Edited by
Belinda Clements
Probing the Boundaries of Environmental Justice & Global Citizenship
Papers Presented at the Fifth Global Conference on Environmental Justice & Global Citizenship Monday 3rd July – Thursday 6th July 2006 Mansfield College, Oxford
Edited by Belinda Clements
Oxford, United Kingdom
Dr Robert Fisher Series Editor
Advisory Board Professor Margaret Chatterjee Dr Wayne Cristaudo Dr Phil Fitzsimmons Dr Jones Irwin Professor Asa Kasher Revd Stephen Morris
Professor John Parry Dr David Seth Preston Professor Peter Twohig Professor S Ram Vemuri Professor Bernie Warren Revd Dr Kenneth Wilson, O.B.E
Volume 39 A volume in the Probing the Boundaries project >Environmental Justice and Global Citizenship=
Published by the Inter-Disciplinary Press Oxford, United Kingdom
First Edition 2007
8 Inter-Disciplinary Press 2007
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers.
ISBN: 978-1-904710-38-7 EAN: 9781904710387
Contents
Contents Introduction Belinda Clements
PART I
1
Top Down…? 11 Government responses to Environmental Justice The Final Frontier: International Law and Corporate Capitalism Kristy J. Buckley
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What does it Mean to Regulate? A Review of Epistemological 21 Frameworks and their Application within the Indian Context Janak Rana Ghose Legal Impediments to the Survival of Organic Production? Martin Phillipson
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The Sustainability Analysis Framework: A Whole of Government Model Kendal Hodgman
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Utilisation of voluntary Conservation Agreements in Australia: A Perspective on Queensland Jo Kehoe
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PART II
… Or Bottom Up? The Participation of ‘Laypeople’
Environmental Justice: Bridging the Gap between Experts And laymen Kim Loyens
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Using Facilitative Processes to Achieve Sustainable Environmental Outcomes Tania Sourdin
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Going Local? Public Participation and Future Mobility in Ireland Henrike Rau and John McDonagh
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Knowledge Production and Citizens’ Participation in the Implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive in Finland Timo Peuhkuri
119
Environmental Justice and Hazardous Waste Controversies 133 in Taiwan Mei-Fang Fan Reflections on Decisionmaking Process in Transition Society: The Case of Oil Shale Mining in North-Eastern Estonia Maie Kiisel
PART III
Whose Knowledge Counts Anyway? Understanding Environmental Issues
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The Public Debate on Genetic Modification (GM): Varieties of Understanding Linda Hadfield
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Discursive Strategies in GM Policy: A Theoretical Assessment Eszter Kollár, Attila Fonyó and Miklós Sükösd
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Getting the Message: Audience Resonance with Australian Climate Change Campaigns Nina Hall and Cassandra Star
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How Many Koalas are there on Kangaroo Island? Sarah Wilks
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Environmental Grief® Kriss Kevorkian
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Examining the Technological Approach to Environmentally 223 Sustainable Architecture in India Deepika Mathur Search for a Theory Linking Environment and Society Doriana Daroit and Luis Felipe Nascimento
PART IV
The Search for Effective Moral Discourse: Environmental Ethics and Campaigning
Owning Nature: The Case of Hegel Simon Hailwood
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243
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Sustainable Development, Bioethics and "Vulnerable" 255 Human Subjects: Ethics of Sustainable Economic Enrichment of Diverse Traditional Cultures Participating in Pharmaceutical Research Janet Brewer Water Rights are Human Rights Maria Baldwin
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The Mobilisation of Norms for Legitimacy in the Global Warming Debate Cassandra Star
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Promoting Environmental Citizenship? A Critique of the Moral Persuasiveness of Direct Action Environmental Protest Belinda Clements
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PART V
Making Knowledge Count: Environmental Education
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Environmental Education in a Course on Ethics and International Development Judith Andre
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Forward Thinking: A Teaching Project David Hunter
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‘Environment’ and ‘Sustainable Development’: Investigating the Content and Social Dimension of Two Central Environmental Education Concepts Among University Students Chatzifotiou, A. Liarakou G and Daskolia, M.
