Chapter 08 · Finance, data & evidenceSustainability Language
Ecological economics
Definition
Ecological economics is a transdisciplinary field that studies the economy as embedded in and constrained by the Earth's ecological systems, addressing scale (physical limits to throughput), distribution (equity) and allocation (efficiency) together. Founded institutionally with the International Society for Ecological Economics and its journal in 1989, its intellectual lineage runs through Kenneth Boulding, Nicholas Georgescu-Roegen and Herman Daly, whose steady-state economy remains a defining model. It differs from environmental economics by grounding analysis in biophysical limits rather than assuming substitutability of natural capital.
References
disciplinary definition and mission
intellectual lineage and steady-state model
Overview
What it means
Economics rebuilt on thermodynamics and ecology: the ecosphere is the containing system, not a sector of the economy.
How it is used
The field underpins natural-capital accounting, strong sustainability, degrowth scholarship and critiques of GDP as a progress measure.
Why it matters
Ecological economics supplies the theoretical foundations for planetary-boundaries thinking, wellbeing economies and post-growth policy debates.