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Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons™

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Selected Works

Sustainability

Environmental Policy

Articles 1 - 19 of 19

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Biobased Products And The Leed® Rating System, Meredith Chambers, Mikesch Muecke Nov 2017

Biobased Products And The Leed® Rating System, Meredith Chambers, Mikesch Muecke

Mikesch Muecke

At the beginning of the 20th century, over 40% by weight of all the materials consumed through the production of goods within the United States were comprised of renewable resources (Matos and Wagner 1998). In contrast, by the end of the 20th century renewable material usage had dropped to less than 8% by weight (Matos and Wagner 1998). Combined with both an increase in the overall rate at which we consume resources as well as growing awareness of the inherently finite availability of nonrenewable resources, the early decades of the 21st century may mark the beginning of a shift back …

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What Economics Teaches Us About Environmental Protection, Chad J. Mcguire Jan 2015

What Economics Teaches Us About Environmental Protection, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

A basic premise in economics is that companies should pay all of the costs that are incurred in the process of producing their goods and services. The reason? By incurring all of the costs in production, the price charged by the company will reflect those costs. The price consumers pay, then, will also reflect all of the costs incurred in production. This leads to price efficiency, a major goal in free-market economic principles.
Unfortunately we don’t always include the costs to the environment in the production process. Take, for example, electricity generation, which can be accomplished using different inputs. Coal-burning …

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Market Failures And Protecting The Environment, Chad J. Mcguire Jan 2015

Market Failures And Protecting The Environment, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

Whether you agree with government intervention, or with the specific form of gov- ernment intervention applied, it is a fact that government becomes involved in environ- mental issues because, to date, we have failed to fully inter- nalize the costs of our actions toward the environment in our market systems. So this is why government becomes involved in the first place, to correct existing and recurring market failures. Knowing this important fact helps us better understand, and judge, envi- ronmental laws and policies.

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Valuing Ecosystem Services In Coastal Management Policy: Looking Beyond The Here And Now, Chad J. Mcguire Dec 2014

Valuing Ecosystem Services In Coastal Management Policy: Looking Beyond The Here And Now, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

This article explores how the identification and account- ing of ecosystem services can aid coastal management policies, particularly as management looks to a future that includes the impacts of climate change. At the core of making better deci- sions is an understanding of the value of ecosystem services. The economic context of ecosystem services is explored in order to outline what may be considered a complete account- ing of costs. Once contextualized, ecosystem services will then be applied to current coastal management issues associ- ated with sea level rise. In particular, policy-relevant questions about mitigating and adapting to sea level …

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The Role Of Risk Perception In Building Sustainable Policy Instruments: A Case Study Of Public Coastal Flood Insurance In The Usa, Chad J. Mcguire Dec 2014

The Role Of Risk Perception In Building Sustainable Policy Instruments: A Case Study Of Public Coastal Flood Insurance In The Usa, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

Public planning for sustainability implies a forward-looking approach that often includes imagining future harm and taking steps to prevent that future harm before it occurs. A major challenge to implementing such forward looking, or precautionary, a policy instrument is managing the impacts such policies have on existing expectations. The purpose of this paper is to discuss the role of risk perception in the development of forward-looking policy instruments. A case study example focused on coastal flood insurance in the USA is presented to highlight the difficulty of implementing sustainable policy goals when current policies incentivise the discounting of risk. The …

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Climate-Induced Sea Level Rise And Sustainable Coastal Management: The Influence Of Existing Policy Frameworks On Risk Perception, Chad J. Mcguire Nov 2014

Climate-Induced Sea Level Rise And Sustainable Coastal Management: The Influence Of Existing Policy Frameworks On Risk Perception, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

This article looks at the role of existing government policies on perceptions of risk and the impact they have on developing forward-looking sustainable policy instruments. Coastal flood insurance policy in the United States is examined as a way of exploring the relationship between policy instruments and risk perception. Insights include the importance of understanding the role of community risk perception in policy development, as well as the role of historical and existing policies in influencing community risk perception.

