L2- (D1) The Consequences of Overconsumption

In our first discussion session, we'll consider two papers from the research of Professor Julia Steinberger from the Universities of Lausanne and Leeds. Her papers consider the broad-scale changes that are needed to achieve sustainability and some of the barriers to making these. The work uses a definition of sustainability as ‘a good life for all within planetary boundaries.' We’ll unpack this concept and explore what it means in the discussion.

A good life for all within planetary boundaries, Daniel W. O’Neill , Andrew L. Fanning, William F. Lamb, Julia K. Steinberger, 2018

Question asked-> 

• what level of biophysical resource use is associated with meeting people’s basic needs

• can this level of resource use be extended to all people without exceeding critical planetary boundaries?

Method-> 

• analysed the relationships between 7 indicators of national environmental pressure (relative to biophysical boundaries) and 11 indicators of social outcomes (relative to sufficiency thresholds) for over 150 countries

Context→

• The 9 boundaries that the Earth were in in the stable Holocene are known as the ‘safe operating space’

• There has been better estimation of environmental footprints

• Human needs theory argues that there are a finite number of basic human needs that are universal, satiable and non-substitutable-> SJS framework:

  

Aim->

• understand how resource use and social outcomes are linked to determine whether it is actually possible for countries to operate within the safe and just space. quantified the links between the biophysical boundaries and social thresholds

• investigating what level of biophysical resource use is associated with meeting people’s basic needs, and whether this level of resource use can be extended to all people without exceeding critical planetary boundaries.

• Importance of this-> the pursuit of universal human development, which is the ambition of the SDGs

Method->

• Have combined earth's boundaries and environmental footprints on a national level to explore what quality of life could be universally achieved if resources were distributed equally.

• Used indicators for biophysical and social indicators which have thresholds and compared these to actual national levels

• Framework used:

  

Results→

• the majority of the countries are using resources at levels above the per capita biophysical boundaries 

• The most difficult biophysical boundary to meet is climate change: only 34% of countries are within the per capita boundary for this indicator. 

• Overall, 16 countries remain within all 7 per capita biophysical boundaries, while there are 48 countries that transgress 6 or more of them

• Countries do not perform as well on the more qualitative goals.

• No country performs well on both the biophysical and social indicators. In general, the more social thresholds a country achieves, the more biophysical boundaries it transgresses and vice versa. Many wealthy nations achieve the majority of the social thresholds, but at a level of resource use that is far beyond the per capita biophysical boundaries.

• In general, the more social thresholds associated with need satisfiers that a country achieves, the higher the level of human wellbeing. Except vietnam

Relationship between indicators:

• social performance is most tightly coupled to CO2 emissions and material footprint, and least tightly coupled to eHANPP.

• Social indicators are more closely associated with meeting physical needs than with achieving more qualitative goals

• The largest gap between current performance and the biophysical boundary occurs for CO2 emissions

• The best performance values show that some nations are able to achieve the social thresholds at a much lower level of resource use. These results give a sense of the possibility space for achieving the social thresholds within planetary boundaries, while also highlighting the unequal distribution of current resource use among countries

• Physical needs could likely be met for 7 billion people at a level of resource use that does not significantly transgress planetary boundaries

• our results suggest that provisioning systems must be fundamentally restructured to enable basic needs to be met at a much lower level of resource use

Two strategies:

• resource use could be reduced significantly in many wealthy countries without affecting social outcomes, while also achieving a more equitable distribution among countries. A focus on sufficiency would involve recognizing that overconsumption burdens societies with a variety of social and environmental problems. It could also involve the pursuit of ‘degrowth’ in wealthy nations, and the shift towards alternative economic models such as a steady-state economy

• clear need to characterize and improve both physical and social provisioning systems. Highly linked to positive effect on a broad range of social outcome\, ms

• 150 countries

• Quantify the amount of resources needed, excess consumption meets these needs

• Top-down approach- opposite to paris agreement-happened to move away from this, allowed each nation to set its own targets, 

• this paper- dividing the limit equally, is it possible for all needs to be met, radical approach

• Planetary boundaries-> defining tipping points to boundaries, including human health, living within our means

• Some have more local effects e.g. phosphorus, nitrogen-> hard to make planetary boundaries

• To achieve social needs, there has to be some consumption-> makes the donut, must exceed inner limit but not outer limit-> paper is asking is there even a donut, no reason that human needs should be met within these boundaries

• Rio+20- nations asked to submit to the UN what they felt their nation needed, UN body has tried to summarise these and create indicators for these- used in this paper

