IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/now/jnlsbe/102.00000065t.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

The Impacts of Other-Regarding Preferences and Ethical Choice on Environmental Outcomes: A Review of the Literature

Author

Listed:
  • Van Long, Ngo

Abstract

This paper reviews the literature concerning the impacts of other-regarding preferences and ethical choice on environmental outcomes when agents behave strategically. We consider two types of other-regarding preferences: (i) envy or status concern, (ii) altruism and inequality aversion. We contrast these preference-based approaches with the ethical approach in which some choices are made on ethical ground and thus are not necessarily utility-maximizing. Models exhibiting other-regarding preferences do not yield unambiguous results concerning the effects of strategic behavior on the environment. In contrast, models in which choices are motivated by Kantian ethics display more robust results.

Suggested Citation

  • Van Long, Ngo, 2016. "The Impacts of Other-Regarding Preferences and Ethical Choice on Environmental Outcomes: A Review of the Literature," Strategic Behavior and the Environment, now publishers, vol. 6(1-2), pages 1-35, December.
    • Handle: RePEc:now:jnlsbe:102.00000065t
    DOI: 10.1561/102.00000065
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1561/102.00000065
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://libkey.io/10.1561/102.00000065?utm_source=ideas
    LibKey link: if access is restricted and if your library uses this service, LibKey will redirect you to where you can use your library subscription to access this item
    ---><---

    Other versions of this item:

