With MAs from Kent State University, Michigan State University and University of Pennsylvania, James Quilligan began his career as a program evaluation supervisor with the United States Labor Department in 1976. In the 1980s-90s, he served in various roles as monetary analyst, researcher, publicist and speechwriter for the Brandt, Palme, Brundtland, Nyerere and Carlsson-Ramphal commissions, making presentations to committees at the United Nations, US House of Representatives, UK House of Commons and Council on Foreign Relations. During the 1990s-2000s, Quilligan was a manager and speechwriter for several NGOs, including Brandt 21 Forum, Center for Global Negotiations, Globalization for the Common Good, Global Marshall Plan, Commons Cluster at the United Nations and WANA Forum. With his experience in energy value analysis, he became a monetary consultant for governments in South America, the Middle East and Africa during this period. In 2000, he began using carrying capacity metrics to calculate the thermodynamic value of monetary currencies within specific bioregions. Over the past two decades, Quilligan’s work in biophysical economics has led to positions in management, research and communications with Majlis El Hassan in Amman, Jordan; Economic Democracy Advocates in the United States; and Center for New Critical Politics and Governance at Aarhus University in Denmark. He is a trainer in carrying capacity measurement, husband and fitness enthusiast.
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What Earth Supplies and What We Need: Carrying Capacity as a Guide for Regional and Planetary Governance and Sustainability
Sooner or later, sovereign nations must confer technological and political power to planetary institutions beyond their political borders, while devolving economic power to the bioregional and local communities within their state boundaries
March 21, 2025
Who Will Pay Back the Earth? Revaluing Net Energy through the Sustainable Yield of Regional Ecosystems
A planetary compact, focusing on the ratio between sustainable yield and human need, would encourage new partnerships between businesses, governments, and the public, granting to citizens the rights and responsibilities to organize the self-sufficiency and sustainability of their own regional habitats.
October 29, 2024
Beyond Supply and Demand: The Dynamic Equilibrium Between Global Thresholds and Allocations
Let’s begin by asking, is supply and demand truly able to manage the thresholds of resources which an environment can sustain, or to ensure that these resources are allocated sufficiently for the population living in that environment?
March 9, 2018
Beyond State Capitalism: The Commons Economy in our Lifetimes
In considering the essential problem of how to produce and distribute material wealth, virtually all of the great economists in Western history have ignored the significance of the commons—the shared resources of nature and society that people inherit, create and utilize.
September 14, 2017
Carrying Capacity as a Basis for Political and Economic Self-Governance
No major civilization has EVER practiced carrying capacity as a basis for political and economic self-governance; carrying capacity has only succeeded in small communities. Of course, we know this from the modern Ostrom view of the commons; but Ostrom never put her finger on the pulse of carrying capacity as the *self-organizing principle between a species and its environment*.
September 11, 2017
Should We Move to Bioregionalism?
“It’s time to consider that bioregional self-sufficiency—the principle of meeting human needs within the constraints of resource areas—is really what leads to democracy and prosperity.”
August 31, 2015
