{"id":4212,"date":"2020-03-10T19:40:52","date_gmt":"2020-03-10T19:40:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/?p=4212"},"modified":"2020-03-10T19:40:53","modified_gmt":"2020-03-10T19:40:53","slug":"ecological-economics-dangerous-ideas-and-academic-freedom","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/2020\/03\/10\/ecological-economics-dangerous-ideas-and-academic-freedom\/","title":{"rendered":"Ecological Economics, Dangerous Ideas, and Academic Freedom"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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by Matthew Burgess<\/a>
CSTPR Core Faculty and Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies<\/em><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Few things make me appreciate the importance of leaving space for discussing dangerous ideas\u2014without fear of reprisal or censorship\u2014in academia than teaching ecological economics and interacting with ecological economists. I developed a course at CU called \u201cSustainable Economies\u201d (ENVS 3555, offered in Spring 2021, for those interested), which brings ecological economics together with traditional macroeconomics and some other topics related to political economy (tribalism, democracy, inequality, social capital, etc.). I also recently joined the International Society for Ecological Economics<\/a>, and attended their U.S. affiliate\u2019s annual conference this past summer.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ecological economists discuss some pretty dangerous ideas. For instance, some ecological economists<\/a>\u2014and some students who take my class\u2014argue that environmental sustainability demands radical de-growth, i.e. a radical decrease in the size of the economy. These arguments don\u2019t always include specific numbers, but when they do they can be pretty drastic. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

For instance, one argument I\u2019ve seen starts from the target of halving CO2<\/sub> emissions by 2030 (following the recent IPCC report<\/a> on 1.5 degrees of warming), and assumes U.S. growth rates in population (0.5%\/year<\/a>) and CO2<\/sub> intensity of GDP (\u20131.5%\/year over the past two years<\/a>) stay constant. To square these numbers with the target of halving emissions, some students calculate\u2014correctly!\u2014that we would need a ~6%\/year decline in GDP per capita. To put this in context, this means we\u2019d need an economic contraction larger than the Great Recession in 2008-2009 (which was about \u20135% per-capita GDP in the U.S.<\/a>) every year<\/em> for the next ten years. I have little doubt that an economic shock this severe would cause total sociopolitical breakdown, large increases of poverty, unrest, violence, and probably political movements far scarier than anything we have now.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I\u2019ve also heard (e.g. here<\/a> from a prominent climate journalist) arguments for immediately banning fossil fuels\u2014despite the fact that they currently make up the vast majority of global energy use. Again, I have no doubt that doing this would cause widespread suffering, poverty, death, and probably violence\u2014likely most acutely felt by the poor and marginalized.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Whether they\u2019re right or\nwrong, these are very dangerous ideas! <\/p>\n\n\n\n

