Economic Development and Biodiversity

Jan Luiten van Zanden and Thomas van Goethem

No 13544, CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers

Abstract: There is an urgent need for studying the development of biodiversity in the (recent) past. It is one of the biggest threats to the sustainable future of mankind, and the process is largely driven by economic and demographic changes. However, it has however not received much attention by economic historians. Several (historical) socio-economic drivers of biodiversity have been recognized, however, the extent, rate and precise causes of current decline remains unknown. A historical perspective on biodiversity and the network of socio-economic factors causing it, will lead to a more inclusive understanding of the complex human-nature relations resulting in biodiversity decline. The models currently used to simulate these processes, and theoretical notions about it, have not been sufficiently tested against the historical record. To that end, it is proposed to study biodiversity on the basis of historical records and data. Moreover, a research framework is presented that may be the starting point for the new research agenda. The framework gives a schematic overview of the interconnected natural and socio-economic systems across different temporal, spatial and biological scales. This is then applied to the case of the Netherlands in the 20th century, and the causes of the decline and recent rise of biodiversity are analyzed.

Keywords: Economic history; Biodiversity; Sustainability (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: Q57 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2019-02
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-env
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (2)

Downloads: (external link)
https://cepr.org/publications/DP13544 (application/pdf)
CEPR Discussion Papers are free to download for our researchers, subscribers and members. If you fall into one of these categories but have trouble downloading our papers, please contact us at subscribers@cepr.org

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:cpr:ceprdp:13544

Ordering information: This working paper can be ordered from
https://cepr.org/publications/DP13544

Access Statistics for this paper

More papers in CEPR Discussion Papers from C.E.P.R. Discussion Papers Centre for Economic Policy Research, 33 Great Sutton Street, London EC1V 0DX.
Bibliographic data for series maintained by ().