As the Economy Grows, the Environment Degrades Essay

Ecological modernisation has not only found application around the world in empirical studies and theoretical debates but politicians also are using it to shape environmental reform programs in both developed and developing countries (Mol et al., 2010). It is a ‘green’ ideology that accounts for changes in national and regional environmental policies and regulation. Therefore, this essay seeks to compare changes in national environmental policies and regulation in South Africa and the UK following the influence of ecological modernization. Focussing on how the ideas of economic growth-environmental protection coexistence and market-based environmental policy instruments have found overwhelming acceptance in the UK and South

Other studies have been completed that suggest evidence against an Environmental Kuznets Curve. It is safe to say that a nation with environmental regulations is a nation that is more developed and has higher income per capita, such that they can spare growth for protection of the environment. A nation that is less developed can’t make the sacrifice for the protection of the environment and must focus solely on economic growth.

While industrialization has been strongly associated with greenhouse gas emissions, it is premature, however, to conclude that economic growth is the independent factor responsible to climate change. Neumayer (1998) contended that there is no sound scientific evidence documenting consequences of economic development on the environmental degradation in the long term (p. 4). There is also no linear association between economic growth and environmental deterioration, as maintained by Ferguson et al. (1996, p. 28) that the existing evidence “cannot be used to justify a view that economic growth (…) will automatically be good or bad for the environment” (cited in Neumayer 1998, p. 16).

EKC refer to changes over time that occurs in one country. The best way to test these hypotheses is to examine the economic growth for years and examine what took place in that country with respect to their particular environment. However even this method is insufficient and thus, the ability to import products from other countries lead in fact to pollution's export and other environmental impacts to the host country (XX).

The poverty-environmental linkage has several dimensions. From an economic growth perspective; rapid economic growth is often seen as the key foundation for achieving poverty reduction. There is a lot empirical evidence in support of this assertion. Therefore while the linkage between economic growth and poverty reduction is generally obvious, the relationship between economic growth and degradation of the environment or and improvement in the environment remains ambiguous or unclear. One part of the poverty-environment hypothesis suggests that economic growth is needed to break the poverty-environment downward

One positive implication capitalism has to the natural environment is industrial ecology, a system of chain production and consumption, serving to the lowest environmental impacts in a most environmentally sustainable economy as the main goal of operation (Richards & Pearson, 1998). The Companies in a like to operate in such way because of four major reasons. The most important factor is known as the corporate well-being, for it is determined by higher profits and growth provided by innovations in an industry. Profits are increased from recognizing the production ineffiency costs that comes from wasted inputs and energy losses; this allowing cost savings to increase and ineffiency to decrease. compliance with cleaner technology alternatives such as ones that produce less waste and less energy will provide long term savings which are both beneficial to the environment and the business at hand. A real world example freight company changes their salvaged driving equipment to hybrid vehicles. Money is temporarily lost, but the gasoline and maintenances cost savings will compensate in a long run period of time.

Is there an environmental crisis? Expert opinions vary. The Wingspread Conference Center in January of 1998 came to this conclusion: “We believe there is compelling evidence that damage to humans and the worldwide environment is of such magnitude and seriousness, that new principles for conducting human activities are necessary.” The need for environmental peace is at a greater demand than it used to be. Extremist, Peter Rossi, believes the real enemy of the environment is poverty. He states, “Economic growth is meant to lead to pollution, habitat loss, global warming cultural homogenization, exploitation of the poor and war for oil,” (The Real Environmental Crisis). The

Whenever the issue of environmental management arises, it causes a stir in both the political and social circles. There are always comparisons between the environmental situations in different parts of the world. This paper focuses on factors affecting the overall influence that certain economic elements have on the environmental quality. Such factors may include lack of proper knowledge and inadequacy of resources. It is important to note that various components define the environment, such as the Environmental Kuznets Curve hypothesis (EKC). The EKC and the citizens of a developing country can explain the reasons for the state of environmental quality in developing countries.

In relations, international liberal market values and subsequent free trade agreements are at the forefront of economic globalization. As the global markets and economic competition intensifies, nations move towards trade liberalization. International trade agreements by extension of economic globalization are more often prioritized before environmental agreements. In fact it is evident that environmental policy is rarely prioritized over economic growth. The neo-liberal market ideals have encouraged the development of economic globalization and therefore sustain the approach to environmental policy that the global south needs to “grow-up now” and “clean up later”. This strategy encourages the development of free trade agreements and the prioritization of economic development and growth over the protection of the environment, as “environmental policy may constitute a constraint to economic growth” . This approach is flawed as it disregards the issues of degradation and irreversible damages to the environment and specific ecosystems as well as the potential high costs of cleaning up and reversing, if possible, the damages.

Collier asserts that the poorest states are in need of rapid economic growth which creates tension between poverty reduction and the perversion of nature. This is most evident in China where their desire to grow economically has come at the price of pollution. While China has grown exponentially economically and have reduced poverty, this growth is not sustainable due to their negligence of the environment. The level of pollution in major cities has hurt the Chinese economy because individuals are refusing to do business there due to health

The Kuznets curve is firstly introduced in 1955 by Kuznets as an inverted-U relationship between income inequality and economic development. Later it is found that the Kuznets curve is useful for describing the relationship between environmental pressure and the economic growth or known as the Environmental Kuznets Curve (EKC) (Dinda, 2004). The hypothesis of the EKC is that at early stages of a country’s development, the quality of its environment will be deteriorated faster and getting slow down at some level of income per capita that the economic growth support the increasing of environmental performance (Stern, 2004). The EKC applies differently between countries depend on the economic growth status of the country. This essay will discuss the different appearance of the EKC using the evidences from developing and developed countries. The EKC of developing countries will show the upward slope stage of the curve because of the countries’ focus on economic growth and less protection to the environment. Conversely, the developed countries will show the later downward slope stage of the EKC as their economic growth is already high and there is more attention for environmental protection.

An environment is everything that makes up our surrounding, this can be living or non-living things, for example; the air we breathe, the sea, the plants and animals etc.

Economic development can be a major thing for the economic growth and improvement of civilization. Also it can be harmful to the environment. Amongst other industrial process which can cause climate change, polluting the air, water and soil, health issues, death of species, and more. For this term paper I will be expanding the issues on the four movies ”Civil action, Glencore, Erin Brockovich,” Inside Job that was dealing with big business and the chemical release harming communities.

Traditionally economic development has been seen as the target, and the environment as the tool through the use of resources. Economic prosperity is a very important element of sustainable development; it allows to combat poverty, to finance remediation of old burdens, to make changes in our development, etc. However, not all economic growth implies improvement for sustainable development. Only economic growth at reduced environmental impact can be defended as being part of sustainable development. In other words,

In the United States, we consume more energy from oil than from any other energy source. In 2014 the total amount of petroleum consumed in the United States was about 19 million barrels per day. As we look into making the world a more eco friendly environment, I ask the question; what are some alternatives of oil and the effects of the alternative.