Climate Change: Economics, Ethics, and Population
Semester 1 2020, Australian National University
Main Texts
John Broome, Climate Matters: Ethics in a Warming World, Norton (2012)
Derek Parfit, Reasons and Persons, Oxford UP (1984)
Weekly Topics and Readings
Only numbered Readings are Required
March 11: Justice, Goodness, and Individual Ethics
1. William Nordhaus, The Ethics of Efficient Markets and Commons Tragedies: A Review of John Broome's Climate Matters, Journal of Economic Literature (2014)
Optional:
John Broome, chapters 4 and 5 of Climate Matters, Norton (2012)
Julia Nefsky, "Climate Change and Inefficacy: A Dilemma for the Expected Utility Approach, and The Need for an Imperfect View", in Budolfson, McPherson, and Plunkett eds. Climate Change and Philosophy, Oxford UP (forthcoming)
March 18: Justice, Goodness, and Economic Analysis of Public Policy
1. John Broome, chapter 3 of Climate Matters, Norton (2012)
Optional:
Carbon Pricing 101, Resources for the Future
William Nordhaus, A Question of Balance, Yale UP (2007)
History of global economic inequality, and some of its important consequences for today, from ourworldindata.org
March 25: Aggregating Goodness, Social Welfare Functions, and Economic Analysis of Publc Policy
1. John Broome, chapter 6 of Climate Matters, Norton (2012)
Optional:
Francis Dennig et al. Inequality, climate impacts on the future poor, and carbon prices, PNAS (2015)
William Nordhaus, DICE 2016 model
Matthew Adler, Measuring Social Welfare, Oxford UP (2019)
April 1: Maximizing Expected Value vs. Precautionary Objectives for Policy
1. John Broome, chapter 7 of Climate Matters, Norton (2012)
Optional:
Stephen Gardiner, A Core Precautionary Principle, Journal of Political Philosophy (2006)
Lara Buchak, Weighing the Risks of Climate Change, The Monist (2019)
April 8: Discounting
1. John Broome, chapter 8 of Climate Matters, Norton (2012)
Optional:
Ken Arrow, Discounting, Morality, and Gaming, in Portney and Weyant eds., Discounting and Intergenerational Equity, Resources for the Future (1999)
Hilary Greaves, Discounting for Public Policy: A Survey, Economics and Philosophy (2017)
April 15: No Class, Spring Break
April 22: Valuing Life and Death
1. John Broome, chapter 9 of Climate Matters, Norton (2012)
2. Excel worksheet on utilitarianism and different monetizations of deaths for rich vs. poor
Optional:
ABC discussion of COVID-19, with some discussion of tradeoffs between lives and financial wealth
Cass Sunstein, intro and chapters 2-5 of Valuing Life, U Chicago Press (2014)
John Broome, Weighing Lives, Oxford UP (2004)
April 29: Population Ethics and Climate Change
1. John Broome, chapter 10 of Climate Matters, Norton (2012)
Optional:
May 6: Population Ethics: The Repugnant Conclusion and Non-Identity Problem
1. Derek Parfit, pp. 351-390 of Reasons and Persons, Oxford UP (1984)
Optional:
Melinda Roberts, The Nonidentity Problem, Stanford Encyclopedia of Philosophy (2009,2019)
Gustaf Arrhenius, An impossibility theorem for welfarist axiologies, Economics and Philosophy (2000)
Gustaf Arrhenius, Mark Budolfson, and Dean Spears, Does Climate Change Policy Depend Importantly on Population Ethics? Deflationary Responses to the Challenges of Population Ethics for Public Policy, in Budolfson, Plunkett, and McPherson eds., Climate Change and Philosophy, Oxford UP (forthcoming)
May 13: Population Ethics: Mere Addition Paradox, Sadistic Conclusion, Very Repugnant Conclusion
1. Derek Parfit, pp. 390-454 of Reasons and Persons, Oxford UP (1984)
Optional:
Mark Budolfson and Dean Spears, Why the repugnant conclusion is inescapable, working paper
Hilary Greaves, Population Axiology, Philosophy Compass (2017)
May 20: Population Ethics: Pareto-Dominance and Different Number Cases
1. John Broome, Efficiency and Future Generations, Economics and Philosophy (2018)
2. Michal Masny, section VI.3 (ie only pp. 131-133) of On Parfit's Wide Dual Person-Affecting Principle, Philosophical Quarterly (2019)
May 27: Population Ethics Continued
Optional:
Mark Fleurbaey, Maddalena Ferranna, et al. The Social Cost of Carbon: Valuing Inequality, Risk, and Population for Climate Policy, The Monist (2019)
Mark Budolfson and Dean Spears, Public Policy, Consequentialism, the Environment, and Non-Human Animals, in Portmore ed. Oxford Handbook of Consequentialism, Oxford UP (forthcoming)
