Capitalism Versus Environmental Sustainability Essay
Several environmentalists are not satisfied with the environmental history of free market economies. They claim that capitalism is an uneconomical method which negatively exploits the limited resources on earth in a futile ploy to promote a . Such claims which are exposed under the guise of sustainable development are well known.
With the prospects of world hunger escalating, western nations have been cautioned time and again that making use of their resources so fast will cause inadequacy of some things in nature if not everything else. However, it is possible to be environmentally sustainable and still maintain a capitalistic, free market economy.
Before digressing to other important issues, terms have to be defined for ease of understanding. Capitalism refers to an economic system which is typified by an individual or corporate ownership of the capital goods present in a market.
Under capitalism, investments are controlled through private choice, pricing, manufacture, and distribution processes of goods which are determined mostly through competitiveness within a free market (Hawken 100). Free market refers to a market where prices are derived through competition among the individual businesses and not under the regulation of the government.
The world faces a problem in safeguarding ecological values. Although great accomplishments have been attained in several disciplines, other environmental challenges still exist. Proponents of that these challenges arise from market failure. According to them, this failure is caused by the incapacity of capitalism to deal with environmental issues properly.
Those in support of free market say that such challenges do not arise from forces in the market, but the absence of such forces. The market plays an important role in safeguarding the resources which are privately owned and do not experience a political intrusion. In such circumstances, there are true practices of sustainability.
This implies that those people charged with safeguarding the environment and promoting the growth of humanity should struggle to promote capitalism. This can be done by increasing property rights to the widest possible limits of environmental resources. The main objective should be to eradicate political intrusion that exists in the human as well as natural environments and not to increase it.
Private stewardship of available resources in the environment is a strong method of promoting sustainability. It is only individuals who have the power to safeguard their environment.
Politics plays no role. Where political strategies do not encourage people to positively participate in environmental conservation, the plans can than any good. The obvious presence of many ecological challenges in many nations of the world can be surmounted by simply encouraging private stewardship and nothing else (Putnam 24).
a process where the management of natural resources can offer an equivalent or growing output within a certain time frame.
Conceptually, it is ambiguous more often than a clich. No person realistically promotes non-sustainable development at this time and age. Sustainable development essentially means that humanity has to make sure that providing the present demands does not stand in the way of future generations to provide for their wants.
Sustainability demands that as resources are used, one of three issues must happen. Fresh resources have to be created or identified, demands should be moved to other adequate resources, or fresh knowledge and information must allow people to provide for such wants from other .
This implies, as resources are continually reduced, they have to be refreshed. There are many people who imagine that the market is not able to meet this feat. A great historic feat proves the exact opposite.
