Welcome to the Economics of Sustainability Bulletin Board

Professor Wayne Hayes | SUST640 | Spring 2011

Edition #17: 4/28/2011

Last class! We will conclude the presentations. I will give a brief overview of how I will rebuild my essay on Economic Strategies for Sustainability 2.0, a web-based version. I also will ask for your suggestions about how to deliver SUST640 in the spring, 2012.

 

I have enjoyed every minute of our time together!

 

Edition #16: 4/19/2011

Dr. Sangha Padhy will visit our class of April 25, accompanied by Ashwani Vasishth. She wishes to meet and greet. Our agenda includes:

1. Business and announcements 
2. Greetings to Dr. Sangha Padhy
3. Oral presentations and discussions of research reports. Please see the guidelines. So far, our presenters (not necessarily in order) include Rob Dill, Lee Pratt, Peter Russo, Chris Scaffa, and Rachel Wieland. Note: An advantage of going on the first day is that you have more time to absorb the feedback you will receive. Others ready to go will be most welcome.
4. Break
5. Student evaluations 
6. Status reports from those not presenting. This surveys the class and gets ready for next week.
7. Next class 

 

Edition #15.1: 4/13/2011

Our guest will be Dr. Behzad Yaghmaian, Professor of Political Economy. Please read his upcoming article in Foreign Affairs, May 11, 2011, "Out of Africa: EU Immigration Policy and the North Africa Uprising." We will engage Dr. Yaghmaian in a discussion of globalization and World Sustainability. View a BBC video that provides an overview of immigration from Tunisia to Italy. View a map.

 

Please read the article in the course schedule by Herman Daly, "Globalization and Its Discontents." Our agenda will be:

1. Business and announcements
2. Dr. Behzad Yaghmaian on globalization and sustainability: remarks and open discussion
3. Break
4. Notes on the concept of natural capital. Please read the classic article by Robert Costanza, et al., The value of the world's ecosystem services and natural capital, Nature, May 1997. The Natural Capital Project explains the concept of ecosystem goods and services (aka, flow of benefits derived from a stock of natural capital).
5. Workshop on final presentations and reports. Please see the guidelines on the oral presentations. We will set up the presentations that will conclude SUST640. Please be prepared with a brief oral status report.
6. New business and next class. 

 

Edition #14: 4/9/2011

We meet at 6:30 P.M. at the Pavillion, not at the SSEC. Your interpretive essay on economics and sustainability is due by then. Remember that you must register for the event, Careers in Sustainability: A Networking Roundtable sponsored by 1Step, SLF, the Cahill Center, and NJHEPS. 

 

Edition #13.0: 4/1/2011

Please register for Careers in Sustainability: A Networking Roundtable sponsored by 1Step, SLF, the Cahill Center, and NJHEPS. The event will be held in the Pavillion from 6:30 to 9:30 on Monday, April 11, 2011.

 

Remember that the interpretive essay on economics and sustainability is due by or before class time on April 11 via email attachment.

 

Our agenda for class on April 4 is:

1. Business and announcements: Be sure to register for the sustainability roundtable for April 11.
2. We review and discuss Bill McKibben, Deep Economy: Ch. 1: Rachel Wieland; Ch. 2.: Amy Heid; Ch. 3: Lauran Shur; Ch. 4: Chris Hanson; Ch. 5: Leslie Raucher. I will conclude McKibben, including my (one and only) slide show. (Note: Please explain three or four bullet points that resonate with you. No need to do a detailed outline.)
3. Break within the discussion of McKibben
4. Wayne on globalization and its response. 
5. Discussion of how to frame the interpretive essay, which due by class time on April 11. (Note that since we will go to the sustainability roundtable, there will be no assignment for that class.)
6. Next class and new business. 

 

Matt Smith has expressed interest in following up on 350.org's campaign to educate and influence the Chamber of Commerce. McKibben explains why in an op-ed.

 

Recommended: Introduction to Common Property Rights video, from Thwink.org, a sustainable systems web site.

