Croissance et Développement durable : Comment concilier économie et écologie au Nord mais aussi au Sud?

The common idea is that the economic theory is not really interested by the environmental issue (that is to say the protection of the nature), as it focuses mainly on the economic growth. This idea is in a large extend untrue. In fact, for many decades, the matter of non-renewable natural resources, as well as the pollution's one (pollution of the air, water, and soil) are subject of important debates among economists. Answers given to these questions naturally vary according to authors and schools of thought. If we put aside the so-called "theory of the decrease", which as yet has had no concrete application, the alternative solutions to the mass-production model are based on the concept of "Eco-development" and, above all, on the one of "Sustainable Development". After having outlined succinctly the different theoretical positions, the article explores the Sustainable Development notion, using on one hand, the economic theory works and, on the other hand, some documents of the international organizations (notably the 1987 Brundtland Report). One of the major questions concerns the well-known dilemma, economy versus ecology (or, in other words, economic growth versus protection of the nature) in developing countries, notably in the poorest among them. The last part of the article which tackles this question shows that Sustainable Development in poor countries is not only an internal challenge for each of them but a crucial stake of North/South international relations.