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Empowerment of Professionals as a Strategy for Effective Sustainability of the Built Environment Joseph Akin Fadamiro
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Notes on Contributors
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Introduction Belinda Clements The papers in this collection are taken from the Environmental Justice and Global Citizenship Conference held at Mansfield College, Oxford University in July 2006. These series of conferences aim to take an interdisciplinary approach to considering issues of environmental justice, and as such a pluralist and inclusive approach was taken to the variety of interpretations of the theme. Interestingly (and perhaps refreshingly for some), the participants did not engage in endless debate about what either environmental justice or global citizenship ‘is’ or ‘should be’. Rather, each paper uses their own interpretations of the terms and provides a discussion from the contributor’s own disciplinary and geographical perspective. The papers that have been included here therefore present a ‘snapshot’ of the conference – all those who presented a paper at the conference had the opportunity to contribute to this e-book, and the contributions are presented as received, with little editorial interference. Rather than painstakingly identifying ‘the’ definitive version of ‘environmental justice’ and then treating this as an end state to be reached, environmental justice could instead be viewed as a process, as a shift in our perspective and approach to our interactions with each other and the world around us. The general, if largely unspoken, consensus of the conference could then have been that rather than debating what we ‘mean’ by environmental justice, we can instead work with the plurality of interpretations that we have, and get on with the task of using them. The question, then, becomes how to promote environmental justice? The papers in this book have been arranged thematically according to the range of approaches that the contributors have taken to addressing this question. One response when considering the policy options at our disposal for addressing environmental issues is to regulate, to pass laws compelling individuals, corporations or states to adhere to particular environmental standards. However, though this option may at first appear attractive, a plethora of problems arise when we attempt to regulate to mitigate environmental problems. For a start, environmental problems are frequently cross-boundary. For example, pollution produced in one country may have a greater effect outside the national boundary than it does on those doing the polluting. Many questions therefore arise. At what level should the process of regulation occur? At a national level? International? Who should (or can) enforce any laws that are passed?
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Introduction
___________________________________________________________ Importantly, are the regulations, in reality, enforceable? And, importantly, whose interests do the laws really serve? Part I of the book begins by assessing a range of attempts to bring about (varying interpretations of) environmental justice at the level of international, national and regional government, largely through regulation. Buckley begins by examining the nature and structure of international public law, in particular examining the power that the corporation has in weak or ‘failed’ states, and calls for stronger regulation over large or multinational corporations. But what exactly do we mean when we call for ‘regulation’, and who has the authority to impose and implement it? Ghose considers more broadly how ‘authority’ can be understood in less developed countries, and how (or whether) in the context of scientific uncertainty and uncalculated risk regulation can be effectual. In so doing he considers both formal and informal spheres of regulation, and by focusing on the increasing use of genetically modified organisms in India considers whether what he terms ‘soft laws’ (for example UN conventions) or ‘hard laws’ (such as national law) are more viable. Phillipson then provides a case study of ‘hard law’ in practice. Given that both organic and GM (Genetically Modified) methods of agricultural production are currently enjoying such significant growth, he considers whether existing legal systems are sufficient to protect organic agriculture. Unfortunately, he concludes they are not – in its present form, he argues, the legal system impedes not only the growth, but perhaps the very survival of organic agriculture. However, not all of the pictures painted by our contributors in this first section were entirely bleak. In examining how sustainability principles can be incorporated into the whole government process, Hodgman contends that where her sustainability analysis framework has been adopted in New South Wales, Australia, large organisations (including governments) can indeed fulfil their sustainability obligations. While recognising that it is important to continue to debate the definition of sustainability, like other contributors Hodgman feels it imperative that we move past the stage of defining the term, and begin more seriously to implement sustainable policy. With this in mind, we should remember that regulation through lawmaking is by no means the only policy option open to policy-makers attempting to promote sustainability and environmental justice. Kehoe’s chapter examines the use of voluntary conservation agreements in Queensland, Australia, an option which she argues is currently being under utilised. Her chapter focuses on the content of the agreement and the
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___________________________________________________________ financial rewards that are offered to encourage farmers to participate in the schemes. Financial incentives are not, of course, the only methods that can be used to encourage people to participate in such schemes – people can be persuaded