June 17: Buchak on Climate Change, Risk, and Precaution
1. Lara Buchak, Weighing the Risks of Climate Change, The Monist (2019)
Optional:
Lara Buchak, Taking Risks Behind the Veil of Ignorance, Ethics (2017)
Lara Buchak, Why high-risk, non-expected-utility-maximizing gambles can be rational and beneficial: The case of HIV cure studies, Journal of Medical Ethics (2016)
June 27: Final Paper Due via email at 11:59pm Canberra Time
Further Reading
Further Reading: Science, Impacts, Adaptation, Mitigation
David Archer, The Long Thaw: How Humans are Changing the Next 100,000 Years of Earth's Climate, Princeton UP (2016)
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), "Technical Summary [of the Physical Science Basis]", in Climate Change 2013: The Physical Science Basis, Cambridge UP (2013)
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), "Technical Summary [of Impacts]", in Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, Cambridge UP (2014)
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), "Technical Summary [of Mitigation]", in Climate Change 2014: Mitigation of Climate Change, Cambridge UP (2014)
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), discussion of cobenefits, Section 11.9 of Climate Change 2014: Impacts, Adaptation, and Vulnerability, Cambridge UP (2014)
David Archer and Stefan Rahmstorf, selection on "The Band Saturation Effect", in The Climate Crisis, Cambridge UP (2010)
Historical Temperature Change Video from berkeleyearth.org
Further Reading: Ethics and Philosophy
United Nations, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (1992)
Climate Equity Reference Project
Gardiner, Caney, Jamieson, and Shue eds. Climate Ethics, Oxford UP (2010)
Budolfson, McPherson, Plunkett eds., Climate Change and Philosophy, Oxford UP (forthcoming)
Other ethics and climate change monographs and anthologies:
Further Reading: Climate Economics
General Climate Economics:
Carbon Pricing 101, Resources for the Future
Nicholas Stern et al., The Economics of Climate Change: The Stern Review, Cambridge UP (2007)
Estimating Climate Damages:
William Nordhaus, "Summary for the Concerned Citizen", in A Question of Balance, Yale UP (2008)
Delavane Diaz and Frances Moore, "Quantifying the Economic Risks of Climate Change", Nature Climate Change (2017)
Frances Moore and Delavane Diaz, "Temperature Impacts on economic growth warrant stringent mitigation policy", Nature Climate Change (2015)
William Nordhaus and Paul Sztorc, DICE 2013 Manual (2014)
Solomon Hsiang et al. Estimating Damage from Climate Change in the United States, Science (2017)
National Academies of Science, Engineering, and Medicine, Valuing Climate Damages, USA
Inequalities:
Thomas Schelling, Notes on Personal Ranking [of Responses to Climate Change], in Lomborg ed. Smart Solutions to Climate Change, Cambridge UP (2010)
Francis Dennig et al. Inequality, climate impacts on the future poor, and carbon prices, PNAS (2015)
Frances Moore and Delavane Diaz, Temperature Impacts on economic growth warrant stringent mitigation policy, Nature Climate Change (2015)
Matthew Adler, Measuring Social Welfare, Oxford UP (2019)
Discounting:
Kenneth Arrow et al., Intertemporal Equity, Discounting, and Economic Efficiency, in Climate Change 1995: Economic and Social Dimensions of Climate Change
Ken Arrow et al., Should governments use a declinging discount rate in policy analysis?, Review of Environmental Economics and Policy (2014)
Risk and Precaution:
Gernot Wagner and Martin Weitzman, Climate Shock, Princeton UP (2015)
Cass Sunstein, Laws of Fear: Beyond the Precautionary Principle, Cambridge UP (2005)
Revenue Recycling:
Carbon Pricing Calculator, Resources for the Future
Health Co-Benefits:
Noah Scovronick et al., The impact of human health co-benefits on evaluations of global climate policy, Nature Communications (2019)
Political Economy and the 'Pre-Paris Top-Down Approach to International Action (ie seeking a Kyoto-like international treaty):
Joseph Aldy and Robert Stavins eds., Architectures for Agreement, Cambridge UP (2007)
Scott Barrett, Environment and Statecraft, Oxford UP (2007)
Political Economy and the 'Post-Paris Bottom-Up Approach to International Action':
Cass Sunstein, "US Should Act Unilaterally on Climate Change", Bloomberg View (2013)