Discounting the future - A need for a fresh look

Arif S. Malik

doi:10.1109/SYSTEMS.2008.4519004

Discounting the future - A need for a fresh look

Arif S. Malik

Electrical and Computer Engineering

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution

Abstract

The past models of the development process have tended to assume that the 'future will look after itself, whereas, the sustainable development approach acknowledges that the ability of the future to do this can be seriously impaired by actions taken now. It is because of this, the practice of discounting the future, a standard feature of the economic approach to inter-temporal decision-making, is discussed critically in this paper. The paper argues that in the sustainability context we need a systems' thinking approach when discounting the future.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	2008 IEEE International Systems Conference Proceedings, SysCon 2008
Pages	167-170
Number of pages	4
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1109/SYSTEMS.2008.4519004
Publication status	Published - 2008
Event	2008 IEEE International Systems Conference Proceedings, SysCon 2008 - Montreal, QC, Canada Duration: Apr 7 2008 → Apr 10 2008

Other

Other	2008 IEEE International Systems Conference Proceedings, SysCon 2008
Country	Canada
City	Montreal, QC
Period	4/7/08 → 4/10/08

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Keywords

Environmental discounting
Project economic evaluation
Sustainable development

ASJC Scopus subject areas

Control and Systems Engineering

Cite this

Malik, A. S. (2008). Discounting the future - A need for a fresh look. In 2008 IEEE International Systems Conference Proceedings, SysCon 2008 (pp. 167-170). [4519004] https://doi.org/10.1109/SYSTEMS.2008.4519004

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Access to Document

10.1109/SYSTEMS.2008.4519004