by a variety of means, not least through education. However, it has for some time been recognised that one of the barriers to public participation in voluntary agreements and, more broadly, in decisionmaking processes concerning the issues discussed at this conference is that the layperson frequently feels alienated and undervalued by the ‘expert’ community of decision-makers who create such agreements. If we are to work towards some form of environmental justice, it seems intuitive that people should be able to contribute to the decisions made about the environmental in which they live. Part II of this book therefore moves on to consider the possibility of greater integration of the ‘layperson’ into decision-making processes. Loyens begins by addressing this question head on – for her environmental justice is about recognising the value of lay knowledge. In making this observation she is, of course, in good company with much of the work published in the field of environmental politics. Interestingly, however, her paper goes further than simply reiterating this contention, and considers specific techniques that can be used to integrate laypeople when decisions about the environment are taken. However, including a wider range of people in decision-making processes will more than likely lead to a broader array of viewpoints and increases the possibility of disagreement. Sourdin’s chapter looks more closely at the processes used to facilitate and resolve conflicts where policy disputes occur and the frameworks within which such disputes are addressed. Many of the formal structures used to negotiate conflicts within decision-making processes tend to be rigid and inaccessible to the layperson, creating a barrier to participation. Then follows a selection of case studies looking at examples of public participation in decision-making. Rau and McDonaugh examine decisionmaking structures in Ireland and find them wanting in terms of promoting citizen participation. Peuhkuri examines whether citizen’s knowledge has been incorporated into the EU Water Framework Directive. Fan’s paper is a classic environmental justice issue, looking at citizen demand for the recognition of the value of local contextual knowledge in the location of industry waste and incinerator ash in Taiwan. Kiisel’s contribution may come from a different part of world but the message is similar; here too there is very little meaningful public participation in the decisions taken about the location and practice of oil shale mining in Estonia.
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___________________________________________________________ Implicit in many of these papers is the idea that environmental justice is more likely to be achieved if laypeople contribute to a greater and more meaningful extent in decision-making processes. But if we are calling for more public participation, at some point it is surely pertinent to ask, what opinions and ideas does the layperson contribute, and are they all of equal value? Does the extent to which the layperson is informed about environmental issues matter? This issue is a thorny one, and is understandably not one that is tackled by many of the contributors in this volume. What some people see as necessary ‘environmental education’, others (particularly those not sympathetic to many of the claims made by environmentalists) may view as ‘green fascism’. But environmental issues are often complex and difficult to understand for the layperson and policy-maker/decision-taker alike. Science (even where there is a consensus within the scientific community) may not always give us a complete picture of the wider socio-environmental context of an issue. In Part III we consider more directly the ways in which various environmental issues are understood. We begin with an analysis of public understanding of an extremely complex issue - the GM debate in the UK. In the face of such complicated and often contradictory scientific evidence, how does the layperson construct a coherent opinion? As Hadfield demonstrates, our opinions are often as much influenced by implicit assumptions about right or wrong than about scientific ‘facts’, and she demonstrates an interesting range of methods that people use to justify their truth claims in the face of such seeming uncertainty. Staying with the theme of GM policy-making, Kollar et al use ‘argumentative discourse analysis’ in order to understand the different discourses in GM policy debates and, as with Hadfield, examine the normative assumptions, agendas and rhetorical devices used to make these claims. One of the most pressing environmental issues that appears to be facing us at the moment is arguably climate change. While the scientific community is now more or less agreed that anthropogenically induced climate change is a dangerous reality, fully understanding this issue (and still further finding workable solutions) remains rather elusive. Hall and Star’s contribution examines the effectiveness of climate change campaigns by NGOs in Australia at several levels – according to their analysis, the campaigns are good at raising public awareness of the issues, but are far less effective at affecting policy. However, there is yet another difficult and pertinent question, relevant both to the theme of participation in decision-making considered in the previous section and also to the theme in this section of how environmental issues are understood: Can we necessarily trust the message and information that comes from environmental campaigners? In an interesting contribution concerning the
