Since the establishment of the International Society for Ecological Economics in 1988, a wide spectrum of research topics has been presented in its journal and at the conferences. As the contributions are very diverse,recent years have seen some discussion on the characteristics and delimitation of ecological economics:Is ecological economics a transdiscipline; a new paradigm; something different from environmental economics or, rather, a part of environmental economics;
open for anything with a relation to the environment; or something more well defined?