IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/p/ehl/lserod/30738.html
   My bibliography  Save this paper

Beyond growth: against the misplaced focus on economic growth

Author

Listed:
  • Neumayer, Eric

Abstract

This paper aspires to argue in favour of a simple, but fundamental, hypothesis. This hypothesis is that economic growth is neither the cause of nor the solution to environmental problems and that therefore both anti-growth environmentalists and pro-growth neoclassical environmental economists share a misplaced focus on economic growth. Economic growth is not the issue, environmental problems are. Environmental problems can be solved no matter whether or not economic growth takes place and environmental problems can be solved without any significant detrimental effect on economic growth. On the other hand, economic growth in itself will not solve any environmental problems.

Suggested Citation

  • Neumayer, Eric, 2000. "Beyond growth: against the misplaced focus on economic growth," LSE Research Online Documents on Economics 30738, London School of Economics and Political Science, LSE Library.
    • Handle: RePEc:ehl:lserod:30738
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/30738/
    File Function: Open access version.
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Beckerman, Wilfred, 1992. "Economic growth and the environment: Whose growth? whose environment?," World Development, Elsevier, vol. 20(4), pages 481-496, April.
    2. Barro, Robert J, 1996. "Democracy and Growth," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 1(1), pages 1-27, March.
    3. Ayres, Robert U., 1998. "Eco-thermodynamics: economics and the second law," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 26(2), pages 189-209, August.
    4. Eric Neumayer, 2013. "Weak versus Strong Sustainability," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 14993.
    5. Ayres, Robert U., 1998. "The price-value paradox," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 25(1), pages 17-19, 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. Kemi Yekini & Han Li & Paschal Ohalehi & Aruoriwo M. Chijoke-Mgbame, 2019. "CSR disclosure and corporate sustainability: evidence from the Shenzhen Stock Exchange," International Journal of Business Governance and Ethics, Inderscience Enterprises Ltd, vol. 13(3), pages 300-322.

    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. Indra de Soysa & Jennifer Bailey & Eric Neumayer, 2004. "Free to Squander? Democracy, Institutional Design, and Economic Sustainability, 1975–2000," Macroeconomics 0412004, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    2. Victor Court & Pierre-André Jouvet & Frédéric Lantz, 2015. "Endogenous economic growth, EROI, and transition towards renewable energy," Working Papers 1507, Chaire Economie du climat.
    3. Ayres, Robert U., 2004. "On the life cycle metaphor: where ecology and economics diverge," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 48(4), pages 425-438, April.
    4. Jung Yun Choi & Doo Bong Han, 2018. "The Links between Environmental Innovation and Environmental Performance: Evidence for High- and Middle-Income Countries," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(7), pages 1-14, June.
    5. Ukidwe, Nandan U. & Bakshi, Bhavik R., 2007. "Industrial and ecological cumulative exergy consumption of the United States via the 1997 input–output benchmark model," Energy, Elsevier, vol. 32(9), pages 1560-1592.
    6. Ghassan Dibeh & Ali Fakih & Walid Marrouch & Ghida Matar, 2021. "Who Cares About Environmental Quality in the MENA Region?," Social Indicators Research: An International and Interdisciplinary Journal for Quality-of-Life Measurement, Springer, vol. 157(2), pages 603-629, September.
    7. Gerlagh, Reyer, 2017. "Generous Sustainability," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 136(C), pages 94-100.
    8. Cameron Hepburn & Alex Bowen, 2013. "Prosperity with growth: economic growth, climate change and environmental limits," Chapters, in: Roger Fouquet (ed.), Handbook on Energy and Climate Change, chapter 29, pages 617-638, Edward Elgar Publishing.
    9. Blanco, Luisa & Grier, Robin, 2012. "Natural resource dependence and the accumulation of physical and human capital in Latin America," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 281-295.
    10. Jian-Guang Shen, 2002. "Democracy and growth: An alternative empirical approach," Development and Comp Systems 0212002, University Library of Munich, Germany.
    11. Aysit Tansel & Nil Demet Güngör, 2016. "Gender Effects of Education on Economic Development in Turkey," World Scientific Book Chapters, in: Nadereh Chamlou & Massoud Karshenas (ed.), Women, Work and Welfare in the Middle East and North Africa The Role of Socio-demographics, Entrepreneurship and Public Policies, chapter 3, pages 57-86, World Scientific Publishing Co. Pte. Ltd..
    12. Myint Moe Chit, 2018. "Political openness and the growth of small and medium enterprises: empirical evidence from transition economies," Empirical Economics, Springer, vol. 55(2), pages 781-804, September.
    13. Hu, Jin-Li & Wang, Shih-Chuan & Yeh, Fang-Yu, 2006. "Total-factor water efficiency of regions in China," Resources Policy, Elsevier, vol. 31(4), pages 217-230, December.
    14. Torsten Persson & Guido Tabellini, 2009. "Democratic Capital: The Nexus of Political and Economic Change," American Economic Journal: Macroeconomics, American Economic Association, vol. 1(2), pages 88-126, July.
    15. Yong Glasure & Aie-Rie Lee & James Norris, 1999. "Level of economic development and political democracy revisited," International Advances in Economic Research, Springer;International Atlantic Economic Society, vol. 5(4), pages 466-477, November.
    16. Rok Spruk & Mitja Kovac, 2018. "Inefficient Growth," Review of Economics and Institutions, Università di Perugia, vol. 9(2).
    17. Shrabani Saha & Kunal Sen, 2019. "The corruption-growth relationship: Do political institutions matter?," WIDER Working Paper Series wp-2019-65, World Institute for Development Economic Research (UNU-WIDER).
    18. Pauline Grosjean & Claudia Senik, 2011. "Democracy, Market Liberalization, and Political Preferences," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 93(1), pages 365-381, February.
    19. Paul Pelzl & Steven Poelhekke, 2023. "Democratization, leader education and growth: firm-level evidence from Indonesia," Journal of Economic Growth, Springer, vol. 28(4), pages 571-600, December.
    20. Pettersson, Jan, 2003. "Democracy, Consolidation and Growth," Research Papers in Economics 2002:16, Stockholm University, Department of Economics, revised 15 Dec 2004.

    More about this item

    JEL classification:

    • N0 - Economic History - - General

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    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:ehl:lserod:30738. 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: LSERO Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://edirc.repec.org/data/lsepsuk.html .

    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.