Introduction to the Special Issues on Societal Metabolism: Blending New Insights from Complex System Thinking with Old Insights from Biophysical Analyses of the Economic Process

Population and Environment -     

SouthNorth Materials Flow: History and Environmental Repercussions

The current literature on the relationship between income and environmental quality is dominated by a notion of an inverted 'U'-shaped curve between both variables. However, a key variable is missing in this kind of study: the extra-territorial environmental effects of national economies. International trade of raw materials may be a good proxy to estimate these 'environmental load displacement' effects. The present work tries to elucidate some patterns in the relationship between economic growth in affluent countries and the quantity of non-renewable materials imported from less-developed countries. The results indicate that a general de-linking between economic growth and Southern resource consumption is not occurring in the industrialized world. Thus, developed countries may be increasingly displacing the environmental costs associated with material throughput to poorer regions of the world.