Abstract
Given government’s less than stellar record at protecting the environment, it is hard to put faith in proposals that call for more governmental regulation to ensure environmental quality. Consider the environmental damage caused by governmental central planning in the socialist countries of Eastern Europe and in the Soviet Union prior to their collapse. Economist Mikhail Bernstam estimated that firms in these economies discharged more than twice as much air pollution as firms in Western market economies did.1 Socialistic firms also used three times the energy to produce an equivalent amount of goods produced in Western market economies.2
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Notes
Mikhail S. Bernstam, The Wealth of Nations and the Environment (London, England: Institute of Economic Affairs, 1991), 22.
Gareth W. Dodd, “EPA Report Says U.S. Government Nation’s No. 1 Polluter of Waterways,” U.S.Water News (May 2000): 12.
Holly Lippke Fretwell, Public Lands: The Price We Pay, Public Lands Report No. 1 (Bozeman, MT: Political Economy Research Center,August 1998); and Forests: Do We Get What We Pay For? Public Lands Report No. 2 (Bozeman, MT: Political Economy Research Center, July 1999).
Holly Lippke Fretwell, Federal Estate: Is Bigger Better? Public Lands Report No. 3 (Bozeman, MT: Political Economy Research Center, May 2000), 2.
Traci Watson, “Environmental Groups Wielding Power of the Purse,” USA Today, February 3, 2000.
This term is from the title of Hank Fischer’s book, Wolf Wars:The Remarkable Story of the Restoration of Wolves in Yellowstone (Helena, MT: Falcon Publishing, 1995).
Delta Waterfowl, Delta Waterfowl: Adopt a Pothole Summary Report, Deerfield, Illinois, August 1993.
Donald R. Leal, “Unlocking the Logjam Over Jobs and Endangered Animals,” San Diego Union-Tribune, April 18, 1993.
For a discussion of the difference between federal and state land management, see Donald R. Leal, “Turning a Profit on Public Forests,” PERC Policy Series No. PS-4 (Bozeman, MT: Political Economy Research Center, September 1995).
Linda Platts, “Environmentalists Use Market Tools,” Montana Farmer-Stockman, February 1997, 18.
Lisa Church, “Fun Hogs to Replace Cows in a Utah Monument,” High Country News, February 1, 1999, 4.
Quoted in David Stalling, “Public Elk, Private Lands: Should Landowners Benefit from Elk and Elk Hunting?” Bugle, January–February 1999, 73.
Dennis Glick, David Cowan, Robert Bonnie, David Wilcove, Chris Williams, Dominick Dellasala, and Steve Primm, Incentives for Conserving Open Lands in Greater Yellowstone (Bozeman, MT: Greater Yellowstone, 1998), 8.
Aldo Leopold, “Conservation Economics,” in The River of the Mother of the Mother of God and Other Essays by Aldo Leopold, ed. Susan L. Flader and J. Baird Callicott (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1991 [1934]), 202.
Terry L. Anderson, Vernon L. Smith, and Emily Simmons, “How and Why to Privatize Federal Lands,” Cato Policy Analysis 363, December 9, 1999.
Donald R. Leal and Holly Lippke Fretwell, “Back to the Future to Save Our Parks,” PERC Policy Series No. PS-10 (Bozeman, MT: Political Economy Research Center, June 1997), 9.
Donald R. Leal and Holly Lippke Fretwell, “Parks in Transition:A Look at State Parks,” Bozeman, MT: Political Economy Research Center, June 1997, website: http://www/perc.org/stpk.htm.
John Baden and Richard Stroup, “Saving the Wilderness: A Radical Proposal,” Reason 13 ( July 1981): 28–36.
Presidio Trust, The Presidio Trust Financial Management Program, report to Congress, San Francisco, California, July 8, 1998, 3.
As of May 2000, legislation is pending in Congress to acquire and apply a trust approach to the 95,000–acre Baca Ranch in New Mexico. Generally, when the federal government acquires land, it can spell bad news given its track record of mismanaging resources under its care. In this case, however, an experimental management regime is being provided that is intended to be cost effective and environmentally sensitive.
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Draft Framework for Watershed-Based Trading, EPA 800–R-96–001, Washington, DC: U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, May 1996.
Bruce Yandle, “Environmental Regulation: Lessons from the Past and Future Prospects,” in Breaking the Environmental Gridlock, ed. Terry L. Anderson (Stanford, CA: Hoover Institution Press, 1997), 161–62.
Terry L. Anderson and Donald R. Leal, Enviro-Capitalists: Doing GoodWhile DoingWell (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 1997), 48–52.
Terry L. Anderson and Pamela S. Snyder, Water Markets: Priming the Invisible Pump (Washington, DC: Cato Institute, 1997).
Terry L. Anderson and Alexander James, eds., The Politics and Economics of Park Management (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2001).
Peter S. Menell, “Institutional Fantasylands: From Scientific Management to Free Market Environmentalism,” Harvard Journal of Law and Public Policy 15 (1992): 589–610.
David Schoenbrod, “Protecting the Environment in the Spirit of the Common Law,” in The Common Law and the Environment: Rethinking the Statutory Basis for Modern Environmental Law, ed. Roger E. Meiners and Andrew P. Morriss (Lanham, MD: Rowman and Littlefield Publishers, 2000), 3–24.
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© 2001 Terry L. Anderson and Donald R. Leal
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Anderson, T.L., Leal, D.R. (2001). Purity Versus Pragmatism. In: Free Market Environmentalism. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780312299736_13
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780312299736_13
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