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Losing The Message: Some Policy Implications Of Anthropocentric Indirect Arguments For Environmental Protection, Chad J. Mcguire Sep 2014

Losing The Message: Some Policy Implications Of Anthropocentric Indirect Arguments For Environmental Protection, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

The value of anthropocentric indirect arguments (AIAs), as stated by Elliott (2014), is to focus on non-environmental benefits that derive from actions or policies that also benefit the environment. The key difference with these indirect arguments—from more direct anthropocentric arguments—is they focus on human benefits unrelated to the environment. So, for example, less coal burning power plants means less respiratory illness and higher worker productivity. The air is cleaner, but rather than clean air being the goal in arguing for less coal burning power plants, healthier people is the goal. Or as Elliott notes, clean energy can create jobs, and …

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Wicked Tools: The Value Of Scientific Models For Solving Maine’S Wicked Problems, Tim Waring Nov 2013

Wicked Tools: The Value Of Scientific Models For Solving Maine’S Wicked Problems, Tim Waring

Timothy M Waring

“Wicked problems” are urgent, high-stake socioeconomic-environmental challenges that often involve ideological conflict and have no “best solutions.” Using examples from Maine’s Sustainability Solutions Initiative projects, Tim Waring describes how scientific models can be used to address these kinds of problems. When well-constructed and tested models are used to address policy-relevant issues, include input from stakeholders, and integrate social, economic and environmental dynamics, they can become “wicked tools” to address some of society’s biggest challenges.

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The Emergence Of A Standards Market: Multiplicity Of Sustainability Standards In The Global Coffee Industry, Juliane Reinecke, Stephan Manning, Oliver Von Hagen Mar 2013

The Emergence Of A Standards Market: Multiplicity Of Sustainability Standards In The Global Coffee Industry, Juliane Reinecke, Stephan Manning, Oliver Von Hagen

Stephan Manning

The growing number of voluntary standards for governing transnational arenas is presenting standards organizations with a problem. While claiming that they are pursuing shared, overarching objectives, at the same time, they are promoting their own respective standards that are increasingly similar. By developing the notion of ‘standards markets,’ this paper examines this tension and studies how different social movement and industry-driven standards organizations compete as well as collaborate over governance in transnational arenas. Based on an in-depth case study of sustainability standards in the global coffee industry, we find that the ongoing co-existence of multiple standards is being promoted by …

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Regulatory Takings Claims And Coastal Management Of Sea Level Rise: Remembering Governments Are More Than Regulators, Chad J. Mcguire Jan 2012

Regulatory Takings Claims And Coastal Management Of Sea Level Rise: Remembering Governments Are More Than Regulators, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

The purpose of this article is to highlight some of the roles government can take on that exist outside the traditional regulatory powers of government. Two such nonregulatory roles include the rights of government as the property owner of submerged lands, and the rights/ obligations of government as trustee of the public trust under the public trust doctrine that exists at common law and also statutorily in many coastal states. The reasons these nonregulatory roles are important considerations is because of the reasonable argument that a government that is not acting in a regulatory capacity cannot be said to be …

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Can Consumer Demand Deliver Sustainable Food?: Recent Research In Sustainable Consumption Policy & Practice, Cindy Isenhour Dec 2011

Can Consumer Demand Deliver Sustainable Food?: Recent Research In Sustainable Consumption Policy & Practice, Cindy Isenhour

Cindy Isenhour

No abstract provided.

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Ch 21. 'Future Perspectives On Solar Fuels', Thomas A. Faunce Dec 2011

Ch 21. 'Future Perspectives On Solar Fuels', Thomas A. Faunce

Thomas A Faunce

This chapter opens by examining whether the research and development of molecular solar fuels will be characterized in future by its promotion of fundamental societal virtues such as equality and environmental sustainability. As a thought experiment, it presents a vision of some important elements of such a future world—one where energy is primarily not only a matter of global artificial photosynthesis (GAP), but of such virtues. Central to the future perspective presented here is nanotechnological construction with enhanced efficiency of each aspect of the natural photosynthetic process into units capable of inexpensive mass production for domestic use. This involves a …

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Governing Planetary Nanomedicine: Environmental Sustainability And A Unesco Universal Declaration On The Bioethics And Human Rights Of Natural And Artificial Photosynthesis (Global Solar Fuels And Foods)., Thomas A. Faunce Dec 2011

Governing Planetary Nanomedicine: Environmental Sustainability And A Unesco Universal Declaration On The Bioethics And Human Rights Of Natural And Artificial Photosynthesis (Global Solar Fuels And Foods)., Thomas A. Faunce