 

See the web site of the Business Alliance for Local Living Economies, BALLE. See their measures of success.

 

Edition #12.2: 3/26/2011

Harris Gleckman will join us until the break during our class of March 28. Our agenda:

1. Business and announcements: Be sure to register for the sustainability roundtable for April 11.
2. Harris Gleckman discussion of the Brundtland Commission report and general issues of sustainability on a global basis, including climate change negotiations
3. Break
4. End Montague on Daly, parts 5 with Leslie Raucher and 6, including cap and trade
5. Start McKibben: Introduction and Chapter 1. See my overview of McKibben.
6. Discussion of how to frame the interpretive essay due on April 11. (Note that since we will go to the sustainability roundtable, there will be no assignment for that class.)
7. Next class and new business. 

 

Please note two adjustments in our schedule:

1. Ramapo's Professor of Political Economy Bezhad Yaghmaian will join us on April 18. This moves the material on globalization until after the interpretive essay is due.
2. Dr. Sanghamitra (Sangha) Padhy has been hired to a tenure-track position that includes her teaching in the Master of Arts in Sustainability Studies program. She will be our guest in class on April 25.

 

Edition #11: 3/22/2011

Rachel kindly shared the Authentic Happiness web site to help understand aspects of happiness and virtue. I am setting up a meeting with Harris Gleckman in preparation for his visit for our next class. I will post an agenda after consulting with Harris.

 

You should have read McKibben's Deep Economy by class time next Monday. We need to finish Montague on Daly. I hope that we can discuss cap and trade in a lively discussion of climate change policy with Harris.

 

Edition #10: 3/16/2011

Hope that you are enjoying your break. Think about your project! Here is our agenda for our next class, March 21, which follows our schedule:

1. Business and announcements
2. Montague articles on Daly as in the schedule, 1 through 6, with break: #1, Jennie Isaacs; #2, Peter Russo; #3, Lauren Shur; #4, Chris Scaffa; #5, Leslie Raucher; #6, Wayne. Note: This is an abbreviated survey of much of ecological economics. I will refer to my article, Economic Strategies for Sustainability, as we proceed. Please be prepared for a crisp discussion. I have thrown together a background page, The Legacy of Ecological Economics and have working notes on Daly, Beyond Growth.
3. Progress reports on term projects
4. Time permitting, we will start McKibben, Deep Economy, Introduction and Chapter 1. See my overview of McKibben.
5. New business. 

 

Edition #9.2: 3/7/2011

The agenda for class on March 7 concludes Brundtland on Sustainable Development and discusses the term paper proposals.

1. Business and announcements
2. Brundtland Report: The International Economy with Rachel Wieland (see Prof Hayes's  notes on the Washington Consensus, specifically refuted by this chapter of Brundtland)
3. Brundtland Report: Energy with Rob Dill (see Prof. Hayes's notes on energy demand, energy supply) 
4. Brundtland Report: Industry with Matt Smith
5. Break
6. Brundtland Report: Managing the Commons with Professor Hayes --- and see his notes on the commons. (Note: we will hold discussion of the final chapter of Brundtland, Towards Common Action pp 308-346, until March 28 when Harris Gleckman will visit our class --- see below.) 
7. Discussion of term projects (all proposals have received comments and have been graded )
8. Schedule revision and responders for the rest of the term 
9. New business 

 

Please note that the course schedule has been updated for the dates after the spring break.

 

Just before class, Ben Levy of our Study Abroad Office, invited students to a program featuring the Ethiopia: Development and Globalization program. 

 

Note the changes in the schedule for the course after the spring break:

1. The interpretive essay on the intersection of economics and sustainability is now due on April 11. Formerly, this assignment had been scheduled for April 4. 
2. Harris Gleckman will join us on March 28 to discuss the Brundtland report, for which he was staff. Harris had been director of the U.N. Conference on Trade and Development and is now a senior consultant on climate change. We will hold the final section on Brundtland until March 28.
3. Professor of Political Economy Bezhad Yaghmaian will join us on April 4 to discuss economic globalization and the current state of the world. We will also discuss Bill McKibben's Deep Economy at that class.
4. On April 11, we will join the 1-Step Careers in Sustainability Network Roundtable. Note: Since there are no readings for April 11, you will be able to concentrate on your interpretive essay on the intersection of economics and sustainability.

