Nicholas Stern Ethics , equity and the economics of climate

This paper examines a broad range of ethical perspectives and principles relevant to the analysis of issues raised by the science of climate change and explores their implications. A second and companion paper extends this analysis to the contribution of ethics, economics and politics in understanding policy towards climate change. These tasks must start with the science which tells us that this is a problem of risk management on an immense scale. Risks on this scale take us far outside the familiar policy questions and standard, largely marginal, techniques commonly used by economists; this is a subject that requires the full breadth and depth of what economics has to offer and a much more thoughtful view of ethics than economists usually bring to bear. Different philosophical approaches bring different perspectives on understanding and policy, yet they generally point to the case for strong action to manage climate change. INTRODUCTION: The principal purpose of the two papers in this series is to set out a framework for combining economic and ethical analyses of the issues raised by the science of climate change and to do this in a way that can inform the economics and politics of practical policy discussion and negotiation. All too often one or more of the disciplines of science, philosophy, economics and politics are excluded * My thanks to Christopher Bliss, Alex Bowen, Nancy Cartwright, Raj Chetty, Janet Currie, Angus Deaton, Peter Diamond, Simon Dietz, Ottmar Edenhofer, Cameron Hepburn, Dale Jamieson, Kirit Parikh, Mattia Romani, Amartya Sen, Ioanna Sikiaridi, Michael Spackman, Chris Taylor, Bob Ward, Martin Weitzman and Dimitri Zenghelis for helpful guidance and comments. John Broome has given generously of his guidance on moral philosophy and I am very grateful to him. I am especially grateful to James Rydge for his work on this paper. The editor and referees gave very valuable advice for which I am very grateful. The opinions and views expressed, and any errors, are my own. Some of the ideas were discussed at a meeting of The New York Institute of Philosophy in their project, “New Directions in Political Philosophy” at New York University organised by Samuel Scheffler – I am very grateful for the valuable comments and discussion at that meeting (on 13 th October 2012).