BUS604: Innovation and Sustainability

In the US context and consistent with the nation's private market principles, most would agree that sustainability policies should strive to achieve desired environmental objectives with the greatest positive economic benefit or at least cost. Another key principle is to strive for fairness and justice - that is, to try to ensure that polices work to reduce inequities or at a minimum do not make current inequities in our society any worse than they currently are. An example of injustice is using low-income neighborhoods or countries as the location for hazardous waste collection to reduce hazardous waste generated in higher-income neighborhoods or nations.

After these principles, most of the pragmatic proponents of sustainability would be supportive of the following policy design features:

1. Use an incremental approach. Policy proponents should recognize that there will be supporters of existing policies who will resist change. An incremental approach respects what exists now; however, it should not be an excuse for either inaction or diversion from longer-term desired objectives.
2. Be ready to change or adjust policies. Policies must be able to adapt to changed conditions. Policies are evaluated once they are vetted and tested after they are implemented; experience provides opportunities for learning and adjustment. The process of adaptive management should guide policy design and implementation.
3. Address problems institutionally on the same scale as the problem. It is desirable to deal with a problem at the smallest domain in which it can be solved. Problems should be addressed by institutions on the same scale as the problem. For example, garbage and recycling collection is mostly a local problem and requires local policies. Garbage disposal and the reuse of recycled materials is a wider area issue and would require multilocal or regional entities to address. Climate stability and energy use are global problems and require global policy instruments and institutions.
4. Address uncertainty by erring on the side of reducing risk of environmental damage when dealing with the possibility of significant environmental damage that is irreversible. Policies should leave a margin of error when dealing with the biophysical environment. Ecosystem dynamics involve considerable uncertainties and could involve irrevocable negative changes. Adopting a precautionary approach would establish a safety margin between the demands placed on ecosystems and best estimates of their capacities.