Thomas A Faunce

Environmental and public health-focused sciences are increasingly characterised as constituting an emerging discipline—planetary medicine. From a governance perspective, the ethical components of that discipline may usefully be viewed as bestowing upon our ailing natural environment the symbolic moral status of a patient. Such components emphasise, for example, the origins and content of professional and social virtues and related ethical principles needed to promote global governance systems and policies that reduce ecological stresses and pathologies derived from human overpopulation, selfishness and greed— such as pollution, loss of biodiversity, deforestation and greenhouse gas emissions, as well as provide necessary energy, water and …

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A Framework For Analyzing Information Flows In Public Policy Decision-Making: A Move Towards Building Sustainable Policy Instruments, Chad J. Mcguire Aug 2011

A Framework For Analyzing Information Flows In Public Policy Decision-Making: A Move Towards Building Sustainable Policy Instruments, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

The purpose of this paper is to explain a framework that focuses on information flows as a means of understanding public policy decision-making, with a specific emphasis on information relating to sustainable development. The goal of this framework is to further aid in identifying and explaining the extent to which sustainability goals are being implemented in public policy decisions. The suggestion is that by focusing on the information flows directly related to sustainable information, instances can be isolated where specific pieces of information are not making their way to final decision-making processes, or alternatively, where new information interferes with sustainable …

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The Nonexistence Of Sustainability In International Maritime Shipping: Issues For Consideration, Chad J. Mcguire, Helen Perivier Jan 2011

The Nonexistence Of Sustainability In International Maritime Shipping: Issues For Consideration, Chad J. Mcguire, Helen Perivier

Chad J McGuire

There is an ongoing practice in the international shipping community that impacts fundamental notions of sustainability as defined in the peer-reviewed literature (WCED, 1987; Gladwin, Kennelly & Krause, 1995; McManus, 1996, Naess, 2003; McGregor, 2004). The practice is based in discounting the true costs of maritime shipping through a system of open registries. By engaging in such practices, there is an inherent failure by the international community to internalize the true costs (environmental, social, labor, etc.) associated with shipping. The result is a practice that artificially keeps the international costs of maritime shipping low at the expense of environmental and …

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Sustainable Approaches To Managing Small-Scale Ecosystems: A Case Study Of Vernal Pool Protection In The Commonwealth Of Massachusetts, United States Of America, Chad J. Mcguire May 2010

Sustainable Approaches To Managing Small-Scale Ecosystems: A Case Study Of Vernal Pool Protection In The Commonwealth Of Massachusetts, United States Of America, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

This paper reviews the current management scheme used by Massachusetts to protect vernal pools, which represent small-scale ecosystems, and analyzes its relative strengths and weaknesses from an overall sustainability standpoint by looking at the frameworks developed for management. The frameworks are analyzed to determine if the objectives of vernal pool protection are being met. The initial impression is the outcomes are not meeting the objective of overall vernal pool protection, because there are failures in the drivers (mainly the certification requirement), which limits the number of verbal pools actually protected. An expansion of the current Massachusetts program is suggested to …

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A Case Study Of Carbon Sequestration Potential Of Land Use Policies Favoring Re-Growth And Long-Term Protection Of Temperate Forests, Chad J. Mcguire Feb 2010

A Case Study Of Carbon Sequestration Potential Of Land Use Policies Favoring Re-Growth And Long-Term Protection Of Temperate Forests, Chad J. Mcguire

Chad J McGuire

There is a traditional view suggesting forests remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere (Pregitzer & Euskirchen, 2004), but they cease to serve as a carbon sink as they fully mature (Odum, 1969). Recent modeling of old-growth forest carbon sequestration indicate they continue to serve as a “net sink” of carbon even after maturity (Carey, Sala, Keane, & Callaway, 2001; Zhou et al., 2006) - sequestering an average of 2.4 +/- 0.8 tC ha-1 yr-1 (tC = metric tons of carbon; ha = hectare; yr =year), and yielding a ratio of heterotrophic respiration (Rh) to net primary production (NPP) of approximately …

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Building Sustainable Societies: A Swedish Case Study On The Limits Of Reflexive Modernization., Cindy Isenhour Dec 2009

Building Sustainable Societies: A Swedish Case Study On The Limits Of Reflexive Modernization., Cindy Isenhour

Cindy Isenhour

No abstract provided.

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On Conflicted Swedish Consumers, The Effort To “Stop Shopping” & Neoliberal Environmental Governance, Cindy Isenhour Dec 2009

On Conflicted Swedish Consumers, The Effort To “Stop Shopping” & Neoliberal Environmental Governance, Cindy Isenhour

Cindy Isenhour

No abstract provided.

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