Economics was dismal enough before the environmentalists started perverting it

spiked-essays | Essay | The dismal quackery of eco-economics:

"One of the most striking but least noticed aspects of the rise of environmentalism is the way that it has helped to redefine economics. Economic production and consumption are viewed in a fundamentally different way than they were before environmentalism became central to the dominant worldview.


"Environmentalist assumptions that, at the very least, should be the subject of debate are unquestioningly accepted. Environmentalism has become central to the mainstream outlook, rather than the particular property of green parties or organisations.


"This development isn't just important at the level of ideas. A gloomy view of economic development plays an important role in holding back human potential. At its starkest, the acceptance of the idea that economic growth has to be curtailed is a tragedy in a world where billions of people still live in dire poverty."

So begins an excellent essay at spiked-online.com by Daniel Ben-Ami which traces many ways in which the anti-growth mentality of the modern ecological movement constitutes a wide-ranging assault on the very idea of progress embodied in the Enlightenment.

I have only a few minor quibbles with Ben-Ami. He mentions the use which the ecological crowd make of the "tragedy of the commons" to illustrate wasteful overuse of resources without noting that free market economists use the same example to show the ill effects which flow from the lack of defined private property rights. He is also a bit too willing to bow to a scientific consensus that does not in fact exist with regard to an impending crisis caused by anthropogenic global warming, although he persuasively makes the case that richer societies are better able to cope with environmental stressors and that requires growth.

Highly recommended reading for anyone interested in the environmental debate, especially its aspects of limits to growth and risk aversion.