Journal of Cleaner Production

Green economy and related concepts: An overview
Eleonore Loiseaua, Laura Saikkub, Riina Antikainen, Nils Drostec, Bernd Hansjürgens, Kati Pitkänen, Pekka Leskinen, Peter Kuikmand, Marianne Thomsene

Abstract

For the last ten years, the notion of a green economy has become increasingly attractive to policy makers. However, green economy covers a lot of diverse concepts and its links with sustainability are not always clear. In this article, we focus on definitions of green economy and related concepts and an evaluation of these concepts against the criterion of strong and weak sustainability. The article serves three purposes: Firstly, we identify and describe diverse theories, concepts, approaches and tools related to a “green economy”. Among these are the theories of environmental economics and ecological economics, the concepts and approaches of cleaner production, waste hierarchy, bio-economy, industrial ecology, circular economy, nature-based solutions, and dematerialization through product-servicizing, and tools like life cycle assessment, and cost-benefit analysis..

Link to the very interesting book => https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0959652616311490