HUMAN ECOLOGY AS AN INTERDISCIPLINARY CONCEPT
31
and ‘system oriented’, reflecting man’s organizational and innovative
abilities”, that “in their quest to organize themselves and natural
resources in response to economic needs, men began by institutionalizing
economic relationships”. Some sort of equilibrium is recognized also by
Green in his statement that “within the institutional structure of the
market, the economic phenomena of supply and demand are coordinated
and ‘balanced out’ through functioning of the price mechanism”.
The above examples do not mark the beginning of the association
between economics and ecology, only recent examples from the standpoint of the economist. Here again is the (previously noted) historically
intertwined development of two disciplines that are here being examined
with a view toward integration. Economics and ecology have long
exhibited conceptual interdependence. Darwin, for example, took some
of his basic (ecological) ideas from the economist Malthus: they shared
concern over “the struggle for existence”. Wells et al. (1931) clearly
defined ecology in terms of economics and economics in terms of
ecology: “ecology is really an extension of economics to the whole world
of life” and “economics, therefore, is merely human ecology, it is the
narrow and special study of the ecology of the very extraordinary
community in which we live”.
Economists are apparently unaware of the early role played by
economics in the development of human ecology. All of the comparisons
and connections attempted by economists (as reviewed above) seem to
have been between economics and biological ecology.
Parallels and the cross-fertilization of concepts between economics
and human ecology (though one-sided) certainly go back as far as the
beginning text by Park and Burgess (1921), to the early works of Park
(e.g. 1936a, b) and especially to the works of McKenzie (especially
1926). Park, for example, summarized the ecologist’s interest in change
as interest in “the movements of population and of artifacts (commodities) and changes in location and occupation-any sort of change,
in fact, which affects an existing division of labor . . .” McKenzie (1926)
early claimed that “communal growth and structure are largely functions
of ecological distance as a time-cost concept . . . and a response to
distance in the local movements of commodities and people”. He
classified ecological factors into four general categories, one of them
economic: “a wide range and variety of phenomena such as the nature
and organization of local industries, occupational distribution, and
standard of living of the population”.
So, a tradition of sorts does exist for the correlation of economics with
human ecology; acceptance and implementation on a meaningful scale
is something else. The relationships between these two disciplines (or
concepts) are too often put in the form of ecology versus economics; this
31
and ‘system oriented’, reflecting man’s organizational and innovative
abilities”, that “in their quest to organize themselves and natural
resources in response to economic needs, men began by institutionalizing
economic relationships”. Some sort of equilibrium is recognized also by
Green in his statement that “within the institutional structure of the
market, the economic phenomena of supply and demand are coordinated
and ‘balanced out’ through functioning of the price mechanism”.
The above examples do not mark the beginning of the association
between economics and ecology, only recent examples from the standpoint of the economist. Here again is the (previously noted) historically
intertwined development of two disciplines that are here being examined
with a view toward integration. Economics and ecology have long
exhibited conceptual interdependence. Darwin, for example, took some
of his basic (ecological) ideas from the economist Malthus: they shared
concern over “the struggle for existence”. Wells et al. (1931) clearly
defined ecology in terms of economics and economics in terms of
ecology: “ecology is really an extension of economics to the whole world
of life” and “economics, therefore, is merely human ecology, it is the
narrow and special study of the ecology of the very extraordinary
community in which we live”.
Economists are apparently unaware of the early role played by
economics in the development of human ecology. All of the comparisons
and connections attempted by economists (as reviewed above) seem to
have been between economics and biological ecology.
Parallels and the cross-fertilization of concepts between economics
and human ecology (though one-sided) certainly go back as far as the
beginning text by Park and Burgess (1921), to the early works of Park
(e.g. 1936a, b) and especially to the works of McKenzie (especially
1926). Park, for example, summarized the ecologist’s interest in change
as interest in “the movements of population and of artifacts (commodities) and changes in location and occupation-any sort of change,
in fact, which affects an existing division of labor . . .” McKenzie (1926)
early claimed that “communal growth and structure are largely functions
of ecological distance as a time-cost concept . . . and a response to
distance in the local movements of commodities and people”. He
classified ecological factors into four general categories, one of them
economic: “a wide range and variety of phenomena such as the nature
and organization of local industries, occupational distribution, and
standard of living of the population”.
So, a tradition of sorts does exist for the correlation of economics with
human ecology; acceptance and implementation on a meaningful scale
is something else. The relationships between these two disciplines (or
concepts) are too often put in the form of ecology versus economics; this