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___________________________________________________________ introduction of the Koala in Kangaroo Island, Australia, Wilks explores four very different constructions of the situation. While the Koala is widely recognised as an endangered species in mainland Australia, the suggestion in this paper is that the accepted ‘green’ response to a situation should not automatically be assumed to be the best one for ‘nature’. The fidelity of the knowledge upon which our decisions about the environment are based is, of course, vitally important. But, as has been discussed by environmental sociologists for several decades, certain, reliable knowledge about the environment remains an elusive goal. i We cannot take at face value our ideas about nature, even when the ‘facts’ are presented to us from the scientific community. It has long been argued that scientific knowledge is to a greater or lesser extent socially constructed, and that our desire for reliable, objective facts about the world should not lead us to ignore other forms of non-scientific knowledge. ii Kevorkian’s contribution provides an interesting comment on this issue - while scientific observation is still widely maintained to be detached and objective (at least by the established policy-making community, even if not by many sociologists or even some scientists themselves), she suggests that as human beings, scientists suffer from what she terms ‘environmental grief’ when during the research process they witness forms of environmental degradation. Recognising and putting a name to this process, she argues, is the first step in the healing process. While she makes no direct comment in her paper about the ways in which this grief may affect the knowledge these scientists generate, the notion that the scientists particular reaction to this grief may have some bearing on the research is implicit, and provides interesting comment on the role that scientists plays in environmental conservation. iii However, while we should recognise that our knowledge about the world around us, including that from the scientific community, is socially constructed, we should also recognise the role that the physical world plays in this construction. iv While the Actant Network Theory approach used by Wilks attempts not to privilege one interpretation of the ‘Koala’ over another, if we are to take decisions about environmental management we do at some point need to make a judgement about which perspectives will be incorporated into policy. Theoretical perspectives that recognise both the social and physical aspects of environmental issues (and how these understandings are intertwined) need to be further developed. This issue is highlighted by the last two papers in this section, first by Mathur’s contribution concerning sustainable architecture in India, which argues that we must consider both the physical and the social aspect of ‘solutions’ to environmental problems, and second by Daroit and Nascimento, who explicitly seek a theory linking society and nature. They argue that nature,
6
Introduction
___________________________________________________________ society and economics should be studied together, believing that this insight could lead to transformations in environmental management. Where does all this lead us to in terms of moving towards ‘environmental justice’? While encouraging higher levels of public participation in environmental decision-making may be part of the answer, it is certainly not the only solution. Environmental issues and conflicts are more often than not complex, our knowledge of them is frequently incomplete and the systems in place for negotiating and understanding disagreement over a range of possible understandings and solutions are often deficient. When faced with different interpretations of environmentally ‘just’ solutions, which should we follow? Easy answers to such questions, of course, are not forthcoming. What an interdisciplinary conference such as the one represented in this book can do, however, is to provide us with a wide range of viewpoints from researchers working in very different fields in an attempt to investigate such questions and their possible responses from many different angles. One particular perspective is offered by the contributions in Part IV. For several millennium philosophers have been exploring the idea that we can construct (or discover) moral frameworks which can guide our decisionmaking, some believing that such systems of ethics can provide us with objective answers about right and wrong. The contributions in Part IV look specifically at the use of moral arguments to help guide us through the labyrinth of environmental issues and environmental justice. In contrast to most of the papers presented in this volume, Hailwood is concerned with ecological justice, i.e. justice in terms of the environment as an entity in itself, not just in terms of justice for people. He examines our ideas about property, arguing that they are anthropocentric in that they take only human interests into account, and not those of non-human nature. The non-human world should not be seen merely as something to be owned by humans, he argues. The way in which the non-human world can or should be ‘owned’ by people is an issue that also concerns Brewer, who in her contribution considers the bioethical issues surrounding the pharmaceutical companies use of natural resources and the possibility of the fair and equitable distribution of the benefits from the use of biological resources. Staying with the theme of the equitable distribution of natural resources, Baldwin’s paper recognises the human injustice of a situation where something as basic as water supply is not available to around a sixth of the world’s population, and suggests that a human rights framework could be used to address this issue. She argues that the current dominant discourse
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___________________________________________________________ that views water as a basic human need leads us to see people as passive recipients. A human rights framework, in contrast, would focus us more directly not only on the basic right to clean water, but also on our collective responsibility to provide that right and for responsible water usage. One of the messages from this section of the book is then that the particular moral discourses uses by environmental campaigners deserve attention and consideration. Star’s paper considers the