 

Edition #8.0: 2/26/2011

The term paper proposal is due by class time on Monday, February 28. Please send your proposal as an attachment to wkhayes@gmail.com. I have provided a sample of my own proposal as a model to assist in your preparation.

 

Our agenda for our class of February 28 is:

 

1. Business and announcements
2. Brundtland Report: Our Threatened Future with Chris Scaffa
3. Brundtland Report: Toward Sustainable Development with Matthew Smith
4. Brundtland Report: The International Economy with Rachel Wieland
5. Break
6. Brundtland Report: Population and Human Resources with Jenny Isaacs 
7. Brundtland Report: Species and Ecosystems with Jules Scarola
8. Discussion of term paper proposals
9. Responders and agenda for March 7 --- last class before "spring" break 
10. New business 

 

I have assembled some background notes on the Brundtland report, with an expansion into Brundtland Part II. Please see updates to my News and Trends page.

 

Edition #7.4: 2/21/2011

Paul Coraggio of 1-Step has invited us to a program of Careers in Sustainability on April 11, but during class time. We need to decide whether to go or not. (We were to examine Natural Capital that evening.)

 

See a recent Bergen Record article on a visit to Bergen Community College by Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. The speaker endorsed green economic initiatives such as renewable energy. This statement contains the spirit of the Economics of Sustainability:

"We heard over the past 10 years that… we have to choose between economic prosperity on the one hand and environmental protection on the other. That is a false choice. Good environmental policy is identical to good economic policy." 

 

Please remember that the Sustainability Studies Program and 1-Step are presenting the film The Economics of Happiness in SC-137 from 3:00 to 5:00 PM on Wednesday, February 23. This important film will reinforce an essential theme of the Economics of Sustainability.

 

Our agenda for class on February 21 is:

1. Business and announcements. Careers April 11? Economics of Happiness February 23.
2. Story of Stuff, Disposal with Lauren Shur 
3. Story of Stuff, New Story with Rob Dill
4. Transition with a poem, Tomorrow's Child (a poem to inspire sustainability) by Glenn Thomas 
5. Wayne introduces Brundtland and Sustainable Development; Preface.
6. Break
7. From One Earth to One World with Amy Heid
8. Our Threatened Future with Chris Scaffa --- if time 
9. Term project round-table discussion: The term project proposals are due next week.
10. Next week: responders 
11. New business. 

 

I am experimenting with Google Docs and have published my notes on Brundtland as a web page. More than ever, I see Brundtland as a response to the Neo-Liberal agenda of economic globalization.  

 

Remember our discussion of the term lawyers? A standard definition is "The right to use and enjoy the profits and advantages of something belonging to another as long as the property is not damaged or altered in any way." Wikipedia offers an extended discussion of this venerable tradition in property law.

 

Edition #6.0: 2/16/2011

The proposal for your term paper is due on February 28. I have provided a sample proposal to present a model of what this should look like. Please feel free to ask questions via my email. I have added more time to discussion of your term project proposal to the agenda of class on February 21: 

1. Agenda, announcements, and business
2. Leonard, Disposal
3. Conclusion of Story of Stuff, Writing the New Story 
4. Start of Brundtland with my overview 
5. Break
6. Brundtland, From One Earth to One World, pp 1 - 23 
7. Brundtland Part I, Common Concerns, A Threatened Future, pp. 27 - 42; Professor Hayes, Statement of Concern 
8. Status report on term project proposals
9. New business
10. Next class and responders 

 

Edition #5.2: 2/14/2011

Please take a look at the wiki page for your collaboration on the interpretive essay assignment. I will explain the use of the wiki and discuss whether you wish to talk to each other with this tool to think through the essay assignment.

