NINE centuries after William the Conqueror invaded Britain across the boggy
coastal marshes of East Sussex, the people of the Pevensey Levels are manning
the ditches against another invading force 鈥� environmental economists.
English Nature has for several years been paying farmers on the Pevensey
Levels 拢72 a hectare to look after the wildlife on their wet pastures.
To gauge whether this was money well spent, it then paid economists from the
University of Newcastle to ask local people how much they would personally be
willing to pay in taxes to conserve the Levels. This increasingly widespread
method of putting a cash value on conservation is known as contingent
valuation.
Then, to assess the assessors, English Nature and the Economic and Social
Research Council (ESRC) sent in another team, from the geography department of
University College London, to ask the people of Pevensey what they thought of
the questions they had been asked.
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The answers, collected during eight-hour discussion groups, were 鈥渄ownright
rude鈥�, says Jacquelin Burgess of UCL. 鈥淭his is the first time that anybody has
attempted to find out what people think about contingent valuation, and the
answers challenge the whole legitimacy of the method.鈥�
Contingent valuation 鈥渋s being increasingly taken up by policymakers鈥� says
Sarah Sleet of the ESRC. It has been used, for instance, to assess how much
Swedish anglers would pay to end acid rain, or how much to pay Alaskans as
compensation for the Exxon Valdez oil spill.
The method assumes that 鈥減eople perceive their environment as a discrete
set of useful objects鈥� and that 鈥渢he cornerstone of value is individual self-
interest鈥�, says Burgess. But the largely Tory-voting Pevensey Levellers don鈥檛
see things that way. 鈥淭he idea of valuing nature in money terms was an alien
one. People spoke of the `common good鈥�, as nature belonging to everyone,鈥� says
Burgess.
鈥淢any people said that they felt they had been duped by the economists,鈥�
she says. 鈥淭hey had no idea their answers would be used in cost-benefit
assessments of conservation, and were very angry when they found out. They
could not see why decisions on the future of the Levels should not be taken
democratically, rather than through
secret questionnaires.鈥