Integration of approaches to social metabolism into democratic economic planning models

Abstract

The integration of environmental issues into democratic economic planning models is the object of ongoing debates. Environmental factors cannot be reduced only to economic indicators, rendering economic models unable to properly account for ecological limits. By focusing on our societies’ biophysical needs, the concept of social metabolism opens new avenues to answer such problems. This paper presents two sociometabolic models and their limits to explore how this perspective could inform democratic economic planning models. This paper is part of the “Democratic Economic Planning” theme.

Keywords:

• Democratic economic planning
• ecological economics
• social metabolism
• postcapitalism

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Notes

1 Those who want a summary of these three models can refer to Legault and Tremblay-Pepin, “Brief Sketch.”

2 Planning for Entropy, “Democratic Economic Planning.”

3 Robin Hahnel first called this institution a pollution damage revealing mechanism. We agree with the author that the name given in his most recent publication, where he replaced “damage” by “demand,” is more appropriate. It is clear to us that this process does not reveal damage done by pollution, but only how much people affected by it want to be affected by it and at what cost.

4 Hahnel, Of the People, By the People, 120–21; Hahnel and Kerkhoff, “Integrating Investment and Annual Planning,” 226–33.

5 Hahnel, Democratic Economic Planning, 265.

6 Tremblay-Pepin, “Five Criteria.” In this text, five criteria are presented: organization, regulation, limitation, formalization, and scope.

7 Laibman, “Multilevel Democratic Iterative Coordination.”

8 Castoriadis, “The Greek Polis.”

9 Fischer-Kowalski, “Society’s Metabolism.”

10 Fischer-Kowalski and Weisz, “Archipelago of Social Ecology.”

11 Erb et al., “Beyond Inputs and Outputs.”

12 Marx and Engels, “Capital 1.”

13 The model MEFA usually uses the wording “social metabolism,” and MuSIASEM “societal” or “socioeconomic metabolism.” We use them accordingly in the description of the models and as synonyms in the rest of the paper.

14 Ayres and Kneese, “Production, Consumption, and Externalities.”

15 We identify the following four: first, Input-Output Analysis (IOA) with its extensions Environmentally Extended Input-Output (EE-IO) and Multi-Regional Input-Output (MR-IO); second, Life-Cycle Analysis (LCA); third, Material and Energy Flow Analyses (MEFA) comprised of Material Flow Analyses (MFA) and Energy Flow Analyses (EFA); fourth, Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis of Societal and Ecosystem Metabolism (MuSIASEM).

16 Gerber and Scheidel, “In Search of Substantive Economics.”

17 Fischer-Kowalski and Weisz, “Archipelago of Social Ecology.”

18 Fischer-Kowalski and Erb, “Core Concepts and Heuristics.”

19 Fischer-Kowalski et al., “Methodology and Indicators.”

20 Singh et al., “Local Studies Manual.”

21 Krausmann et al., “Economy-wide Material Flow Accounting”; European Commission, Economy-Wide Material Flow Accounts Handbook.

22 Schaffartzik et al., “Global Metabolic Transition.”

23 Krausmann et al., “Economy-wide Material Flow Accounting,” 11.

24 Krausmann et al., “Material Flow Accounting”; UNEP, Use of Natural Resources.

25 It is worth noting that input output analyses (IOA) and environmentally extended IOAs (EE-IOA) both offer alternative methods better suited to internal accounting and can often be complementary to MEFA data.

26 Wiedenhofer et al., “Integrating Material Stock Dynamics.”

27 Seto et al., “Carbon Lock-In.”

28 Traditional MEFA, in contrast, is designed to conduct ex-post analyses of social metabolism. The MISO model was already used to explore future resource requirements, waste, and emissions. See, for example, Wiedenhofer et al., “Integrating Material Stock Dynamics” and Krausmann et al., “Growing Stocks of Buildings.”

29 Giampietro and Bukkens, “Analogy between Sudoku.”

30 Giampietro, Mayumi, and Ramos-Martin, “Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis.”

31 Giampietro, Mayumi, and Sorman, Metabolic Pattern of Societies.

32 Giampietro, Mayumi, and Sorman, Metabolic Pattern of Societies.

33 Giampietro, Mayumi, and Ramos-Martin, “Multi-Scale Integrated Analysis”; Gerber and Scheidel, “In Search of Substantive Economics.”