 

We will follow the schedule and review The Story of Stuff this evening. Our agenda is:

 

1. Business, agenda, goals
2. Production with Peter Russo (See Good Guide and Clean Production)
3. Distribution with Leslie Raucher (Walmart monitors its supply chain for sustainability, a huge and valuable project, and publishes its Global Sustainability Report. Walmart has also committed to more local production. Go figure. See also BALLE for local, living economies: I contend that economics in general ignores the local in favor of the global and that the local will grow over time. Do you agree? Think about it.)  
4. Consumption with Jules Scarola (See Happy Planet Index and table on Wikipedia.)
5. Break 
6. Disposal with Lauren Shur
7. Conclusion with Rob Dill
8. Introduction to the wiki 
9. Next class: agenda and reponders: we start Brundtland
10. Term project updates
11. New business 

 

I have started a news and trends page that gathers random articles on themes of interest in tracking World Sustainability. 

 

Edition #4.5: 2/7/2011

Please see a minor modification in the schedule, 2/5/2011. I added the long introduction to Annie Leonard, The Story of Stuff, which is an excellent discussion of ecological economics and sustainability, quite compatible with my article, Economic Strategies for Sustainability. We need to unpack all this with some care. We will surely not have time to discuss the chapter on Production, but you should read it to smooth out the volume of readings.

 

The first versions of the definitions of the term project proposal and of the term project has been posted on our Bulletin Board. The interpretive essay on the intersection of economics and sustainability has also been defined.

 

Paul Krugman's commentary, Droughts, Floods and Food, in yesterday's New York Times points to themes of interest in Economics of Sustainability, such as the spike in protest movements being partially fueled by higher food prices. Look at it and figure out why and how. The Yale Environment 360 web site offers an informative article, Why Does Energy Efficiency's Promise Remain Unfilled by John R. Luomo.

 

Edition #3.3: 2/2/2011

Thanks for a great class on January 31 and for totally re-inventing the Hitana Bay simulation game. The robust discussion of Sachs showed how much you know and how open you are to learning. (BTW, here is a link to matrial in my legacy course in the suspended MBA program, Business and the Environment. It is dormant and dated.)

 

The revisions to the grading policy that we agreed upon have been added to the syllabus. Please examine them.

 

I have adjusted the course schedule to plug in my articles for next week and to cut down on the reading from The Story of Stuff. See the schedule. (Hint: Your browser's cache may load the prior version and hitting the reload button will capture the new version.)

 

I will soon provide more definition to the interpretive essay on the Economics of Sustainability and the term project. Please give some thought to how you might generally frame your project.

 

Edition #2.2: 1/31/2011

The campus bookstore has still (1/31/2011) not received Annie Leonard, The Story of Stuff. As I recall, three students had not obtained a copy, which should be available from other vendors and your library. We must start reading this book for next week. Please let me know in class later today if this will be a problem.

 

I have sent each of you an email explaining that I have added a wiki page for the modification of the grading policy. My next task is to adjust the class schedule to spread out the first batch of readings, on the economics of sustainability.

 

In class, Jenny asked for a definition of economics. Please see two pages that might help:

1. Introducing economics for sustainability 
2. Defining economics around sustainability. 

 

See an article by Nancy Folbre in today's New York Times, The Weak Heart of Economics, that reflects concerns of gender, culture, and loyalty that are consistent with the framing of economics in SUST640.

 

Edition #1: 1/17/2011

Welcome to the first offering of SUST640, Economics of Sustainability! Please note the course syllabus and schedule. Our first class will provide introductions and a planning session for the flow of the semester. Please see the schedule for the events for our first class meeting, January 24. 

 

I have just been notified by the campus store that the first book for the course, Annie Leonard's Story of Stuff, is not yet available. We will alter the schedule to accommodate to the availability of the book, providing an opportunity to define the flow of the course to best facilitate its learning goals. I will provide photocopied reading assignments to carry us to January 31.

 

I am excited to meet you, at long last, and to get down to the business of sustainability. ~WH