IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/eee/ecolec/v70y2011i6p1121-1128.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The relationship between resilience and sustainability of ecological-economic systems

Author

Listed:
  • Derissen, Sandra
  • Quaas, Martin F.
  • Baumgärtner, Stefan

Abstract

Resilience as a descriptive concept gives insight into the dynamic properties of an ecological-economic system. Sustainability as a normative concept captures basic ideas of intergenerational justice when human well-being depends on natural capital and services. Thus, resilience and sustainability are independent concepts. In this paper, we discuss the relationship between resilience and sustainability of ecological-economic systems. We use a simple dynamic model where two natural capital stocks provide ecosystem services that are complements for human well-being, to illustrate different possible cases of the relationship between resilience and sustainability, and to identify the conditions under which each of those will hold: a) resilience of the system is necessary, but not sufficient, for sustainability; b) resilience of the system is sufficient, but not necessary, for sustainability; c) resilience of the system is neither necessary nor sufficient for sustainability; and d) resilience is both necessary and sufficient for sustainability. We conclude that more criteria than just resilience have to be taken into account when designing policies for the sustainable development of ecological-economic systems, and, vice versa, the property of resilience should not be confused with the positive normative connotations of sustainability.

Suggested Citation

  • Derissen, Sandra & Quaas, Martin F. & Baumgärtner, Stefan, 2011. "The relationship between resilience and sustainability of ecological-economic systems," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(6), pages 1121-1128, April.
    • Handle: RePEc:eee:ecolec:v:70:y:2011:i:6:p:1121-1128
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0921-8009(11)00010-3
    Download Restriction: Full text for ScienceDirect subscribers only
    ---><---

