Human well‐being and climate change mitigation

By W. Lamb, J. Steinberger. 2017

181 citations recorded by the source corpus.

Climate change mitigation research is fundamentally motivated by the preservation of human lives and the environmental conditions which enable them. However, the field has to date rather superficial in its appreciation of theoretical claims in well‐being thought, with deep implications for the framing of mitigation priorities, policies, and research. Major strands of well‐being thought are hedonic well‐being—typically referred to as happiness or subjective well‐being—and eudaimonic well‐being, which includes theories of human needs, capabilities, and multidimensional poverty. Aspects of each can be found in political and procedural accounts such as the Sustainable Development Goals. Situating these concepts within the challenges of addressing climate change, the choice of approach is highly consequential for: (1) understanding inter‐ and intra‐generational equity; (2) defining appropriate mitigation strategies; and (3) conceptualizing the socio‐technical provisioning systems that convert biophysical resources into well‐being outcomes. Eudaimonic approaches emphasize the importance of consumption thresholds, beyond which dimensions of well‐being become satiated. Related strands of well‐being and mitigation research suggest constraining consumption to within minimum and maximum consumption levels, inviting normative discussions on the social benefits, climate impacts, and political challenges associated with a given form of provisioning. The question of how current socio‐technical provisioning systems can be shifted towards low‐carbon, well‐being enhancing forms constitutes a new frontier in mitigation research, involving not just technological change and economic incentives, but wide‐ranging social, institutional, and cultural shifts. WIREs Clim Change 2017, 8:e485. doi: 10.1002/wcc.485

Subfields: Health, Toxicology and Mutagenesis, Management, Monitoring, Policy and Law, Social Psychology

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/2ed2312852c7114ba89570590032cb03dcf82dc2

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Citations in the corpus

A systematic review of the evidence on decoupling of GDP, resource use and GHG emissions, part II: synthesizing the insights (2020, background): “…demand-side measures consistent with provision of services that are vital for social well-being is at the core of a currently emerging research community (Cullen et al 2011, Creutzig et al 2016, 2018, BrandCorrea and Steinberger 2017, Carmona et al 2017, Lamb and Steinberger 2017, Vita et al 2019).”
Demand-side solutions to climate change mitigation consistent with high levels of well-being (2021, unknown): “A widely perceived divide separates well-being concepts into three broad camps: preference satisfaction, hedonic and eudaimonic positions 9,109,10 with diverging implications for climate change mitigation 11,1211,12 .”
Providing decent living with minimum energy: A global scenario (2020, background): “This ‘adaptivity’ has also been criticised for its contrary effects: when people adapt to difficult circumstances this can leave subjective well-being measures obscuring systemic injustices (Lamb and Steinberger, 2017).”
Explaining differential vulnerability to climate change: A social science review (2018, background): “Accordingly, eudaimonic accounts focus on the activities, abilities, or ‘functionings’ (rather than goods) that constitute a well-lived life” (Lamb & Steinberger, 2017, p. 3).”