We study the role of consumer needs for (limited) resilience of
natural-resource-dependent economies. In particular, we study how substi-
tutability vs. complementarity of natural resources in consumer needs may
give rise for multiple steady states and path dependence under the optimally
controlled harvest of two renewable natural resources. This is a major shift in
the interpretation and analysis of resilience, from seeing (limited) resilience
as an objective property of the economy-environment system to acknowledg-
ing its partially subjective, preference-based character. We show that the
resilience of natural-resource-dependent economies decreases with the degree
of complementarity between resources in consumer needs. More generally,
we hypothesize that the stability of economic systems decreases with the
strength of demand-side interactions.

gemeinsam mit Martin F. Quaas