    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. Levin, Simon A. & Barrett, Scott & Aniyar, Sara & Baumol, William & Bliss, Christopher & Bolin, Bert & Dasgupta, Partha & Ehrlich, Paul & Folke, Carl & Gren, Ing-Marie & Holling, C.S. & Jansson, Annma, 1998. "Resilience in natural and socioeconomic systems," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 3(2), pages 221-262, May.
    2. Karl-Göran Mäler & Anastasios Xepapadeas & Aart de Zeeuw, 2003. "The Economics of Shallow Lakes," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 26(4), pages 603-624, December.
    3. World Commission on Environment and Development,, 1987. "Our Common Future," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780192820808.
    4. Karl-Göran Mäler, 2008. "Sustainable Development and Resilience in Ecosystems," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 39(1), pages 17-24, January.
    5. Baumgärtner, Stefan & Quaas, Martin F., 2009. "Ecological-economic viability as a criterion of strong sustainability under uncertainty," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(7), pages 2008-2020, May.
    6. Bretschger, Lucas & Pittel, Karen, 2008. "From time zero to infinity: transitional and long-run dynamics in capital–resource economies," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 13(6), pages 673-689, December.
    7. Common, Mick & Perrings, Charles, 1992. "Towards an ecological economics of sustainability," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 6(1), pages 7-34, July.
    8. Martinet, Vincent & Thebaud, Olivier & Doyen, Luc, 2007. "Defining viable recovery paths toward sustainable fisheries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(2), pages 411-422, December.
    9. Janssen, Marco A. & Anderies, John M. & Walker, Brian H., 2004. "Robust strategies for managing rangelands with multiple stable attractors," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 47(1), pages 140-162, January.
    10. Kjell Arne Brekke & Geir B. Asheim, 2002. "Sustainability when capital management has stochastic consequences," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 19(4), pages 921-940.
    11. Arrow, Kenneth & Bolin, Bert & Costanza, Robert & Dasgupta, Partha & Folke, Carl & Holling, C.S. & Jansson, Bengt-Owe & Levin, Simon & Mäler, Karl-Göran & Perrings, Charles & Pimentel, David, 1996. "Economic growth, carrying capacity, and the environment," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 1(1), pages 104-110, February.
    12. Bene, C. & Doyen, L. & Gabay, D., 2001. "A viability analysis for a bio-economic model," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 36(3), pages 385-396, March.
    13. Charles Perrings & David Stern, 2000. "Modelling Loss of Resilience in Agroecosystems: Rangelands in Botswana," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 16(2), pages 185-210, June.
    14. Costanza, Robert, 1995. "Economic growth, carrying capacity, and the environment," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 89-90, November.
    15. Perrings, Charles, 2006. "Resilience and sustainable development," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 11(4), pages 417-427, August.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    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. Baumgärtner, Stefan & Quaas, Martin F., 2009. "Ecological-economic viability as a criterion of strong sustainability under uncertainty," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 68(7), pages 2008-2020, May.
    2. Brand, Fridolin, 2005. "Ecological resilience and its relevance within a theory of sustainable development," UFZ Reports 03/2005, Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research (UFZ).
    3. Jean-Paul Chavas & Salvatore Falco, 2017. "Resilience, Weather and Dynamic Adjustments in Agroecosystems: The Case of Wheat Yield in England," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 67(2), pages 297-320, June.
    4. Ben Heijdra & Pim Heijnen, 2013. "Environmental Abatement and the Macroeconomy in the Presence of Ecological Thresholds," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 55(1), pages 47-70, May.
    5. Sylvie Ferrari & Sébastien Lavaud & Jean-Christophe Pereau, 2012. "Critical natural capital, ecological resilience and sustainable wetland management: a french case study," Post-Print hal-00799051, HAL.
    6. Common, Michael, 1995. "Economists don't read Science," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 15(2), pages 101-103, November.
    7. Perrings, Charles, 2014. "Environment and development economics 20 years on," Environment and Development Economics, Cambridge University Press, vol. 19(3), pages 333-366, June.
    8. Marta Maria Sesana & Paolo Dell’Oro, 2024. "Sustainability and Resilience Assessment Methods: A Literature Review to Support the Decarbonization Target for the Construction Sector," Energies, MDPI, vol. 17(6), pages 1-24, March.
    9. Uehara, Takuro, 2013. "Ecological threshold and ecological economic threshold: Implications from an ecological economic model with adaptation," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 93(C), pages 374-384.
    10. Kohn, Jorg, 1998. "An approach to Baltic Sea sustainability," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 27(1), pages 13-28, October.
    11. Martin F. Quaas & Stefan Baumgärtner & Sandra Derissens & Sebastian Strunz, 2008. "Institutions and preferences determine resilience of ecological-economic systems," Working Paper Series in Economics 109, University of Lüneburg, Institute of Economics.
    12. Doyen, Luc & Péreau, Jean-Christophe, 2012. "Sustainable coalitions in the commons," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 63(1), pages 57-64.
    13. W. Neil Adger & Jennifer Hodbod, 2014. "Ecological and social resilience," Chapters, in: Giles Atkinson & Simon Dietz & Eric Neumayer & Matthew Agarwala (ed.), Handbook of Sustainable Development, chapter 6, pages 91-102, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    14. Costantini, Valeria & Monni, Salvatore, 2008. "Environment, human development and economic growth," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 64(4), pages 867-880, February.
    15. Mônica Bahia Schlee & Kenneth R. Tamminga & Vera Regina Tangari, 2012. "A Method for Gauging Landscape Change as a Prelude to Urban Watershed Regeneration: The Case of the Carioca River, Rio de Janeiro," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 4(9), pages 1-45, August.
    16. Valeria Costantini & Chiara Martini, 2010. "A Modified Environmental Kuznets Curve for sustainable development assessment using panel data," International Journal of Global Environmental Issues, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 10(1/2), pages 84-122.
    17. Stern, David I., 2014. "The Environmental Kuznets Curve: A Primer," Working Papers 249424, Australian National University, Centre for Climate Economics & Policy.
    18. Ervin, David E. & Fox, Glenn, 1998. "Environmental Policy Considerations In The Grain-Livestock Subsectors In Canada, Mexico And The United States," Proceedings of the 4th Agricultural and Food Policy Systems Information Workshop 1998: Economic Harmonization in the Canadian\U.S.\Mexican Grain-Livestock Subsector; 16754, Farm Foundation, Agricultural and Food Policy Systems Information Workshops.
    19. Fleurbaey, Marc, 2015. "On sustainability and social welfare," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 34-53.
    20. Collados, Cecilia & Duane, Timothy P., 1999. "Natural capital and quality of life: a model for evaluating the sustainability of alternative regional development paths," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 30(3), pages 441-460, September.

    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:70:y:2011:i:6:p:1121-1128. 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.