But, I’m glad my students\u2014and\nmy colleagues\u2014are willing to put these ideas forward. These ideas nicely tee up\ndiscussions of the sociopolitical implications of radical de-growth, which\nstudents might not otherwise discuss. Through rigorous, open, and unencumbered\ndebate, my students, and our profession, will get to grapple with these\nconcerns about radical de-growth or immediate de-carbonization, and weigh them\nagainst other very legitimate concerns about the consequences of not meeting\nclimate targets, menus of other options, etc. As a result, we will all become\nbetter, more thoughtful, more precise scientists, climate advocates, policy\nmakers, voters, and whatever else we may do in our lives and careers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What would happen if we\ninstead censored or reprimanded students, journalists, and scholars who put\nforward these ideas and opinions? Would they change their minds? Would\nstudents, parents, and politicians sympathetic to these views trust academics\nas arbiters of truth and public education? Would we be able to grapple with the\nimportant but unsettling tradeoffs that their views might raise (e.g. is it\npossible to cut emissions in half by 2030 without major de-growth? If so, how?\nIf not, what should we do?)? Would the quality of education and scholarship\nimprove? To my mind, the answer to all of these questions is clearly \u2018no\u2019,\nwhich is why I would never advocate for such censorship, nor would any of my\ncolleagues, I suspect. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Nonetheless, I think this is a useful analogy for understanding why academic censorship\u2014of even dangerous ideas\u2014does more harm than good. It\u2019s also useful for understanding why many conservatives have recently become skeptical<\/a> of the value of higher education, as ideological concentration among faculty, and the censorship and chilling of conservative speech, have become more acute on many campuses (e.g., see here<\/a>, here<\/a>, and here<\/a>). I suspect that many leftists would have the same jaded views of academia as many conservatives currently do if folks were harassed or hounded out of their jobs, administrative duties, teaching assignments, speaking engagements, etc., for expressing views in favor of radical de-growth or immediate fossil-fuel bans\u2014ideas that are, objectively, far more dangerous than most of the conservative ideas that have invited censorship on campuses recently. \u00a0\u00a0\u00a0<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Of course, even if we decide\nthat some ideas are worth censoring, it usually doesn\u2019t work, especially for\npolitical speech. Firing and de-platforming people for their ideas tends to\ngive them and their ideas a bigger platform as martyrs, and tends to make their\nadherents angrier and more radical, rather than more willing to listen to\ncountervailing facts or points of view. In other words, an academy with very\nrobust academic freedom norms\/policies, and an ability to discuss even\ndangerous ideas, makes our discourses and institutions smarter and stronger,\nnot weaker; and it makes our policies better and less dangerous, not more\ndangerous. And constructive, rigorous discourse across ideological and\npolitical difference pours water on the fires of our division. Censorship usually\npours gasoline on these fires. Credit where it is due, by the way: the\necological economists I have met get this, and are very open to both criticism\nand vigorous debate. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

This will be my last Prometheus column before CSTPR closes this summer<\/a>, and one reason I wanted to devote it to this topic is in honor of our founding Director, Roger Pielke Jr. Reactions to some of Roger\u2019s work\u2014from politicians<\/a>, online pundits, and occasionally other scientists<\/a>\u2014have sometimes tested the guardrails of academic freedom\u2014tests we at CU have passed at the institutional level<\/a>. I have found Roger to be a smart and insightful voice, including in instances when I disagreed with him (e.g., we disagree on the implications of Robert Gordon\u2019s work on economic growth<\/a>, but we have since collaborated on a paper on a related topic<\/a>). His book, The Honest Broker<\/a><\/em>, provides helpful guidance for scientists on how to inform and interact with contentious policy debates.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Our CU Regent policies on academic freedom and free speech<\/a> are now some of the best in the country, in my estimation. If we maintain this, it will only improve our reputation\u2014as it has<\/a> at the University of Chicago<\/a>. It will also improve our ability to build a harmonious, inclusive, and diverse campus, as I argued previously in response to Academic Futures<\/a>. I hope that our campus leadership and community will continue to appreciate this as we move forward with our \u201cyearlong focus on academic freedom<\/a>\u201d. Schools that fail to uphold academic freedom tend to suffer in terms of reputation, enrollment, and also diversity\u2014as has happened at Evergreen State College<\/a> and the University of Missouri<\/a> for instance, following high-profile rows on their campuses. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Thank you to all the staff, faculty, and leadership at CSTPR<\/a>, who have made this a fun and intellectually stimulating place to work over the past two years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

by Matthew BurgessCSTPR Core Faculty and Assistant Professor of Environmental Studies Few things make me appreciate the importance of leaving space for discussing dangerous ideas\u2014without fear of reprisal or censorship\u2014in academia than teaching ecological economics and interacting with ecological economists. … Continue reading →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":32,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4212","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-commentaries"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","publishpress_future_action":{"enabled":false,"date":"2026-07-01 13:35:15","action":"change-status","newStatus":"draft","terms":[],"taxonomy":"category"},"publishpress_future_workflow_manual_trigger":{"enabledWorkflows":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4212","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/32"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4212"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4212\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4214,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4212\/revisions\/4214"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4212"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4212"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ciresblogs.colorado.edu\/prometheus\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4212"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}