Free-Market Environmentalism

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What would happen if the government stopped caring about the environment? How much would the people care?

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The government doesn't care about the environment, it cares only about being elected.

People would care just the same on issues of pollution and conservation and whatnot. Little less on the green corporatism.

Enforce property rights thru the courts and make companies that pollute pay for the damage they do.

Neither the state or corporations care about the environment. We will need to do away with both.

And replace them with what?

ruveyn

Cooperative enterprises

Only those who take care of the environment, care for it. Many care for the environment emotionally, but the most they do is "like" green movements on facebook, or buy something on the basis that they are supporting a sustainable or green cause. Only to send it to a land fill and not recycle it.

Public and private actors make it so easy to feel good about one's meaningless contributions to the environment. The government will applaud the rainforest's that your taxpayer dollars subsidize, and corporations will even let you help them become more green by mailing in stubs from the packaging so that they will opt for green-sources of energy.

But your not really "doing" anything for the environment, and certainly not doing enough. It's similar to people who feel saintly from giving a homeless some loose change in their pocket. It's so easy to feel good without actually doing much of it.

And how would that solve any environmental problems?

Businesses wouldn't have dictators who are encouraged to screw the environment due to the large profits involved.

The number one problem when it comes to the environment is the free-rider problem.

A cooperative enterprise would likely face much higher transaction costs in defending the environment (at least when the potential environmental problem increases in scale) than a central government (regulation) or market (cap and trade) approach.

Elinor Ostrom provided examples of successful cooperative enterprises in her seminal Governing The Commons, but she also provided examples of blatant failures. One recurring problem was the absence of clear boundaries and memberships, a problem which is likely to increase with the size of the environmental problem.

If the problem is anthropogenic climate change, for instance, you'd pretty much need to have a cooperative enterprise of 7 billion people.

Not a solution. I have worked with cooperatives before (including Rochdale Cooperatives). Invariably there is some string willed or articulate person in the management that takes the point and leads the rest. Most people are followers.

ruveyn