possibility that normative language and discourses can be used to harness moral power in climate change negotiations, in particular analysing the attempts by nongovernmental organisations (NGOs) to use these discourses to legitimise their position. In contrast to Baldwin’s paper, Star found that in this instance the use of human rights discourse was less successful than that of justice. The final paper in this section looks at the moral arguments used by a different set of environmental campaigners in Britain to promote their particular idea of environmental justice. Clements’ paper assesses the success (or otherwise) of direct action environmentalists’ attempts to promote their version of environmental citizenship and examines some the difficulties found when presenting more radical notions of environmental (and ecological) justice. In part the environmental campaigners considered by some of the contributions in Part IV are attempting then to ‘educate’ and transform other people’s ideas about the environment and society. The final part of the book, Part V, looks more closely at the idea of environmental education in various fora. We are reminded of the issue raised above – if we are to call for greater participation in environmental decision-making then a number of issues arise concerning not only levels of environmental knowledge but also the skills that are perhaps necessary to meaningfully participate in negotiation and decision-making processes. The first paper in this final section considers the benefits of a course in ethics and development taken by students at a university in Detroit, USA. These students, like many other North Americans, Andre argues, are largely divorced from their ‘natural’ environment, and make few links between their behaviour and the environmental and social problems felt in other parts of the world. While it is not the only or even the best way to change attitudes, a university course can make a difference, she argues. By considering development within its environmental context, the students begin to understand their own separation from nature and the impact that their lifestyles have on the world around and beyond them.
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___________________________________________________________ Hunter’s paper outlines the basis of a programme that aims to develop the ways in which children think about the world. By focusing on questions of bioethics, children learn to explore their own and each others’ ideas, and to develop their critical skills. In contrast to Andre’s contribution, the focus appears to be less on teaching the children about their impact on the environment, but rather on the children developing skills to think for themselves. In Hunter’s programme, a facilitator assists the children to think critically, but does not provide substantive input – the children are not so much taught what to think, but how to think. In common with Andre’s paper, the children are being encouraged to become socially responsible citizens – as with Andre the assumption here is that people should engage with the world around them and think critically about their place in the world. This section of the book therefore raises some interesting issues about not only the content, but also the process of environmental education. An important question raised in the next contribution focuses directly on the question of who is actually doing the teaching. Chatzifotiou et al identify a lack of research into the ways in which certain concepts in environmental education are perceived and discussed by teachers, and focus their research on how the core concepts of environment and sustainability are understood by trainee teachers in Greece. Of course, like any other form of education, environmental education does not stop at school or university, and should be an ongoing process throughout our lives. The final paper in this collection considers the necessity of empowering development professionals with adequate knowledge to produce a high quality and sustainable built environment. Fadmiro’s contribution highlights the need for more environmental education in Nigeria for built environment professionals to give them a greater understanding of environmental issues and sensitivity to local issues.
Notes i
See, for example: Hannigan, J. Environmental Sociology: a Social Constructionist Perspective. (London: Routledge, 1995); Macnaghten, P and Urry, J. Contested Natures.(London: Sage, 1998) ii See, for example: Wynne, B. ‘May the Sheep Safely Graze? A Reflexive View of the Expert-Lay Knowledge Divide’ in Risk, Environment and Modernity, ed. S. Lash, B. Szerszynski and B. Wynne (London: Sage, 1996) 44-83 iii See, for example, Yearley, S. ‘Science and the environment’ in The International Handbook of Environmental Sociology. ed. M. Redclift and G. Woodgate (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 1997) 227-236. While considering whether science is a friend or foe of environmentalism,
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___________________________________________________________ Yearley notes in science’s favour that natural scientists have often been at the forefront of nature conservation projects. While the ideals of scientific experiment may assume a detached rationalism from the researcher, the reality of emotional involvement is one that provides an interesting counter-balance to the frequent (negative) charges of financial or other bias in scientific research. iv See, for example: Woodgate, G. ‘Introduction’ in The International Handbook of Environmental Sociology. ed. M. Redclift and G. Woodgate (Cheltenham: Edward Elgar, 1997) 1-17; Woodgate, G. and Redclift, M. ‘From a ‘Sociology of Nature’ to Environmental Sociology: Beyond Social Construction’ Environmental Values 7(1) (1998) 3-24; Irwin, A. Sociology and the Environment – A Critical Introduction to Society, Nature and Knowledge. (Cambridge, Polity, 2001); Dickens, P. Society and Nature – Changing our Environment, Changing ourselves. (Cambridge: Polity, 2004).
