You Can't Eat GNP: Economics as Though Ecology Mattered

As Davidson explains, the system of neoclassical economics, which governs our economy, assigns value to goods depending on the level at which they're produced and consumed. For example, marketed consumer products like bread hold high value, while bread's main ingredient, flour, holds less. Flour in its unprocessed form, wheat, holds even less value, and the soil from which wheat is grown holds the least worth of all. This triangle has become an exact inversion of the ecologist's pyramid, however, in which soil--which supports the entire ecological system, from plants to herbivores to carnivores--is viewed as the pyramid's stabilizing resource. Davidson argues these opposing models must be integrated in order to preserve the ecological system that sustains our economic system. He doesn't propose a "back to nature" solution, nor does he negate the importance of technological developments stimulated by our present mode of economics. He does, however, agree with R.H. Tawney's observation that "If economic ambitions are good servants, they are bad masters." Davidson examines the environmental effects of rigidly employed economic values such as cost-benefit analysis and considers the inevitable economic effects of global warming, waste disposal, and the failure to pursue sustainability. Though his proposals for change are not extensive, he does offer workable (and sometimes controversial) suggestions for both individual and community action.

An author as well as a respected scientist, Davidson writes in clear, lucid prose, making the sciences of economics and ecology accessible to the nonscientific reader, without dumbing down his arguments. He supports his points with relevant, contemporary examples, highlighting the vital importance of managing the economy in conjunction with the environment. As this intelligent treatise wryly reminds us, no matter how booming the economy, we'll never be able to eat our gross national product. --S. Ketchum