While recognising the contribution of the traditional approaches and the vital role of the economic components of development, this article is an attempt to explore the need for a radical shift from partial understanding of development, as purely economic phenomena, to a comprehensive and integrated appreciation of development as a multidimensional socio-economic process. In an integrated system nothing can be clearly understood and analysed in isolation. Although components of the interconnected system have separate functions, their compositions, cooperative collectiveness, interrelations and interdependencies, that represent the characteristics of the whole, may not be studied and analysed in isolation and require a multidisciplinary or holistic approach.
This paper will discuss a paradigm which considers the economic system as a subsystem of the complex social system. It will emphasise that development research must adopt a holistic approach which considers the political, social, cultural, environmental, religious, geographical, educational and economic dimensions of ecologically sustainable development. It will also argue that the present global conditions necessitate a paradigm shift to include social and moral in addition to economic dimension in development research and studies.
Get full access to this article
View all access options for this article.
References
1.
AcklandN. (1994). Education Research: A Critique and a proposal for a Holistic Approach, Master of Education Studies, University of Queensland, Australia.
2.
AminiA. (1991). OPEC: An Examination of its Economic and Political Role, Master of Economic Dissertation, University of New England, Armidale, Australia.
3.
AshtonJ.LauraR. (1998). Perils of Progress: The Health and Environmental Hazards of Modern Technology, And What Can You Do About Them?University of New South Wales Press, Sydney, Australia.
4.
BatesonG. (1972). Steps to an Ecology of Mind, Ballantine, New York.
5.
BaumolW. (1991). Towards a Newer Economics, The Future Lies Ahead, Economic Journal, 101, January, 1–8.
6.
BellD.KristolI. (1981). The Crisis in Economic Theory, Basic Books, New York.
7.
BerghJ.van denC.J.M. (1996). Ecological Economics and Sustainable Development: Theory, Method and Applications, Edward Elgar, UK and USA.
BouldingK. (1968). Beyond Economics, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor.
10.
BouldingK. (1981). Evolutionary Economics, essays on Society Religion and Ethics, Sage Publications, Beverley Hills, California.
11.
BuarqueC. (1993). The End of Economics? Ethics and the Disorder of Progress, Zed Book Ltd, London and New Jersey.
12.
BurgessR.G. (1993). Research Methods: Issues in Sociology, Nelson, Hong Kong.
13.
CapraF. (1985). The Turning Point: Science Society and the Rising Culture, Flamingo, Glasgow.
14.
CapraF. (1996). The Webs of Life: A New Synthesis of Mind and Matter, Harper Collins Publishers, London.
15.
CapraF.Steindl-RastD.MatusT. (1991). Belonging to the Universe, Harper, San Francisco.
16.
CaldwellB. (1982). Beyond Positivism: Economic Methodology in the Twentieth Century, Allen and Unwin, London.
17.
ColanderD. (1991). Why Aren’t Economists as Important as Garbagemen?Sharpe Publishing, New York.
18.
ColanderD. (1996). Surviving as a Slightly Out of Sync Economist, in MedemaS.G.SamuelsW.J. eds., Foundation of Research in Economics: How Do Economists Do Economics?, Edward Elgar, UK and USA, 37–49.
19.
ColanderD.BrennerR. eds. (1992). Educating Economists, University of Michigan Press, Ann Arbor.
20.
CostanzaR.LowB.S.OstromE.WilsonJ. (2001). Institutions, Ecosystems and Sustainability, Lewis Publishers, Washington, D.C.
21.
DalyH.E. (1999). Ecological Economics and the Ecology of Economics: Essay in Criticism, Edward Elgar, UK and USA
22.
De LeoD.SchmidtkeA.DiekstraR.F.W. eds. (1998). Suicide Prevention: A Holistic Approach, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, Boston, London.
DiekstraR.F.W. (1998). Reflection on the State of Suicidology, in De LeoD.SchmidtkeA.DiekstraR.F.W. eds. (1998). Suicide Prevention: A Holistic Approach, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, Boston, London, 1–13.
25.
DuffyD.DuffyH. eds. (1994). The Holistic Paradigm: Some Australian Exploration, ACSA, Canberra.
26.
EastonD. (1991). The division, Integration, and Tranfere of Knowledge, in EastonD.SchellingC.S. eds., Divided Knowledge: Across Disciplines, Across Cultures, Sage Publication, Newbury Park.
27.
EislerR. (1987). The Calice and the Blade, Harper and Row, San Francisco.
28.
FeyerabendP. (1988). Against Method, Verso, London.
29.
FoxW. (1989). The Deep Ecology—Ecofeminism Debate and its Parallels, Environmental Ethics, No. 11, 5–25.
30.
FoxW. (1990). Toward a Transpersonal Ecology, Shambhala, Boston.
31.
HahnF. (1991). The Next Hundred years, Economic Journal, 101, January, 47–51.
32.
HausmanD.McPhersonM. (1993). Taking Ethics Seriously: Economics and Contemporary Moral Philosophy, Journal of Economic Literature, 31, June, 671–731.
33.
HendersonH. (1978). Creating Alternative Futures, Putnam, New York.
