Economics and the Environment: A Case of Ethical Neglect
Author(s)
Jenkins, T. N.
Abstract
Cultural heritages may be a starting point for the task of cultivating an ethical obligation towards the natural environment. Different cultures embody alternatives to modernist ways of interacting with social and natural environments. If cultural heritages have a role in establishing an environmental ethic for today, it is necessary to examine whether particular cultural traditions are conducive to ecologically sensitive behavior and to what extent there is congruity between traditional cultural prescriptions and actual current behavior. To do this, the paper contrasts European and Chinese heritages. A persuasive thesis has been developed that modern environmentally destructive tendencies in science, economics and public policy have deep historical roots in Western religious and philosophical tradition, suggesting that recourse to traditional ethics in the West would do nothing to mitigate unsustainability.
