bryce, Rosalind, 2016. "Aesthetic and spiritual values of ecosystems: Recognising the ontological and axiological plurality of cultural ecosystem ‘services’," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 21(PB), pages 218-229.
    54. Dante A. Urbina & Alberto Ruiz‐Villaverde, 2019. "A Critical Review of Homo Economicus from Five Approaches," American Journal of Economics and Sociology, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 78(1), pages 63-93, January.
    55. Kubiszewski, Ida & Farley, Joshua & Costanza, Robert, 2010. "The production and allocation of information as a good that is enhanced with increased use," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(6), pages 1344-1354, April.
    56. Gudeman,Stephen, 2016. "Anthropology and Economy," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9781107577206, September.
    57. Sam Bliss, 2019. "The Case for Studying Non-Market Food Systems," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-30, June.
    58. Hobbes, Thomas, 1651. "Leviathan, or the Matter, Forme, & Power of a Common-wealth Ecclesiasticall and Civill," History of Economic Thought Books, McMaster University Archive for the History of Economic Thought, number hobbes1651a.
    59. Sarah C Klain & Paige Olmsted & Kai M A Chan & Terre Satterfield, 2017. "Relational values resonate broadly and differently than intrinsic or instrumental values, or the New Ecological Paradigm," PLOS ONE, Public Library of Science, vol. 12(8), pages 1-21, August.
    60. Napitupulu, Lucentezza & Bouma, Jetske & Reyes-García, Victoria, 2018. "The Things We Share: Sharing in Daily Life and Experimental Settings Among Punan Tubu, Indonesian Borneo," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 152(C), pages 88-97.
    61. Paudel, Jayash, 2018. "Community-Managed Forests, Household Fuelwood Use and Food Consumption," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 147(C), pages 62-73.
    62. Bromley, Daniel W., 2008. "Volitional pragmatism," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(1-2), pages 1-13, December.
    63. Faasen, Helena & Watts, Scotney, 2007. "Local community reaction to the `no-take' policy on fishing in the Tsitsikamma National Park, South Africa," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(1), pages 36-46, October.
    64. John Taylor & Sarah Lovell, 2014. "Urban home food gardens in the Global North: research traditions and future directions," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 31(2), pages 285-305, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Kish, K. & Mallery, D. & Yahya Haage, G. & Melgar-Melgar, R. & Burke, M. & Orr, C. & Smolyar, N.L. & Sanniti, S. & Larson, J., 2021. "Fostering critical pluralism with systems theory, methods, and heuristics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 189(C).
    2. Margarita Ignatyeva & Vera Yurak & Oksana Logvinenko, 2020. "A New Look at the Natural Capital Concept: Approaches, Structure, and Evaluation Procedure," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 12(21), pages 1-21, November.
    3. Ünsal Özdilek, 2024. "Art-Rent Concept and Measure With Connections to an Evolving Economy," Journal of the Knowledge Economy, Springer;Portland International Center for Management of Engineering and Technology (PICMET), vol. 15(1), pages 1625-1649, March.
    4. Hernández, Mauricio & Chávez-Bustamante, Felipe, 2024. "Sufficiency between producers and consumers: A configurational analysis," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 218(C).

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Sam Bliss, 2019. "The Case for Studying Non-Market Food Systems," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(11), pages 1-30, June.
    2. Lundgren, Jakob, 2022. "Unity through disunity: Strengths, values, and tensions in the disciplinary discourse of ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 191(C).
    3. Kaitlin Kish & Joshua Farley, 2021. "A Research Agenda for the Future of Ecological Economics by Emerging Scholars," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(3), pages 1-17, February.
    4. Spash, Clive L., 2013. "The shallow or the deep ecological economics movement?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 351-362.
    5. Dube, Benjamin, 2021. "Why cross and mix disciplines and methodologies?: Multiple meanings of Interdisciplinarity and pluralism in ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 179(C).
    6. Spash, Clive L., 2020. "A tale of three paradigms: Realising the revolutionary potential of ecological economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 169(C).
    7. Strunz, Sebastian & Klauer, Bernd & Ring, Irene & Schiller, Johannes, 2014. "Between Scylla and Charybdis: On the place of economic methods and concepts within ecological economics," UFZ Discussion Papers 26/2014, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ), Division of Social Sciences (ÖKUS).
    8. Roel Plant & Spike Boydell & Jason Prior & Joanne Chong & Aleta Lederwasch, 2017. "From liability to opportunity: An institutional approach towards value-based land remediation," Environment and Planning C, , vol. 35(2), pages 197-220, March.
    9. Terrance Quinn, 2023. "An Emergent Transdisciplinary Methodology for Effective Collaboration in Ecological Economics," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(9), pages 1-22, May.
    10. Clément Carbonnier, 2023. "Welfare Economics and Neoliberalism: Interpreting the ideal type of perfect competition general equilibrium," SciencePo Working papers Main hal-04062786, HAL.
    11. Géraldine THIRY & Philippe ROMAN, 2015. "L’indice de richesse inclusive : l’économie Mainstream au-delà de ses limites, mais en deçà de la soutenabilité ?," LIDAM Discussion Papers IRES 2015001, Université catholique de Louvain, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES).
    12. Clive L. Spash, 2019. "Time for a Paradigm Shift: From Economic Growth and Price-Making Markets to Social Ecological Economics," SRE-Disc sre-disc-2019_07, Institute for Multilevel Governance and Development, Department of Socioeconomics, Vienna University of Economics and Business.
    13. Farley, Joshua & Schmitt, Abdon & Burke, Matthew & Farr, Marigo, 2015. "Extending market allocation to ecosystem services: Moral and practical implications on a full and unequal planet," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 117(C), pages 244-252.
    14. Pirgmaier, Elke, 2017. "The Neoclassical Trojan Horse of Steady-State Economics," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 133(C), pages 52-61.
    15. Sophia Lingham & Louise Manning & Damian Maye, 2022. "Reimagining Food: Readdressing and Respecting Values," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 14(12), pages 1-19, June.
    16. Spangenberg, Joachim H. & von Haaren, Christina & Settele, Josef, 2014. "The ecosystem service cascade: Further developing the metaphor. Integrating societal processes to accommodate social processes and planning, and the case of bioenergy," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 104(C), pages 22-32.
    17. Leslie Gray & Laureen Elgert & Antoinette WinklerPrins, 2020. "Theorizing urban agriculture: north–south convergence," Agriculture and Human Values, Springer;The Agriculture, Food, & Human Values Society (AFHVS), vol. 37(3), pages 869-883, September.
    18. Jayasinghe, Maneka & Chai, Andreas & Ratnasiri, Shyama & Smith, Christine, 2017. "The power of the vegetable patch: How home-grown food helps large rural households achieve economies of scale & escape poverty," Food Policy, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 62-74.
    19. Balaine, Lorraine & Gallai, Nicola & Del Corso, Jean-Pierre & Kephaliacos, Charilaos, 2020. "Trading off environmental goods for compensations: Insights from traditional and deliberative valuation methods in the Ecuadorian Amazon," Ecosystem Services, Elsevier, vol. 43(C).
    20. Vatn, Arild, 2009. "Cooperative behavior and institutions," Journal of Behavioral and Experimental Economics (formerly The Journal of Socio-Economics), Elsevier, vol. 38(1), pages 188-196, January.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:178:y:2020:i:c:s0921800919312868. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Catherine Liu (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.elsevier.com/locate/ecolecon .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.