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Chander, Parkash & Tulkens, Henry, 2006. "Cooperation, Stability and Self-Enforcement in International Environmental Agreements: A Conceptual Discussion," Coalition Theory Network Working Papers 12170, Fondazione Eni Enrico Mattei (FEEM).
    2. Gary Charness & Matthew Rabin, 2002. "Understanding Social Preferences with Simple Tests," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 117(3), pages 817-869.
    3. Figuières, Charles & Long, Ngo Van & Tidball, Mabel, 2017. "The MBR intertemporal choice criterion and Rawls’ just savings principle," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 85(C), pages 11-22.
    4. Van Long, Ngo & McWhinnie, Stephanie F., 2012. "The tragedy of the commons in a fishery when relative performance matters," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 140-154.
    5. Lange, Andreas & Vogt, Carsten, 2003. "Cooperation in international environmental negotiations due to a preference for equity," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 87(9-10), pages 2049-2067, September.
    6. Effrosyni Diamantoudi & Eftichios S. Sartzetakis, 2006. "Stable International Environmental Agreements: An Analytical Approach," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 8(2), pages 247-263, May.
    7. World Commission on Environment and Development,, 1987. "Our Common Future," OUP Catalogue, Oxford University Press, number 9780192820808.
    8. Geir Asheim & Bjart Holtsmark, 2009. "Renegotiation-Proof Climate Agreements with Full Participation: Conditions for Pareto-Efficiency," Environmental & Resource Economics, Springer;European Association of Environmental and Resource Economists, vol. 43(4), pages 519-533, August.
    9. Naoto Jinji, 2013. "Is Corporate Environmentalism Good for Domestic Welfare?," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 21(5), pages 901-911, November.
    10. David Card & Alexandre Mas & Enrico Moretti & Emmanuel Saez, 2012. "Inequality at Work: The Effect of Peer Salaries on Job Satisfaction," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 102(6), pages 2981-3003, October.
    11. Maxwell, John W & Lyon, Thomas P & Hackett, Steven C, 2000. "Self-Regulation and Social Welfare: The Political Economy of Corporate Environmentalism," Journal of Law and Economics, University of Chicago Press, vol. 43(2), pages 583-617, October.
    12. Samuel Bowles & Yongjin Park, 2005. "Emulation, Inequality, and Work Hours: Was Thorsten Veblen Right?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 115(507), pages 397-412, November.
    13. Yanase, Akihiko, 2013. "Corporate Environmentalism in Dynamic Oligopoly," Strategic Behavior and the Environment, now publishers, vol. 3(3), pages 223-250, March.
    14. Lange, Andreas & Vogt, Carsten & Ziegler, Andreas, 2007. "On the importance of equity in international climate policy: An empirical analysis," Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(3), pages 545-562, May.
    15. Martinet, V. & Doyen, L., 2007. "Sustainability of an economy with an exhaustible resource: A viable control approach," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 29(1), pages 17-39, January.
    16. Ngo Long & Vincent Martinet, 2018. "Combining rights and welfarism: a new approach to intertemporal evaluation of social alternatives," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 50(1), pages 35-64, January.
    17. Nakamura, Masao & Takahashi, Takuya & Vertinsky, Ilan, 2001. "Why Japanese Firms Choose to Certify: A Study of Managerial Responses to Environmental Issues," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 42(1), pages 23-52, July.
    18. Pierre von Mouche & Federico Quartieri (ed.), 2016. "Equilibrium Theory for Cournot Oligopolies and Related Games," Springer Series in Game Theory, Springer, number 978-3-319-29254-0, March.
    19. Erzo F. P. Luttmer, 2005. "Neighbors as Negatives: Relative Earnings and Well-Being," The Quarterly Journal of Economics, President and Fellows of Harvard College, vol. 120(3), pages 963-1002.
    20. Cairns, Robert D. & Martinet, Vincent, 2014. "An environmental-economic measure of sustainable development," European Economic Review, Elsevier, vol. 69(C), pages 4-17.
    21. Ostrom, Elinor & Walker, James & Gardner, Roy, 1992. "Covenants with and without a Sword: Self-Governance Is Possible," American Political Science Review, Cambridge University Press, vol. 86(2), pages 404-417, June.
    22. Long, Ngo Van & Wang, Shengzu, 2009. "Resource-grabbing by status-conscious agents," Journal of Development Economics, Elsevier, vol. 89(1), pages 39-50, May.
    23. Parkash Chander & Henry Tulkens, 2006. "A Core-Theoretic Solution for the Design of Cooperative Agreements on Transfrontier Pollution," Springer Books, in: Parkash Chander & Jacques Drèze & C. Knox Lovell & Jack Mintz (ed.), Public goods, environmental externalities and fiscal competition, chapter 0, pages 176-193, Springer.
    24. Elinor Ostrom, 2000. "Collective Action and the Evolution of Social Norms," Journal of Economic Perspectives, American Economic Association, vol. 14(3), pages 137-158, Summer.
