In the Long Run We are All in Equilibrium: Neoclassical Thought and Early Climate Change Research

• In Event: Theory Section Refereed Roundtables
  In Refereed Roundtable (60 minute): Table 2

Abstract

Status-quo climate policy is based on a rationalized future in which minimal market adjustments yield “optimal” long-run conditions. I historically locate this neoclassical temporality in orthodox American economics during the 1970s – particularly with the early work of William Nordhaus. Drawing on psychoanalysis, the neoclassical assumptions and models are means of gaining mastery over and uncertain future and that economists identify with homo economicus. To further explain the temporality, I discuss two processes: establishing 1.) rules of the game and 2.) technocratic competition in which neoclassical rules were at odds with some scientist’s frameworks. In this context, Nordhaus approached the “CO2 problem.” His climate-macroeconomic framework based on cost/benefits rendered an unknowable future into something experts can confidently manage in predicable ways. This rational mode of thought is underpinned by irrational forces. It legitimates a market order and arguably contributes to political paralysis in the face of a climate emergency.

Author

• Matthew Soener, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign