IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/spr/envsyd/v17y1997i2d10.1023_a1018543831602.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Sustainable development and technology

Author

Listed:
  • Amin U. Sarkar

    (State University of New York)

Abstract

Amongst economists, politicians, environmentalists and others a relatively new phrase has come to the fore, a new cliche´: sustainable development. Its meaning is, however, somewhat obscure, often unique to the speaker. This paper clarifies some of the ideas that surround the concept of sustainable development, the role that technology plays in the ideas and how these concepts can be best put to use in terms of policy. Often the preconceived notions of the authors are imbedded in their idea of sustainable development, sometimes explicitly and othertimes implicitly and, as a result, the policy prescriptions they espouse are also affected. The paper begins with the evolution of the concept of sustainable development, examines economists' decision rules, evaluates the role of the state vis-a`-vis technology and then attempts to ferret out the policy implications. Finally, the paper concludes that sustainability should be a goal of any development plan and should include an explicit technology policy. A range of policy options exists to help pursue these goals, some of which are discussed.

Suggested Citation

  • Amin U. Sarkar, 1997. "Sustainable development and technology," Environment Systems and Decisions, Springer, vol. 17(2), pages 97-102, June.
    • Handle: RePEc:spr:envsyd:v:17:y:1997:i:2:d:10.1023_a:1018543831602
    DOI: 10.1023/A:1018543831602
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://link.springer.com/10.1023/A:1018543831602
    File Function: Abstract
    Download Restriction: Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1023/A:1018543831602?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. William McKillop & Amin Sarkar, 1996. "Sustainable development of forest resources in industrialized countries," Agricultural Economics, International Association of Agricultural Economists, vol. 14(3), pages 175-184, August.
    2. Rudiger Dornbusch, 1992. "The Case for Trade Liberalization in Developing Countries," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 6(1), pages 69-85, Winter.
    3. McKillop, William & Sarkar, Amin, 1996. "Sustainable development of forest resources in industrialized countries," Agricultural Economics, Blackwell, vol. 14(3), pages 175-184, August.
    4. Robert M. Solow, 1974. "The Economics of Resources or the Resources of Economics," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Chennat Gopalakrishnan (ed.), Classic Papers in Natural Resource Economics, chapter 12, pages 257-276, Palgrave Macmillan.
    5. Sanjaya Lall, 1996. "Understanding Technology Development," Palgrave Macmillan Books, in: Learning from the Asian Tigers, chapter 2, pages 27-58, Palgrave Macmillan.
    6. Daly, Herman E., 1990. "Toward some operational principles of sustainable development," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 2(1), pages 1-6, April.
    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. Andreea Constantinescu & Simona Frone, 2014. "The role of technological innovation in sustainable economic development," Journal of Knowledge Management, Economics and Information Technology, ScientificPapers.org, vol. 4(1.1), pages 1-13, February.

    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. Toman, Michael & Pezzey, John C., 2002. "The Economics of Sustainability: A Review of Journal Articles," RFF Working Paper Series dp-02-03, Resources for the Future.
    2. Florian Fizaine, 2021. "La croissance verte est-elle durable et compatible avec l’économie circulaire ? Une approche par l’identité IPAT," Post-Print hal-03884377, HAL.
    3. Ozgur Isil & Michael T. Hernke, 2017. "The Triple Bottom Line: A Critical Review from a Transdisciplinary Perspective," Business Strategy and the Environment, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 26(8), pages 1235-1251, December.
    4. Spash, Clive L. & Clayton, Anthony M. H., 1995. "Strategies for the maintenance of natural capital," MPRA Paper 38273, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    5. Damien Bazin & Emna Omri & Nouri Chtourou, 2015. "Solar Thermal Energy for Sustainable Development in Tunisia," Post-Print halshs-01070616, HAL.
    6. Kohn, Jorg, 1998. "Thinking in terms of system hierarchies and velocities. What makes development sustainable?," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 173-187, August.
    7. Raouf BOUCEKKINE & Blanca MARTINEZ & José Ramon RUIZ-TAMARIT, 2013. "Optimal sustainable policies under pollution ceiling: the demographic side," LIDAM Discussion Papers IRES 2013028, Université catholique de Louvain, Institut de Recherches Economiques et Sociales (IRES).
    8. John C. V. Pezzey, 2004. "Sustainability Policy and Environmental Policy," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 106(2), pages 339-359, June.
    9. Pierre Le Masne, 2012. "Sustainable Development: The Teachings of the Physiocrats and the Classics," Chapters, in: Blandine Laperche & Nadine Levratto & Dimitri Uzunidis (ed.), Crisis, Innovation and Sustainable Development, chapter 7, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    10. Koffi-Tessio, Egnonto M., 2004. "Revisiting Estimation of Agricultural Production Function for Sustainable Agricultural Policies in Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA): Evidence from Togo," 2004 Inaugural Symposium, December 6-8, 2004, Nairobi, Kenya 9534, African Association of Agricultural Economists (AAAE).
    11. Chad S. Boda & Turaj Faran, 2018. "Paradigm Found? Immanent Critique to Tackle Interdisciplinarity and Normativity in Science for Sustainable Development," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(10), pages 1-28, October.
    12. Giampietro, Mario, 2019. "On the Circular Bioeconomy and Decoupling: Implications for Sustainable Growth," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 162(C), pages 143-156.
    13. Martinet, V. & Doyen, L., 2007. "Sustainability of an economy with an exhaustible resource: A viable control approach," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 17-39, January.
    14. Andre, Francisco J. & Cerda, Emilio, 2005. "On natural resource substitution," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 30(4), pages 233-246, December.
    15. Köhn, Jörg, 1996. "Thinking in Terms of System Hierarchies and Velocites. What makes Development Sustainable?," Thuenen-Series of Applied Economic Theory 04, University of Rostock, Institute of Economics.
    16. Garmendia, E. & Prellezo, R. & Murillas, A. & Escapa, M. & Gallastegui, M., 2010. "Weak and strong sustainability assessment in fisheries," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 70(1), pages 96-106, November.
    17. Cheng, Shengkui & Xu, Zengrang & Su, Yun & Zhen, Lin, 2010. "Spatial and temporal flows of China's forest resources: Development of a framework for evaluating resource efficiency," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 69(7), pages 1405-1415, May.
    18. Omri, Emna & Chtourou, Nouri & Bazin, Damien, 2015. "Solar thermal energy for sustainable development in Tunisia: The case of the PROSOL project," Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews, Elsevier, vol. 41(C), pages 1312-1323.
    19. Shahbaz, Muhammad & Hoang, Thi Hong Van & Mahalik, Mantu Kumar & Roubaud, David, 2017. "Energy consumption, financial development and economic growth in India: New evidence from a nonlinear and asymmetric analysis," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 63(C), pages 199-212.

    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:spr:envsyd:v:17:y:1997:i:2:d:10.1023_a:1018543831602. 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: Sonal Shukla or Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.springer.com .

    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.