RECUPERATING FROM MARKET FAILURE - PLANNING FOR BIODIVERSITY AND TECHNOLOGICAL COMPETITIVENESS

How appropriate is market-failure theory for today's policy-making con cerns? In recent years, concepts drawn from tile theory of market fail ure have been increasingly influential in public administration and po licy analysis. Ernest Sternberg contends that this reliance on microec onomic theory is often misleading and harmful because it fails to obse rve the integrity that characterizes many of the objects about which p olicy makers are concerned. He takes two kind objects as examples: eco systems (a central concern of environmental policy) and emerging bodie s of technological knowledge (a fundamental concern in industrial comp etitiveness policy). When policy makers fail to see that an ecosystem and a technological paradigm each have integral features, they can unw ittingly contribute to environmental or industrial deterioration.