34 Giampietro and Bukkens, “Analogy between Sudoku.”

35 Gerber and Scheidel, “In Search of Substantive Economics”; Fraňková, Haas, and Singh, eds., Socio-Metabolic Perspectives.

36 Fischer-Kowalski and Weisz, “Archipelago of Social Ecology.”

37 Dorninger et al., “Global Patterns”; Haberl et al., “Contributions of Sociometabolic Research.”

38 Giampietro, Sorman, and Gamboa, “Using the MuSIASEM Approach.”

39 Krausmann, Wiedenhofer, and Haberl, “Growing Stocks of Buildings.”

40 Haas and Andarge, “More Energy and Less Work.”

41 Krausmann and Langthaler, “Food Regimes.”

42 Schaffartzik, Duro, and Krausmann, “Global Appropriation of Resources”; Mayer, Haas, and Wiedenhofer, “How Countries’ Resource Use History.”

43 Fischer-Kowalski and Schaffartzik, “Energy Availability and Energy Sources.”

44 Giampietro, Sorman, and Gamboa, “Using the MuSIASEM Approach.”

45 Fischer-Kowalski et al., “Energy Transitions and Social Revolutions.”

46 Fischer-Kowalski and Schaffartzik, “Energy Availability and Energy Sources.”

47 Such problems have been recognized by the Viennese school of social ecology (Fischer-Kowalski and Weisz, “Archipelago of Social Ecology.”), but remained unaddressed until recently (Plank et al., “Doing More with Less”).

48 Fischer-Kowalski and Weisz, “Archipelago of Social Ecology.”

49 As far as we are aware, these issues have not been addressed by proponents of the MuSIASEM model.

50 Hausknost et al., “‘Society Can’t Move So Much as a Chair!’”

51 Systems are defined by their difference to a larger environment. This is realized through the system’s mode of operation, which coordinates significant elements in a way that is specific to the system. Systems can be composed of subsystems or can find in their environment other systems to communicate with, but the crucial factor is each system’s functional autonomy. Indeed, a system’s mode of operation is only able to generate change through itself.

52 Hausknost et al., “‘Society Can’t Move So Much as a Chair!’”; Fischer-Kowalski and Weisz, “Archipelago of Social Ecology”; Weisz and Haas, “Health Through Socioecological Lenses.”

53 Hausknost et al., “‘Society Can’t Move So Much as a Chair!’”

54 Plank et al., “Doing More with Less”; Görg et al., “Scrutinizing the Great Acceleration”; Görg et al., “Challenges for Social-Ecological Transformations.”

55 Plank et al., “Doing More with Less”; Haberl et al., “Stocks, Flows, Services and Practices.”

56 Haberl et al., “Stocks, Flows, Services and Practices,” 3.

57 Zeng et al., “Environmental Destruction.”

58 Haberl et al., “Stocks, Flows, Services and Practices.”

59 Haberl et al., “Stocks, Flows, Services and Practices.”

60 While the SFS nexus develops a holistic understanding of the services offered and expected, putting focus on societal structures, the SFP nexus analyzes how individuals’ habits and modes of living drive demand for specific flows and stocks.

61 Plank et al., “Doing More with Less.”

62 Plank et al., “Doing More with Less,” 4.

63 Durand-Folco, Fourier, and Tremblay-Pepin, “Redéfinir démocratiquement les besoins.”

64 Polanyi, Karl, Great Transformation.

65 Castoriadis, “The Greek Polis.”

66 Castoriadis, “The Greek Polis.”

67 An idea that could realize the notion of metabolic self-limitation developed in Legault, Planification démocratique.

68 Akbulut and Adaman, “Ecological Economics.”

Additional information

Funding

This article draws on research supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, file number 430-2020-00871.

Notes on contributors

Krystof Beaucaire

Krystof Beaucaire is currently completing his master’s degree in sociology at the Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM) in Montreal, Quebec, Canada.

Joëlle Saey-Volckrick

Joëlle Saey-Volckrick (she/her) is a lecturer in Ecological Economics at the Berlin School of Economics and Law and an independent researcher. She is also the coordinator of a food cooperative in Grenoble, France.

Simon Tremblay-Pepin

Simon Tremblay-Pepin teaches at the Élisabeth Bruyère School of Social Innovation at Saint Paul University, in Ottawa, Ontario, Canada.