Incommensurability, Environment and Planning: A Response to Hahnel's Reply

Authors

  • John O'Neill University of Manchester, United Kingdom

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.23941/ejpe.v17i2.933

Abstract

This paper responds to Hahnel’s reply to my paper ‘Pluralism, ecology and planning’ in this special issue. It focuses on disagreements concerning value commensurability and growth. It defends the possibility of rational choices in the use of resources in the absence of value commensurability. It defends the claim that the systematic drive for growth in capitalism is a central source of environmental problems and of environmental injustice. It questions Hahnel’s assertion that substitution in production and consumption alone is the only strategy to achieve environmental sustainability. Substitution is necessary but not sufficient. Environmental limits require consumption and production corridors above sufficiency for all but below excess. Those corridors are a condition for meeting the needs of the poor within environmental limits. Both the examination of environmental problems in capitalism and democratic planning require forms of in-kind analysis defended by Neurath and Kapp to address the problem of meeting human needs within environmental limits.

Author Biography

John O'Neill, University of Manchester, United Kingdom

John O'Neill is Professor of Political Economy at Manchester University. He has written widely on philosophy, political economy and environmental policy. His books include Markets, Deliberation and Environment (Routledge, 2007), The Market: Ethics, Knowledge and Politics (Routledge, 1998) and Ecology, Policy and Politics: Human Well-Being and the Natural World (Routledge, 1993). He is co-author of Environmental Values (Routledge, 2008) with Alan Holland and Andrew Light. He has co-authored a number of reports on environmental valuation and on climate change and justice.

Downloads

Published

2025-01-30

How to Cite

O’Neill, J. (2025). Incommensurability, Environment and Planning: A Response to Hahnel’s Reply. Erasmus Journal for Philosophy and Economics, 17(2), 117–124. https://doi.org/10.23941/ejpe.v17i2.933