Part I
Top Down…? Government responses to Environmental Justice
The Final Frontier: International Law and Corporate Capitalism Kristy J. Buckley Abstract The nature and structure of public international law is antiquated in respect to the rise of corporate capitalism and the power they exert in lesserdeveloped countries. In the past three decades there has been an increasing trend towards intra-state conflict, especially in weak and failed states rich in natural resources. Unlike developed countries, having the ability to set strict regulations and monitor corporations operating in their country, underdeveloped states do not have structural or political means to regulate multi-national corporations operating in their territories. Corrupt government officials colluding with corporate managers undermine attempts at state regulation; people and the environment suffer while decision-makers profit. Hitherto, international law and organizational bodies have largely failed to bring about any substantial regulation over corporations. This paper examines the role of capitalism and corporations in weak and failed states throughout Africa, focusing on social and environmental repercussions. Next it demonstrates the void of international law governing these powerful entities and their activities. Finally, it argues that in the face of violent conflict, social erosion, and environmental degradation, it is time that international law catch up with corporate capitalism and devise regulatory mechanisms for protecting exploited people and environments worldwide. Key Words: International Law, Multi-National Corporations, Kenya, Democratic Republic of Congo, Environmental Degradation , Free Trade, Water, Economics. 1.
Introduction This paper will discuss the inescapable trend of globalization and how the effects of this trend are contributing directly and indirectly to environmental degradation. Next, I will discuss the economics of free trade and the international financial system and how these systems negatively and disproportionately impact lesser-developed countries, which can lead to environmental degradation, conflict, political corruption, and even greater disparity between rich and poor. Finally I will conclude by arguing that international law has yet to ‘catch up’ to these new and overwhelming trends in order to address the new challenges this system poses. I will especially focus on the enlarged role and power of multi-national corporations (MNCs) that operate in lesser-developed countries and the
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The Final Frontier: International Law and Corporate Capitalism
_____________________________________________________________ environmental impacts of this growing trend of globalization and economic development. 2.
Globalisation Globalisation and free trade have long been propagated by international institutions and governments worldwide as a panacea for development and progress. International financial institutions follow their economic models and theories about the benefits of trade liberalization while failing to take into account the environmental impacts these systems create- especially in developing countries. The ecological impact of this system results in environmental costs being “exported” to countries in the developing world. Yet the price of most freely traded primary commodities does not reflect the associated environmental costs being experienced in the countries these goods are produced. Many lesser-developed countries rely heavily on unsustainable exploitation of their agriculture and natural resources in order to generate revenue and participate in the world market. These export-oriented economies are fulfilling the demands of the “world” economy (namely the industrialized world) while suffering from environmental degradation as a result. This entire system is also heavily dependent upon the expansion and development of MNCs, which invest and operate in lesser-developed countries and supply the work market demands. 3.
