Economic Growth and Global Change 67 Julien Forbat Contents Definition ........................................................................................ 586 Economic Growth and Global Change ......................................................... 586 Environmental Damages ........................................................................ 587 Social Inequalities ............................................................................... 588 Measures of Economic Growth and Well-Being ............................................... 589 Conclusion ....................................................................................... 591 References ....................................................................................... 591 Additional Recommended Readings ........................................................ 592 Abstract The world economy has experienced an astonishing growth, estimated to have increased from about 100 billion dollars of GDP in the first century to more than 33,700 billion at the end of the twentieth century (Maddison 2001). Until recently, the global environmental impacts of this growth seemed extremely limited, even if some large-scale pollution was noted in Antiquity, for example, the atmospheric pollution stemming from the exploitation of copper mines by the Roman Empire (Boutron et al. 1996). Contemporary’s economic growth appears much more problematic and far more challenging for the future of mankind for several reasons. First, during recent decades, environmental damages have increased at a tremendous rate and reached a global scale, such as the case of greenhouse gases emissions. Second, this trend is reinforced by the growing impact of developing countries which were outside the realm of global economic growth. Third, the expansion of J. Forbat Institute of Environmental Sciences, University of Geneva, Carouge, Switzerland e-mail: julien.forbat@unige.ch Bill Freedman (ed.), Global Environmental Change, DOI 10.1007/978-94-007-5784-4_93, # Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht 2014 585