This was sent to me by a TBY2K poster.

Diane

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you wrote: "P.S. Working on initiating an online discussion group on sustainability topics."

Might I suggest as a topic for discussion the quite provocative paper excerpted below -- WITH WHICH I DO NOT NECESSARILY AGREE, but I did find it to be a good brain stimulant.......

-- Alan

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EXCERPTS:

http://web.inter.nl.net/users/Paul.Treanor/sustainability.html

Why Sustainability is Wrong

by Paul Treanor

ABSTRACT: Sustainable planning policy in Europe rests on an extreme degree of consensus, that sustainability is right. There is no ethical basis for this. An extreme consensus can in itself be unethical. In its most abstract form, sustainability has no inherent value. The standard argument for recent sustainability policy -- transgenerational responsibility -- has no inherent ethical status either. In practice sustainable planning continues standard practice, and this offers the best explanation for its success. Sustainability is an ideology used to justify existing policy (and social order). Revised December 1997.

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This is not the place to give even a summary of the differing eco-ethics, the various ideas of nature, and attitudes to nature. A complete sector has emerged in 20 years, in political theory and philosophy, with a whole range of concepts - anthropocentrism, eco-centrism, deep ecology, shallow sustainability, land ethic, bio-regionalism, eco-feminism, goddess theology, and more (see Dobson and Lucardie 1993). Environmental philosophy can already be divided into twelve sub-disciplines (Zweers 1991, 12).

At first sight, official sustainability policy is easy to locate in this complex context. There is a primary division of these ethics, in many works on the subject: either anthropocentric ethics, or biocentric/ ecocentric ethics (Wissenburg 1993, 4-6). The metaphor of depth is often used. To simplify, deep ecology recognises more intrinsic value in nature than "shallow" ecology. For deep ecologists, anthropocentrism is a fundamental defect of modern culture (perhaps also of ancient culture). On this scale, it seems evident that sustainability policy is anthropocentric. It is aimed at human survival and future generations of humans: it seems quite different from the extremes of deep ecology. Especially since these extremes include a logical conclusion: the Voluntary Human Extinction Movement in the United States (Kossy 1994, 141-144).

Against such extremes, the policy hierarchy of the EC/EU Fifth Environmental Action Programme seems purely anthropocentric. It opens: "The overall objective of the Community is the improved and continued welfare of all its citizens." (CEC 1993, 55) Similarly, activists reject Article 1 of the UNCED Declaration as "a triumph of unrestrained anthropocentricity" (Pallemaerts 1993, 12). Again however, the initial view is deceptive. The classification of sustainability as anthropocentric is only superficially valid. What exactly it is, is an issue for this article.

EFFECTS OF CONSENSUS

Some of the objections to sustainability derive from its status as consensus. Consider this analogy as illustration. Imagine that something you consider morally objectionable, such as cannibalism, is being openly advocated by some people. At first you think they will be ignored. Later however, some politicians say they also support cannibalism. Government and the private sector begin to open experimental facilities for processing human flesh. Nobody objects: all the media are enthusiastic about the projects. They publish advice on cooking human meat. The Government declares cannibalism a policy goal, and the United nations declares cannibalism is necessary for humanity. You, of course, are horrified by this, yet all your friends think that your objections are strange. Your colleagues at work think so too. They stop talking to you, and you lose your job because you irritate them.

Appeals to empathy are a bad basis for judgement, but at least the analogy demonstrates one problem with sustainability: moral objections are not recognised. It is easy to imagine objections to cannibalism, and to see that the individual in the story is being unfairly treated. Yet many people, and governments, will recognise no "objection of conscience" to sustainability. Certainly, there is no provision in EU policy to opt out from sustainability.

Some of those who support sustainability do not even recognise the possibility of objection. I have had this kind of conversation several times with environmentalists:

"What is your position on those who oppose sustainability?"
"No-one is against sustainability"
"I am."
"No, I think we just disagree on the definition."
"I am against it on all definitions."
"No-one can be against sustainability."

This is probably inherent: if objections of conscience are recognised, no sustainability policies are possible. It is like belief in a universal God: if you believe God is only for believers, then you do not believe in a universal God.

By nature, sustainability must claim a monopoly of belief: as a "belief" it cannot admit an opposite belief is equally valid. It is a consistent and universalist world-view, Weltanschauung. Its adherents act in accordance with one general principle: that it should be accepted by all persons. In practice, too, there is common action for sustainability, by governments, non-governmental organisations, loose groups of activists, and industry. The ability to unify diverse groups also suggests sustainability is an ideology, in a negative sense.

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Sustainability, as belief or ethic, has specific characteristics. It requires implementation by the state, by the powerful, by elites. It almost inevitably requires that power is retained by those who already hold it. It requires experts: sustainability policies can not be implemented by revolutionary masses, or by mullahs. It tends, therefore, to reinforce existing social-political structures.

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[Sustainability] is also an ethic which assigns value to duration. There are at least five possible variants here:

1. "A situation of long duration is better than one of short duration".

2. "A situation which has lasted long is better than one which did not". This is the basis of radical traditionalism: return to traditions proved by age.

3. "The continuance of the existing situation is better than its termination" -- the basis of political conservatism.

4. "The continuance of an entity is better than its termination, so that those entities which can continue must have priority". This is the basis of radical conservatism: change society until it can totally withstand change, and last longer.

5. "All situations/entities must last for ever" -- a hypothetical variant only.

Sustainability is obviously not a clear guide to human action (the presumed function of an ethic). In addition the question remains: who, or what must last? Is it humanity? or civilisation? or culture? or "our culture"? or nature? or the Earth? or the ecosystem? or the relation humanity-nature? or the cosmos? or something else?

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The origins of sustainable thinking have little to do with planning as such. The general impression -- in all the publications and debates -- is of a desperate search for every possible argument against change in the existing political social, economic, cultural and technological order. Certainly, that has planning implications. The ideology which goes under the name "sustainability" is a radical conservatism, and it may, paradoxically, lead to changes and restructuring. This is often the explicit intention of radical-conservatives: to change to a change-avoiding order.

.......

see also:
http://web.inter.NL.net/users/Paul.Treanor/loc.env.html

After Sustainability: Mega-Nature and Infra-Nature

Sustainability is one in a series of words to describe a process: the intensification of a long-term trend, to very large park-like cities. Sustainable "ethics" are now being replaced, by emphasis on nature as infrastructure....

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-- Anonymous, March 06, 2000