The ecological-distributional conflicts and sustainability indicators

Abstract

The author studies the social and economic metabolism, in terms of materials and energy flows and of the production of residues, and classifies and studies the corresponding environmental conflicts. He then presents a typology of conflicts on the use of natural resources and on contamination. We call Political Ecology the study of those ecological-distributive conflicts. The actors of such conflicts use diverse languages of appraisal. For example, they can argue that they want to achieve an equivalent monetary compensation to the environmental damages suffered, but also they can say that the territory in question is sacred or they can appeal to the defense of the human rights or of native collective rights, or they can insist on ecological values that cannot be really aforesaid in money. The Ecological Economy studies the relations between economic growth and the environment. From the point of view of «strong» sustainability, that requires the use of physical indicators such as the HANPP or the Materials Flows Accounting. This article intends to show that the ecological-distributive conflicts can be explained and even predicted by those physical indicators of (in)sustainability.