Imagine being asked how much money you would be willing to pay to protect a coral reef you may never visit, or a wetland you’ve never seen. Would you say $10? $100? Nothing at all?
Now imagine you’re asked, How much is it worth to you, in your heart, that such places continue to exist?
This is the tension at the heart of contingent valuation, a method used by researchers and policymakers to measure the value people assign to environmental goods and services that don’t have a market price. In his chapter “Contingent Valuation as a Research Method: Environmental Values and Human Behaviour,” John Gowdy explores not just the technique, but the profound psychological and ethical questions it raises.
Because the truth is, when we try to put a price tag on nature, we’re not just measuring—it’s ourselves we’re revealing.
The Problem of Priceless Things
Many of the things we value most—clean air, unpolluted rivers, thriving wildlife—aren’t bought and sold in markets. Yet decisions about whether to protect or destroy them often come down to economic calculations. This creates a problem: How do we measure what can’t be easily priced?
Contingent valuation (CV) steps into this gap. It asks people directly how much they would be willing to pay (or accept) for changes in the environment—say, preventing deforestation or improving water quality. These hypothetical scenarios help researchers estimate the non-market value of environmental goods.
But Gowdy reminds us that the method, though elegant in design, opens up complex questions about how people relate to nature, how they express their values, and whether some things should even be valued in monetary terms at all.
More Than Just Money: The Psychology of Environmental Valuation
One of the central insights of Gowdy’s work is that people don’t treat contingent valuation questions like typical financial decisions. Instead, their responses are often shaped by:
- Emotions: People may give higher values out of guilt, awe, or love for nature.
- Ethics: Some see it as morally wrong to put a price on sacred or irreplaceable places.
- Cultural norms: Valuations can vary widely depending on social context and local identity.
- Hypothetical bias: People might say they’d pay $100 to save a forest—but wouldn’t actually follow through if asked to pay.
This doesn’t make CV meaningless. On the contrary, it reveals that environmental decisions are not just economic—they are deeply human. They reflect worldviews, identities, and relationships with the living world.
Intrinsic vs. Instrumental Value
Gowdy’s chapter also dives into the philosophical divide between two ways of valuing nature:
- Instrumental value sees nature as useful—valuable because of what it provides us (oxygen, recreation, resources).
- Intrinsic value sees nature as worthy in its own right—regardless of utility.
Contingent valuation often straddles this divide. It tries to capture instrumental values (e.g., how much is clean water worth to you?), but it also bumps into the limitations of this frame. What happens when people feel that no amount of money could reflect the importance of a rainforest or a species?
In such cases, CV becomes a kind of moral thermometer—gauging not just what people are willing to pay, but what they’re willing to stand for.
The Democratic Potential of Contingent Valuation
Despite its limitations, Gowdy argues that contingent valuation has an important democratic function. It gives people—ordinary citizens—a voice in environmental decision-making. It allows values that are often ignored in market transactions (such as beauty, heritage, or peace of mind) to be factored into policy.
In a world where decisions are too often made by elites or experts, CV is a reminder that public values matter. It’s an invitation for people to express care for places they may never visit, for species they’ll never see, and for futures they’ll never inhabit—but still feel responsible for.
This is not just economics. It’s empathy in action.
Rethinking What It Means to “Value” Nature
Contingent valuation challenges us to think beyond markets. It asks:
- What does it mean to value something?
- Can love, awe, or grief be measured—or should they simply be honored?
- How can we design policies that reflect not just efficiency, but meaning?
Gowdy reminds us that CV isn’t just a method—it’s a mirror. It reflects the complexity of human relationships with the Earth, and it invites us to speak up for what we want to protect, even when the language of money falls short.
Final Reflection: The Worth of a Wild World
So what is a forest worth? A coastline? The silence before dawn?
Maybe the point isn’t to find a perfect number. Maybe the point is to realize that even asking the question changes us. It wakes us up to the fragile, precious, interconnected web we’re part of. And it challenges us to build a world where value is measured not just in dollars—but in care, connection, and courage.
Because in the end, the worth of the natural world is not just what we’re willing to pay. It’s what we’re willing to protect.