Introduction: International political economy and the global environment

Abstract

Conventional approaches to political economy, both national and international~ have traditionally focused upon matters relating to man and ignored interactions of humanity with nature, the effects of human action on natural environments, and the reaction of nature to human actions. Certainly this is no longer a defensible practice, either on theoretical or on empirical grounds. The profound dependence of humans on their natural environments--so taken for granted in biology, ecology, and other natural sciences--is only now beginning to be appreciated in the social sciences. And, most certainly, the traditional concerns of political economy cannot be ignored. New concerns do not invalidate the importance of older ones. :\t issue is the expansion of the frontiers of political economy and the extension of our common understanding of matters at the intersection of politics and economics.