Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Boxes
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction: scarcity and frontiers
- 2 The Agricultural Transition (from 10,000 BC to 3000 BC)
- 3 The Rise of Cities (from 3000 BC to 1000 AD)
- 4 The Emergence of the World Economy (from 1000 to 1500)
- 5 Global Frontiers and the Rise of Western Europe (from 1500 to 1914)
- 6 The Atlantic Economy Triangular Trade (from 1500 to 1860)
- 7 The Golden Age of Resource-Based Development (from 1870 to 1914)
- 8 The Age of Dislocation (from 1914 to 1950)
- 9 The Contemporary Era (from 1950 to the present)
- 10 Epilogue: the Age of Ecological Scarcity?
- Index
- References
10 - Epilogue: the Age of Ecological Scarcity?
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 June 2012
Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Figures
- Tables
- Boxes
- Preface
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction: scarcity and frontiers
- 2 The Agricultural Transition (from 10,000 BC to 3000 BC)
- 3 The Rise of Cities (from 3000 BC to 1000 AD)
- 4 The Emergence of the World Economy (from 1000 to 1500)
- 5 Global Frontiers and the Rise of Western Europe (from 1500 to 1914)
- 6 The Atlantic Economy Triangular Trade (from 1500 to 1860)
- 7 The Golden Age of Resource-Based Development (from 1870 to 1914)
- 8 The Age of Dislocation (from 1914 to 1950)
- 9 The Contemporary Era (from 1950 to the present)
- 10 Epilogue: the Age of Ecological Scarcity?
- Index
- References
Summary
The fundamental scarcity problem … is that as the environment is increasingly being exploited for one set of uses (e.g. to provide sources of raw material and energy, and to assimilate additional waste), the quality of the environment may deteriorate. The consequence is an increasing relative scarcity of essential natural services and ecological functions … Although the loss of these essential natural services as a result of environmental degradation is not directly reflected in market outcomes, it nevertheless has a major effect in the form of economic scarcity. In other words, if ‘the environment is regarded as a scarce resource,’ then the ‘deterioration of the environment is also an economic problem.’
(Barbier 1989, pp. 96–97)Introduction
The purpose of this final chapter is to draw together the major “scarcity and frontier” themes of this book to examine the critical question: is the world economy today on the verge of a new era of resource-based development?
As previous chapters have indicated, finding and exploiting new sources, or frontiers, of natural resources has been an important aspect of economic development throughout history. This includes both “horizontally extensive” frontiers such as land for agricultural-based activities and frontiers that extend “vertically downwards” in terms of mineral resources for extractive activities.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- Scarcity and FrontiersHow Economies Have Developed Through Natural Resource Exploitation, pp. 663 - 729Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2010
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