• Social indicators-> some are basic needs whilst others are possibly more subjective, is difficult to do this, allows them to be compared across countries but is divorced from context

• There is a relationship between number of biophysical boundaries and social thresholds achieved but not a causal relationship- can these be decoupled e.g. Vietnam

• USA vs Sri Lanka

• Is a hopeful paper- should focus our energies locally

Socio-economic conditions for satisfying human needs at low energy use: An international analysis of social provisioning, Jefim Vogel, Julia K. Steinberger, Daniel W. O’Neill, William F. Lamb, Jaya Krishnakumar, 2021

Aim-> 

• assessing how the relationship between energy use and need satisfaction varies with the configurations of key socio-economic factors, and what configurations of these factors might enable societies to meet human needs within sustainable levels of energy use. 

Questions asked→

1. What levels of energy use are associated with sufficient need satisfaction in the current international provisioning regime?

2. How does the relationship between energy use and human need satisfaction vary with the configurations of different provisioning factors?

3. Which configurations of provisioning factors are associated with socio-ecologically beneficial performance (higher achievements in, and lower energy requirements of, human need satisfaction), and which ones are associated with socio-ecologically detrimental performance (lower achievements in, and greater energy requirements of, need satisfaction)?

4. To what extent could countries with beneficial configurations of key provisioning factors achieve sufficient need satisfaction within sustainable levels of energy use? 

Methods→

• 19 indicators, 106 countries, ~90% of the global population, 89% of global total final energy use, and 92% of global GDP

• provisioning factors-> all factors that affect how energy and resources are used to meet human needs (the provisioning of goods and services)

  

Results→

• 77 of the 106 countries we analysed, people are significantly deprived of fundamental human needs, whereas the 29 countries in which these needs are sufficiently met all feature highly unsustainable levels of energy use.

 The cross-country relationship between need satisfaction and energy use

• Only 29 countries (28%) reach sufficient levels in all need satisfaction dimensions assessed here-> uses at least 2x maximum sustainable energy use levels

• high levels of energy use seem neither necessary nor particularly beneficial for need satisfaction

Variation of the relationship between need satisfaction and energy use with different configurations of single provisioning factors

3 types of provisioning factors:

• Beneficial provisioning factors-> high values of a beneficial provisioning factor tend to achieve higher levels of need satisfaction at a given level of energy use, and tend to reach a particular level of need satisfaction with lower levels of energy use

• Detrimental provisioning factors-> high values of a detrimental provisioning factor tend to exhibit lower need satisfaction at a given level of energy use, and tend to reach a particular level of need satisfaction only at higher levels of energy use

• Non-significant provisioning factors-> do not show significant interactions with the relationship between energy use and need satisfaction. 
  

• Better configurations of provisioning factors would likely increase their need satisfaction outcomes, even without higher energy use. 
  

Variation of the relationship between need satisfaction and energy use with joint configurations of multiple provisioning factors 

• countries that simultaneously possess high public service quality, high levels of income equality, and low levels of extractivism are likely to achieve a socio-ecologically beneficial performance across all assessed needs

• countries with high energy use tend to have overall beneficial provisioning configurations, whereas countries with low energy use tend to have overall detrimental ones. 

• no country with levels of energy use deemed sustainable sufficiently satisfied all needs

• the satisfaction of fundamental human needs does not only depend on energy use, but also on a broad range of provisioning factors that act as intermediaries between need satisfaction and energy use.

• countries with beneficial provisioning configurations are likely to achieve higher need satisfaction at a given level of energy use, and could likely reach a particular level of need satisfaction with less energy use, compared to the international trend. The better a country’s provisioning configuration is, the better its socio-ecological performance tends to be. 

• Is an issue of the economic system and the overarching political-economic regime per se. 

Future→

• abandoning the pursuit of economic growth beyond moderate levels of affluence

• rendering a non-growing economy socially sustainable will require a fundamental political-economic transformation to remove structural and institutional growth dependencies

• recent literature-> Doughnut-economics, sustainable welfare and Degrowth

• idea of providing Universal Basic Services

• suggest that countries should pursue the provisioning configurations that our analysis identifies as beneficial

Which government policies are needed to help these social needs be met?

• Focused on energy, social indicators in response to energy

• Regression model- looked logarithmic

• The value of different provisioning needs change the curve

• Increase- public service quality, income equality, electricity access- there is a political element to this

• Decrease- extractivism- economy that has a high income selling natural resources e.g. oil, economic growth beyond moderate needs- too high

• Can shift the curve, if put these all together in an imaginary country then it would make things even better

• Comes down to politics but is radical in terms of top-down regulation, but whatever your politics there are configurations that can work