34.
HodgsonG.M. (1993a). Institutional Economics: Surveying the ‘Old’ and the ‘New’, Metroeconomica, 44(1), 1–28.
35.
HodgsonG.M. (1993b). Economics and evolution: Bringing Life Back into Economics, Polity Press, Cambridge.
36.
JohnsonG.L. (1986). Research methodology for Economists: Philosophy and Practice, Macmillan Publishing Company, New York.
37.
KhalilE.L. (1996). Social Theory and Naturalism: An Introduction, in KhalilE.L.BouldingK.E. eds., Evolution, Order and Complexity, Routledge, London and New York, 1–39.
38.
KleinP.A. (1996). How Should Economists Do Economics? A Pragmatic Perspective, in MedemaS.G.SamuelsW.J. eds., Foundation of Research in Economics: How Do Economists Do Economics?Edward Elgar, UK and USA, 122–130.
39.
KuhnT. (1962). The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, Second Edition, International Encyclopaedia of Unified Science, The University of Chicago Press, USA.
40.
LandaJ.T. (1996). Doing the Economics of Trust and Informal Institutions, in MedemaS.G.SamuelsW.J. eds., Foundation of Research in Economics: How Do Economists Do Economics?Edward Elgar, UK and USA, 142–162.
MartinC. (1997). The Holistic Educators: Education for the 21st Century, The Education Heretics Series, Education Heretics Press, Nottingham.
43.
MayerT. (1995). Doing Economic Research: Essays on the Applied Methodology of Economics, Edward Elgar, England.
44.
McCloskeyD.N. (1985). The Rhetoric of Economics, University of Wisconsin Press, Madison.
45.
McNeillP. (1990). Research Methods: Society Now, Routledge, London and New York.
46.
MerchantC. ed. (1994). Ecology, Humanitarian Press, New Jersey.
47.
MorishimaM. (1991). General Equilibrium Theory in the Twenty-First Century, Economic Journal, 101, January, 69–74.
48.
MoshirianF. (1997). National Financial Policies, Global Environmental Damage, and Missing International Institutions, International Journal of Social Economics, 25(6/7/8), 1255–1270.
49.
OgilvieD. (1993). Subverting the Dominant Paradigm, Of Visions and Directions, 6(1), 1–6.
50.
OgilvieD. (1995). Educational Administration: An Holistic Conceptualisation, Australian Council for Educational Administration (ACEA). Monograph series No. 19, Craftsman Press, Burwood.
51.
PencavelJ. (1991). Prospects for Economics, Economic Journal, 101, January, 81–87.
52.
PetersonW. (1994). Silent Depression: The Fate of the American Dream, Norton, New York.
53.
PlottC. (1991). Economics in 2090: The Views of an Experimentalist, Economic Journal, 101, January, 88–93.
54.
PribramK.H. (1996). Interfacing Complexity at a Boundary between the Natural and Social Science, in KhalilE.L.BouldingK.E. eds., Evolution, Order and Complexity, Routledge, London and New York, 40–60.
55.
RawlsJ. (1971). A Theory of Justice, Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
RosenbergA. (1992). Economics—Mathematical Politics or Science of Diminishing Returns?University of Chicago Press, Chicago.
58.
RothA. (1991). Game Theory and Empirical Economics, Economic Journal, 101, January, 107–115.
59.
SaulJ.R. (1997). The Unconscious Civilisation, Penguin Books, Australia.
60.
SchmalenseeR. (1991). Continuity and Change in the Economics Industry, Economic Journal, 101, January, 115–121.
61.
SenA.WilliamsB. eds. (1982). Utilitarianism and Beyond, Harvard University Press, Cambridge.
62.
SchumpeterJ. (1939). Business Cycle: A Theoretical, Historical, and Statistical Analysis of Capitalist Process, McGraw-Hill Book Company, New York and London.
63.
StewartI. (1989). Does God Play Dice?Blackwell, Oxford.
64.
SegalN.L.RoyA. (1998). Twine Research Perspective on Suicide and Suicidal Attempts, in De LeoD.SchmidtkeA.DiekstraR.F.W. eds. (1998). Suicide Prevention: A Holistic Approach, Kluwer Academic Publishers, Dordrecht, Boston, London, 53–61.
65.
SolowR. (1994). Perspectives on Growth Theory, Journal of Economic Perspectives, 8(1), 45–53.
66.
StiglitzJ. (1991). Another Century of Economic Science, Economic Journal, 101, January, 134–141.
67.
SwedbergR. (1990). Economics and Sociology. Redefining their Boundaries: Conversation with Economists and Sociologists, Princeton University Press, Princeton.
68.
TurnovskyS.J. (1991). The Next Hundred Years, Economic Journal, 101, January, 142–148.
69.
United Nations (1998). United Nations Development Programme, Human Development Report, Oxford University Press, Oxford, New York.
70.
WaldropM.M. (1994). Complexity: The Emerging Science at the Edge of Order and Chaos, Penguin Books, England.
71.
WeisemanJ. (1991). The Black Box, Economic Journal, 101, January, 149–153.
