Scientists are urging governments to ditch GDP as an indicator of policy success and adopt a more wholistic measure of the health of an economy.
A research paper out of the United Kingdom argues GDP ignores the wider implications of development and provides no information on the ability to live within the planet’s “safe operating space”.
Lead author Ian Townend, of the University of Southampton, said the researchers were calling for a new “Resilience Index” to inform policy decisions.
“Resilience is about the ability of a system to prepare for, resist, recover and adapt to disturbances in order to function successfully,” Professor Townend said.
“This invites us to take a more holistic view, accommodating both human and natural components of complex systems that extend across environmental, social and economic domains.”
Professor Townend said Gross Domestic Product (GDP) was adopted to guide progress when the Great Depression of the 1930s led to a need for economic growth.
He said since then, it had become one of the most significant policy indicators.
“But there is increasing concern about our use of resources on a finite planet and the growing and interacting pressures of pollution, biodiversity loss and climate change.”
Professor Townend said that’s prompted scientists to consider a “safe operating space” that ensured humanity had an adequate social foundation, while remaining within sustainable ecological limits, also known as planetary boundaries.
“As we encroach on planetary boundaries, the number of organisms an ecosystem can support is reduced.
“Similarly, if we don’t address inequality, embark on conflict, or suffer major disasters, our social foundations are diminished.”
He said a Resilience Index could help policy makers to steer a course through this safe operating space.
Read the full paper: Framing resilience to manage complex environmental systems.