    25. Urs Fischbacher & Simon Gachter, 2010. "Social Preferences, Beliefs, and the Dynamics of Free Riding in Public Goods Experiments," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 100(1), pages 541-556, March.
    26. Charles D. Kolstad, 2014. "International Environmental Agreements among Heterogeneous Countries with Social Preferences," NBER Working Papers 20204, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    27. Andreoni, James, 1990. "Impure Altruism and Donations to Public Goods: A Theory of Warm-Glow Giving?," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 100(401), pages 464-477, June.
    28. d'Autume, Antoine & Hartwick, John M. & Schubert, Katheline, 2010. "The zero discounting and maximin optimal paths in a simple model of global warming," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 59(2), pages 193-207, March.
    29. Effrosyni Diamantoudi & Eftichios Sartzetakis, 2015. "International environmental agreements: coordinated action under foresight," Economic Theory, Springer;Society for the Advancement of Economic Theory (SAET), vol. 59(3), pages 527-546, August.
    30. Barnett,William A. & Moulin,Hervé & Salles,Maurice & Schofield,Norman J. (ed.), 1995. "Social Choice, Welfare, and Ethics," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521443401.
    31. Theodore C. Bergstrom & Rodney J. Garratt & Damien Sheehan-Connor, 2009. "One Chance in a Million: Altruism and the Bone Marrow Registry," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 99(4), pages 1309-1334, September.
    32. Carraro, Carlo & Siniscalco, Domenico, 1993. "Strategies for the international protection of the environment," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 52(3), pages 309-328, October.
    33. R. M. Solow, 1974. "Intergenerational Equity and Exhaustible Resources," The Review of Economic Studies, Review of Economic Studies Ltd, vol. 41(5), pages 29-45.
    34. Kemp, Murray C., 1984. "A note of the theory of international transfers," Economics Letters, Elsevier, vol. 14(2-3), pages 259-262.
    35. Murray C. Kemp & Ngo Van Long, 2009. "Foreign Aid in the Presence of Corruption: Differential Games among Donors," Review of International Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 17(SI), pages 230-243, May.
    36. Sara J. Solnick & David Hemenway, 2005. "Are Positional Concerns Stronger in Some Domains than in Others?," American Economic Review, American Economic Association, vol. 95(2), pages 147-151, May.
    37. Kenneth Stollery, 1998. "Constant Utility Paths and Irreversible Global Warming," Canadian Journal of Economics, Canadian Economics Association, vol. 31(3), pages 730-742, August.
    38. Alvarez-Cuadrado, Francisco & Van Long, Ngo, 2011. "Relative consumption and renewable resource extraction under alternative property-rights regimes," Resource and Energy Economics, Elsevier, vol. 33(4), pages 1028-1053.
    39. Charles D. Kolstad, 2011. "Public Goods Agreements with Other-Regarding Preferences," NBER Working Papers 17017, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    40. Kjell Arne Brekke & Richard B. Howarth, 2002. "Status, Growth and the Environment," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 2160.
    41. J. Solnick, Sara & Hemenway, David, 1998. "Is more always better?: A survey on positional concerns," Journal of Economic Behavior & Organization, Elsevier, vol. 37(3), pages 373-383, November.
    42. Carraro,Carlo & Siniscalco,Domenico (ed.), 1997. "New Directions in the Economic Theory of the Environment," Cambridge Books, Cambridge University Press, number 9780521590891.
    43. Lutz, Stefan & Lyon, Thomas P & Maxwell, John W, 2000. "Quality Leadership When Regulatory Standards Are Forthcoming," Journal of Industrial Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 48(3), pages 331-348, September.
    44. Kolstad Charles D, 2010. "Equity, Heterogeneity and International Environmental Agreements," The B.E. Journal of Economic Analysis & Policy, De Gruyter, vol. 10(2), pages 1-17, October.
    45. de Fraja, Giovanni & Delbono, Flavio, 1989. "Alternative Strategies of a Public Enterprise in Oligopoly," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 41(2), pages 302-311, April.
    46. Ng, Yew-Kwang & Wang, Jianguo, 1993. "Relative income, aspiration, environmental quality, individual and political myopia : Why may the rat-race for material growth be welfare-reducing?," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 26(1), pages 3-23, July.
    47. Olof Johansson-Stenman & Fredrik Carlsson & Dinky Daruvala, 2002. "Measuring Future Grandparents" Preferences for Equality and Relative Standing," Economic Journal, Royal Economic Society, vol. 112(479), pages 362-383, April.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Alistair Ulph & David Ulph, 2023. "International Cooperation and Kantian Moral Behaviour – Complements or Substitutes?," Economics Discussion Paper Series 2302, Economics, The University of Manchester.
    2. Thomas Eichner & Rüdiger Pethig, 2021. "Climate Policy and Moral Consumers," Scandinavian Journal of Economics, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 123(4), pages 1190-1226, October.
    3. Bezin, Emeline & Ponthière, Gregory, 2019. "The tragedy of the commons and socialization: Theory and policy," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 98(C).
