Carol Franco

Building a Sustainable and Desirable Economy-in-Society-in-Nature

In this chapter we describe what an “ecological economy” could look like and how we could get there. We believe that this future can provide full employment and a high quality of life for everyone into the indefinite future while staying within the safe environmental operating space for humanity on earth. Developed countries have a special responsibility for achieving those goals. To get there, we need to stabilize population; more equitably share resources, income, and work; invest in the natural and social capital commons; reform the financial system to better reflect real assets and liabilities; create better measures of progress; reform tax systems to tax “bads” rather than goods; promote technological innovations that support well-being rather than growth; establish “strong democracy,” and create a culture of well-being rather than consumption. In other words, a complete makeover. Several lines of evidence show that these policies are mutually supportive and the resulting system is feasible. The substantial challenge is making the transition to this better world in a peaceful and positive way. There is no way to predict the exact path this transition might take, but we hope that painting this picture of a possible end-point and some milestones along the way will help make this choice and this journey a more viable option.

Building a Sustainable and Desirable Economy-in-Society-in-Nature : Report to the United Nations for the 2012 Rio+20 Conference

“State of the World 2013 is a powerful collection of articles, and the vision behind it is impressive. Here is a book that gets beyond ‘sustainababble’ and asks the tough, essential questions. It should make readers more determined than ever to do their part in avoiding planet-wide disaster—and better informed about how to do that.” — PeteR SiNgeR, Professor of Bioethics, Princeton University, and author of Animal Liberation, One World, and The Life You Can Save