Papers > By author > Buchs Arnaud

Ecological economics is a field of analysis that became institutionalized in the late 1980s with the creation of the International Society for Ecological Economics and the journal Ecological Economics. Important divides between different ways of conceiving the objectives, tools and methods of analysis within the field have promptly appeared. They led to distinguish, following Clive Spash, at least three main approaches that claim a proximity, or, at the contrary a certain distance, with standard economics. The “new resource economics” and the “new environmental pragmatism” are adopting a conciliatory stance towards standard economics and its tools, while “social ecological economics” is more in line with the heritage of heterodox economic approaches and develops an interdisciplinary approach deeply rooted in social sciences.

The purpose of this open panel is to better understand the existing relationships between social ecological economics and the diverse heterodox fields of analysis in economics as well as the ways that could be opened to strengthen and structure these links. To do so, we expect contributions that refer to theoretical and / or methodological arguments and that can be based on diverse fieldworks, from which cross-fertilization could be updated or questioned.

From a theoretical point of view, without being exhaustive, diverse approaches in institutional economics can be referred to (historical institutionalism, regulation school, economics of conventions, economics of proximity...). In addition, what crossings can be made between social ecological economics and Marxian approaches and/or with post-Keynesian analysis? In a more interdisciplinary perspective, what crossings are identifiable, or even desirable, between social ecological economics and other epistemic communities operating at the interface between natures and societies (social-ecological systems, common-pool resources, political ecology...). What are the differences between these approaches and what are the possible blocking points that would prevent a renewed dialogue?

From a methodological point of view, how can we deal with temporal (historical and prospective) and territorial (multi-level governance, cartographic tools, etc.) issues and how to mobilize such approaches? How to renew methods for evaluating environmental damages, environmental risks or those relating to ecosystem services? What role do frontier concepts play, which can be appropriated by the different schools of thought above-mentioned (ecosystem services, natural capital, resilience, governance, commons, etc.) and can they help to foster a dialogue?

All these theoretical and methodological questions can be illustrated from a variety of fieldworks, emphasizing the importance of empirical studies, which can allow us to understand how these actual or foreseen cross-fertilizations can be embodied and applied concretely.