ECONOMIC-ASPECTS OF INTERDISCIPLINARY ENVIRONMENTAL-RESEARCH

Reducing environmental degradation is of great importance to modern society. The successful specialization of sciences turns out to be an obstacle in dealing with environmental issues. By distinguishing two types of scarcity - relative and absolute scarcity - the authors show the limits of pure economic reasoning. Whereas economics is able to deal with relative scarcity, it is not sufficient to cope with absolute scarcity. The problem of absolute scarcity is only tractable using interdisciplinary approaches. The analysis of industrial developments in the chemical industry illustrates the need to combine knowledge gained from the natural sciences and economics. Further, the authors show the determinants of industrial dynamics in a broader context.