Overview of Different Types of Values

What Im Going to Do Discuss Different Values Ask LOTS of Questions Get You to Think of the Answers

Value Social -- the principles, standards, or quality which guides human actions Economic -- the market or estimated worth of commodities

Social Values The quality (positive or negative) that renders something desirable or valuable From:

Social Values The quality (positive or negative) that renders something desirable or valuable Principles, standards or qualities considered worthwhile or desirable by the person who holds them. From:

Social Values The quality (positive or negative) that renders something desirable or valuable Principles, standards or qualities considered worthwhile or desirable by the person who holds them. Those qualities of behavior, thought, and character that society regards as being intrinsically good, having desirable results, and worthy of emulation by others. From:

Social Values The quality (positive or negative) that renders something desirable or valuable Principles, standards or qualities considered worthwhile or desirable by the person who holds them. Those qualities of behavior, thought, and character that society regards as being intrinsically good, having desirable results, and worthy of emulation by others. Values are our subjective reactions to the world around us. They guide and mold our options and behavior. Values have three important characteristics. –Developed early in life and are very resistant to change. –Define what is right and what is wrong. –Cannot be proved correct or incorrect, valid or invalid, right or wrong. Values tell what we should believe, regardless of any evidence or lack thereof. From:

Economic Values Does Price = Value? Assumes perfectly competitive market –Many buyers and sellers –Perfect knowledge –Homogeneous products –All resources are mobile –Free entry/exit from market

Social and Economic Value How well does Market Price approximate Economic Value? Does Social Value equal Economic Value? How do we reconcile? Economists use Willingness-to-Pay to approximate value, what do sociologists use?

Different Values Market and Nonmarket Use and Nonuse Option, Bequest, Existence Economic and Social –Is economic value a subset of social value?

Why are Values Important? Why do agencies want to know values of ecosystem services? Allocation of their scarce resources (labor and capital) to provide the mix of goods and services society values.

Allocation How do you weight different uses? Market goods and services – relative prices give weights Weights change Nonmarket goods and services –What weights –How comparable

Wallowa-Whitman National Forest

How much wilderness is enough? Society values wilderness characteristics First Wilderness Area (best characteristics) designated – most valuable Is the next area as valuable to society? How about the next? And the one after that?

Areas with Wilderness Potential Alternative uses –Wilderness –Backcountry recreation –Development How do you decide which values are most important? Marginal valuation

To Subdivide or Not

Ranchettes Know there is a market value for the small acreage parcel Know there is a desire to not have land broken up –Market value of intact area –Social values –Values placed on Ecological characteristics

Ranchettes So which set of values dominate? Why would the landowner enter into a conservation easement? Is it only $ of the easement? Is location important? Timing?

Choices This or This?

Questions to Ponder Can you add up market and nonmarket values? How much wilderness (biodiversity, water quality) is enough? If fishing in the trout pond outside the lodge is worth $X, is all fishing worth $X? Does everything have to put in dollar terms?

Questions to Ponder What is the trade-off between a tangible (market) good and an intangible (nonmarket) service if they are competitive? Antagonistic?

Questions to Ponder How do you compare an economic value expressed in $ with a social value expressed in I want more …? Which one affects ecological processes more?

Indicators and Values 27.Value of forage harvested from rangeland by livestock 28.Value of production of non-livestock products produced from rangeland 54.Public beliefs, attitudes, and behavioral intentions towards natural resources

Adding Up Discussed many times – How do we avoid double, triple, quadruple counting? Is that important for the Indicator work? Do we really need a common metric ($)? What do private landowners and public land managers respond to? –What values are important?

Adding Up In terms of conceptual model –Ecosystem Services used –Some have $ values, others just social values Important issues are whether either value affects the ecological or human subsystems and how Are market imperfections the cause?

Values and SRR Back to the beginning! Indicators meant to be valueless – things we monitor Common data set that each individual will view differently depending on their own value set