DISCOURSE ANALYSIS: A CONSTRUCTIVIST APPROACH
Layer 3: Epistemic notions
3.4. ECOLOGICAL MODERNISATION AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT
interpretation of ecological modernisation incorporates non-western development and participatory processes. Finally, it provokes the question of whether policies such as PFM could ever achieve sustainability if their implementation is revealed to be consistent with weak ecological modernisation. The extent to which ecological modernisation is valuable, and the form with which PFM is most consistent, is discussed in Chapter Fourteen.
of sustainable development is a holistic perspective of development in that it incorporates and integrates social, economic and environmental components. This is supported by O’Riordan et al., (2000:1) who note that sustainability “unites economic, social and environmental programmes”, and captures “economically and democratically redistributive processes and placing them in ecological and social frames of empowerment and mutual respect”.
Ecological modernisation is insufficient in itself to bring about increased sustainability within a society or industry, because it does not emphasise the need for substantial structural changes but rather settles for techno-institutional fixes to environmental problems that do not frustrate the prevailing capitalist political system (Hajer, 1995; Langhelle, 2000). To achieve sustainable development, or at least to progress towards improved sustainability, the application of an approach that is more radical is required, what some would term a strong sustainability approach. Strong sustainability is an approach to sustainability that incorporates social and environmental justice and equity concerns and in so doing addresses issues of power and the resultant social inequalities (Blowers, 1997).
Strong sustainability should also not be conflated with strong ecological modernisation (Langhelle, 2000); although it is acknowledged that strong ecological modernisation does conform more closely to stronger approaches of sustainability than weak ecological modernisation. However, an important difference between the two terms is that strong ecological modernisation still takes an anthropocentric view towards the environment: that it is in our best interests to be good custodians of environmental resources, rather than the more radical strong sustainability view that one should be a good custodian because it is morally right and because nature alone is unable to defend itself against the pressures placed upon it by people - nature needs people to act in its defence (Langhelle, 2000).
Furthermore, where ecological modernisation is content with techno-institutional fixes, even if through more participative and socially just means (Hajer, 1993), strong sustainability contends that “nothing less than fundamental social and economic changes” (Blowers, 1997:846) are needed to manage the global ecological crisis. It is adaptation versus transformation, which is also evident when one compares sustainability and ecological modernisation’s assertion about the economy. An ecological modernisation approach does not challenge the capitalist market system that dominates most advanced industrialised societies and endorses the view that the capitalist economic system does not constrain but creates
Sustainability
opportunities for the transition towards sustainability. The strong sustainability discourse on the other hand advocates a substantial restructuring and transformation of the capitalist approach to development (O’Riordan, 1993; Gibbs et al., 1996) to one that is sensitive to the local context and that decreases dependency on external (foreign or national) markets and increases self reliance and autonomy (Pepper, 1999; Blowers, 2000).
Similarly, a weak-sustainability approach should not be conflated with weak ecological modernisation. It is arguable that, to a large degree, much of ecological modernisation thinking can be located within the weak sustainability camp, although there are different ‘degrees of weakness’. This relationship between ecological modernisation and sustainability is depicted in Figure 3.1 below. This figure is a schematic representation that was developed from the literature and a review of the concepts of ecological modernisation and sustainability. The purpose of this schematic representation is to illustrate the link between these concepts as interpreted in this thesis.
*EM = Ecological Modernisation
Figure 3.1. The link between ecological modernisation and sustainability in addressing sustainable development.
In the diagram, if a strong sustainability approach to environmental problem solving is represented by a complete sphere, then ecological modernisation is a segment of the of the sphere, an approach which is part of an all-encompassing strong sustainability approach. The
Biophysical, economic and social elements of sustainability
Strong/
Broad EM Weak/
Narrow EM
In the center of the sphere, not all issues of sustainability are addressed, but as one reaches the perimeter of the sphere, greater sustainability is achieved as more elements that comprise sustainability are addressed.
Weaker EM in centre, getting stronger as one approaches perimeter of circle.
Therefore stronger EM contributes to enhanced sustainability.
This EM* segment is a subset of the greater strong sustainability approach to environmental problem
distance from the center of the sphere represents the degree to which issues of sustainability are addressed. In the center of the sphere, not all issues of sustainability are addressed, but as one reaches the perimeter of the sphere, greater sustainability is achieved as more elements that comprise sustainability are addressed. Therefore, the further one moves away from the centre of the circle, and the more complete the sphere becomes, the stronger the approach to sustainability becomes.
Similarly, within the ecological modernisation segment, weaker ecological modernisation approaches would be located closer to the center of the sphere with stronger approaches being closer to the perimeter. Therefore stronger ecological modernisation contributes to enhanced or stronger sustainability. Ecological modernisation by its very definition and premise cannot be strong sustainability (Langhelle, 2000), but the degree to which it contributes towards strong sustainability is a function of the strength or weakness of the ecological modernisation approach. What Figure 3.1 does not make clear is whether an approach to environmental management that only displays ecological modernisation qualities (even if strong ecological modernisation) could be defined as weak sustainability.
This section has discussed the relationship between ecological modernisation and sustainability in the manner in which they are interpreted in this study. These ideas are drawn on in Chapter Fourteen, where they are discussed in relation to the national and local PFM discourses and the ideological discourses with which they are most consistent.
3.5. ECOLOGICAL MODERNISATION THEORY AND ITS APPLICATION TO