Environmental Challenges: Justice in Natural Resource Management

This course explores three basic principles when considering natural resource management: The principles of justice Transaction costs The problem of aggregating social preferences, the so-called Arrow impossibility When looking at different societies and cultures around the world, it is interesting how ubiquitous the principles of justice are. It is part of our human nature to think about equality, and consider fairness as something that we do naturally. However, when you start to consider transaction costs and the problems of aggregating social preferences, you soon realise that, in practical terms, equality is hard to achieve. Equality in aggregating social preferences leads to perverse or impossible outcomes. Moreover, if there is equality of decision making for everybody, then the transaction costs are very high. Intrigued? Then sign up for this short course to find out more. Earn credit from the University of Leeds This course is part of the Environmental Challenges program from the University of Leeds. When you complete all five courses in the program and buy a Certificate of Achievement for each, you will be eligible to join a final assessment course that leads to the award of 10 credits from the University of Leeds. Gain a key environmental management skill Each course in the program includes an exercise and revision material to help you develop a skill that is key to working in environmental management – this course focuses on how to write the Terms of Reference for a Strategic Environment Assessment. This course has been certified by the CPD Certification Service as conforming to continuing professional development principles. By completing all aspects of the course you will have achieved 14 hours of CPD time. Choose how you would like to learn If you have a general interest in this topic, you can work through the activities in around three hours each week. You will have the opportunity to check your understanding and spend some time joining the discussions. If you would like to know more about the topic, you can spend up to an extra two hours a week reading the additional materials and watching the videos provided in the ‘Downloads’ and ‘See also’ sections within some course steps. By doing this, you will have the required knowledge to attempt the end of course test. If you have more time to study, you can also complete the optional revision activity and join a live Q&A session in the second week of the course – this will help you when you attempt the end of course test. You will need to allow a further two hours a week to cover the revision tasks.