    4. Thomas Eichner & Rüdiger Pethig, 2022. "International Environmental Agreements When Countries Behave Morally," CESifo Working Paper Series 10090, CESifo.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Ngo Long & Vincent Martinet, 2018. "Combining rights and welfarism: a new approach to intertemporal evaluation of social alternatives," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 50(1), pages 35-64, January.
    2. Clark, Andrew E. & D'Ambrosio, Conchita, 2014. "Attitudes to Income Inequality: Experimental and Survey Evidence," IZA Discussion Papers 8136, Institute of Labor Economics (IZA).
    3. Marco Vincenzi, 2023. "Mapping the empirical relationship between environmental performance and social preferences: Evidence from macro data," ECONOMICS AND POLICY OF ENERGY AND THE ENVIRONMENT, FrancoAngeli Editore, vol. 2023(1), pages 85-102.
    4. Gary D. Libecap, 2013. "Addressing Global Environmental Externalities: Transaction Costs Considerations," NBER Working Papers 19501, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    5. Rogna, Marco & Vogt, Carla, 2020. "Coalition formation with optimal transfers when players are heterogeneous and inequality averse," Ruhr Economic Papers 865, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    6. Gary D. Libecap, 2014. "Addressing Global Environmental Externalities: Transaction Costs Considerations," Journal of Economic Literature, American Economic Association, vol. 52(2), pages 424-479, June.
    7. Thomas Aronsson & Sugata Ghosh & Ronald Wendner, 2023. "Positional preferences and efficiency in a dynamic economy," Social Choice and Welfare, Springer;The Society for Social Choice and Welfare, vol. 61(2), pages 311-337, August.
    8. Van Long, Ngo & McWhinnie, Stephanie F., 2012. "The tragedy of the commons in a fishery when relative performance matters," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 81(C), pages 140-154.
    9. Eckerstorfer, Paul & Wendner, Ronald, 2013. "Asymmetric and non-atmospheric consumption externalities, and efficient consumption taxation," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 42-56.
    10. Paul Eckerstorfer, 2014. "Relative Consumption Concerns and the Optimal Tax Mix," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 16(6), pages 936-958, December.
    11. Johansson-Stenman, Olof & Sterner, Thomas, 2015. "Discounting and relative consumption," Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, Elsevier, vol. 71(C), pages 19-33.
    12. Aronsson, Thomas & Johansson-Stenman, Olof, 2015. "Keeping up with the Joneses, the Smiths and the Tanakas: On international tax coordination and social comparisons," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 131(C), pages 71-86.
    13. Rafat Beigpoor Shahrivar & Duesterhoeft, Ilka & Rogna, Marco & Vogt, Carla, 2023. "A mechanism of proportional contributions for public good games," Ruhr Economic Papers 990, RWI - Leibniz-Institut für Wirtschaftsforschung, Ruhr-University Bochum, TU Dortmund University, University of Duisburg-Essen.
    14. Ronald Wendner, 2014. "Ramsey, Pigou, Heterogeneous Agents, and Nonatmospheric Consumption Externalities," Journal of Public Economic Theory, Association for Public Economic Theory, vol. 16(3), pages 491-521, June.
    15. Wendner, Ronald & Goulder, Lawrence H., 2008. "Status effects, public goods provision, and excess burden," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 92(10-11), pages 1968-1985, October.
    16. Charles D. Kolstad, 2014. "International Environmental Agreements among Heterogeneous Countries with Social Preferences," NBER Working Papers 20204, National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc.
    17. Yao-Yu Chih, 2018. "Status competition and benevolence in social networks," Oxford Economic Papers, Oxford University Press, vol. 70(1), pages 141-162.
    18. Hartwick, John M. & Long, Ngo Van, 2018. "Sustainability with endogenous discounting when utility depends on consumption and amenities," Mathematical Social Sciences, Elsevier, vol. 95(C), pages 31-36.
    19. Clément Bellet, 2017. "Essays on Inequality, Social Preferences and Consumer Behavior," Sciences Po publications info:hdl:2441/vbu6kd1s68o, Sciences Po.
    20. Cairns, Robert D. & Del Campo, Stellio & Martinet, Vincent, 2019. "Sustainability of an economy relying on two reproducible assets," Journal of Economic Dynamics and Control, Elsevier, vol. 101(C), pages 145-160.

    More about this item

    Keywords

    Corporate governance; Kantian equilibrium; other-regarding preferences; positional externalities;
    All these keywords.

    JEL classification:

    • Q31 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Nonrenewable Resources and Conservation - - - Demand and Supply; Prices
    • Q42 - Agricultural and Natural Resource Economics; Environmental and Ecological Economics - - Energy - - - Alternative Energy Sources

    Statistics

    Access and download statistics

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:now:jnlsbe:102.00000065t. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: Lucy Wiseman (email available below). General contact details of provider: http://www.nowpublishers.com/ .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.