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Our Purpose & Approach
Our Purpose & Approach
Our name and our purpose come from Aldo Leopold’s “The Land Ethic.”
Many conservationists remember his definition of such an ethic: “A thing is right when it tends to preserve the integrity, stability, and beauty of the biotic community. It is wrong when it tends otherwise.”
But fewer may recall the lead-in: "The ‘key-log’ which must be moved to release the evolutionary process for an ethic is simply this: quit thinking about decent land-use as solely an economic problem. Examine each question in terms of what is ethically and esthetically right, as well as what is economically expedient. A thing is right….”
Thus, if we are to have any hope of doing right by the land community, we have got to understand economics in its proper context: not as THE decision regarding land and natural resources, but as one among multiple disciplinary perspectives and normative guides. We’re here, therefore to help organizations, agencies and communities use a broader ecological-economic approach to examine what is truly expedient and, by keeping even that evolved economic approach in perspective, to make room for what is more wholly right.
We also take great inspiration from Wendell Berry, who in “Think Little,” writes:
"…when the government…again proves too stupid or too blind or too corrupt to see the plain truth and to act with simple decency, I intend to be there, and I trust that I won’t be alone. I hope, moreover, to be there, not with a sign or a slogan or a button, but with the facts and the arguments. A crowd whose discontent has risen no higher than the level of slogans is only a crowd. But a crowd that understands the reasons for its discontent and knows the remedies is a vital community, and it will have to be reckoned with. I would rather go before the government with two men who have a competent understanding of an issue, and who therefore deserve a hearing, than with two thousand who are vaguely dissatisfied."
Key-Log Economics helps NGOs, businesses, and other clients develop the facts and the arguments that make for a competent understanding of today’s conservation, environmental, and sustainability challenges. With those facts, you will deserve a hearing.
We will go with you, and we will have to be reckoned with.
Our Team
Our Team
Spencer Phillips PH.D., Economist & Principal
Spencer Phillips PH.D., Economist & Principal
Spencer is a natural resource economist who founded Key-Log Economics to help people, communities, and institutions understand and attain the benefits of improved land stewardship. He previously did this work at the White House Council on Environmental Quality and as Vice President for Ecology and Economics Research at The Wilderness Society. Spencer’s current research focuses on ecosystem service values—especially as affected by climate change, public land and resource management, and water quality regulation—and on the relationships between economic development and environmental quality. His B.A. in economics is from the University of Virginia, and his M.S. and PhD in Agricultural and Applied Economics are from Virginia Tech.
Anna Perry, Research Associate
Anna Perry, Research Associate
Anna holds an M.S. in Environmental Economics from the University of Georgia, with a research focus on natural infrastructure and coastal economics. Her graduate research with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers focused on incorporating a broader set of nonmarket benefits into traditional cost-benefit methods in the federal agency, and several forthcoming publications contribute to emerging literature on coastal retreat and valuation of coastal resources. She is particularly interested in the use of Bayesian methods for optimal natural resource management and planning under risk and uncertainty. She completed her B.A. in Economics at the University of Virginia.
Hương Ngô, Senior Associate
Hương Ngô, Senior Associate
Hương co-leads our research, organizational development, and policy analysis work with NGOs and businesses in Southeast Asia. Her expertise spans integrative economic development, agricultural sustainability, planning, rights, and other law, and development policy. Hương is also a Lecturer in the School of Law, Vietnam National University, where she co-founded the schools' Human Rights Master's program. She also founded the Center for Development and Integration, an NGO focused on governance, labor rights, and inclusive growth in the context of Vietnam’s rapid economic growth. She holds bachelor's degree in economics from National Economic University, Masters degrees in Human Rights and Public International Law from the University of Oslo, and a Ph.D. in Human Rights and Peace Studies from Mahidol Univerity (Thailand).
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