The Economics of Environmental Degradation In order to understand how globalization, free trade, and the expansion of MNCs have impacted the environment, one must first look to the World Trade Organization (WTO), which, according to the World Resources Institute, is “the most powerful and effective institution for international governance that exists today.” 1 Its current and potential impact on the environment is substantial and far-reaching. However, the trade and environmental regimes have developed rather isolated from one other and sometimes their objectives can come into conflict. 2 Under the WTO, international trade agreements are made not by elected or politically accountable representatives, but by a handful of economists, investors, and lawyers. Despite this lack of democratic process and political accountability, the power and enforceability these trade agreements have at the international level is unprecedented. One such WTO Agreement deals with agriculture. While most of the criticisms of the Agreement on Agriculture deal with unequal competition between small rural farmers and agribusiness, there are also environmental implications. 3 The agreement promotes the movement away from rural farming and towards agribusiness, creating substantial
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_____________________________________________________________ "ecological footprints" including high levels of water consumption, waste, and pollution through widespread use of pesticides. In Kenya, for instance, much of the available water is used to irrigate export crops including coffee, lettuce, peas, broccoli, and flowersand the environmental cost is heavy. For example, a fifty gram bag of lettuce sold in the UK for ninety-nine pence “wastes almost fifty litres of water” in Kenya where it is grown. 4 Industrial agriculture’s insatiable need for water is a practice that is threatening rural farmers who attempt to grow for themselves but are being increasingly deprived of their water supply so that agribusiness can meet the demands of the international market. The over-consumption of water in Kenya is such a problem that even Starbucks now has this promotional flier on their advertising that it funds projects to promote water access to coffee-growers in Kenya. While this is an example of corporate environmental altruism, the environment is too important of a global concern to allow it to be “protected” by the meager philanthropic projects of corporate giants. As exemplified by our dependence on Starbucks, the developed world depends on international trade and industrial agriculture to fulfill its vast need for agricultural products, yet at a costly environmental price. The great dependency on export crops from Kenya is resulting in the unsustainable water use of Lake Naivasha: “…almost everybody in Europe who has eaten Kenyan beans or Kenyan strawberries or gazed at Kenyan roses has bought Naivasha water…it is sucking the lake dry” and soon the lake will “become a turbid, smelly pond with impoverished communities eeking out a living along bare shores.” 5 The prices for these goods are set by market forces, and do not reflect the “true cost” of production. The reliance upon Africa for many of these goods is furthering the exhaustion of the region’s already reduced water supply. “Africa’s water resources for agriculture are already inadequate” and per capita water availability in an export-crop dependent country like Kenya, for instance, is projected to fall by 82 percent by 2050. 6 Competitiveness and demands from the world market requires countries such as Kenya, that regularly experience drought and food shortages, to no longer work to feed themselves, but to plant crops to feed the industrialized world. Ironically, in many ways the world’s poor are feeding the world’s rich, at the expense of using up water and land resources in places where they are so precious. The renewable water resources for sub-Saharan Africa
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The Final Frontier: International Law and Corporate Capitalism
_____________________________________________________________ (where much of the European produce imports are grown) is 6,000 cubic meters per person while Europe maintains 10,000 cubic meters per person. 7 Comparatively, Europe does not have major water problems, yet the international trade market dictates that sub-Saharan countries like Kenya should be growing Europe’s coffee and lettuce. This is in spite of the fact that they barely have enough water to drink, let alone to sustainably irrigate such water-demanding crops. Outside of its impact on developing countries, industrial agriculture has had a global impact on the use of water. Currently, the world produces twice the amount of food as it did just a few decades ago, however it consumes three times the amount of water to do so. 8 The amount of water allocated for agriculture has also risen to equal two-thirds of the total amount of water extracted in the world. 9 Going hand in hand with increased water usage and soil depletion is the problem of deforestation as overproduction degrades soil quality and land dries up from overuse. 10 As explained earlier, the increased need to generate revenues through export crops drives up the rate of production; yet the land used for industrial agriculture is not capable of supporting this high level of production, resulting in desertification. 11 The effects of desertification have been substantial in the Sahara, where approximately 250,000 square miles (equivalent to the size of Somalia) of “onceproductive land…have become desert over the past fifty years.” 12 Following desertification arises the need for new and rich lands. This results in expansion to marginal lands and in many cases, the stripping away of valuable forest, otherwise known as deforestation. 13 In Africa, approximately 12 million acres of forest are cut down, the majority of which is a result of agricultural expansion. 14 4.
Capacity of States While the trend of trade is considered global, as one can see from the previous examples, the associated environmental impacts of free trade are not necessarily distributed on a global scale. Lesser-developed countries incur a majority of the environmental costs as they increasingly focus their economies on export crops and exploitation of their natural resources. Also in these countries, the ability and motivation of the state to devise environmental regulations and enforce them is weak. This is due to the fact that regulation can conflict with a country’s economic incentives if the country depends upon export-oriented industries, such as cash crops or timber. Despite the possible motivation to restrict pesticide use or logging, if “world markets offer high prices for blemish-free fruit and hardwood timber, the economic incentive to violate the regulations will be strong.” 15
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_____________________________________________________________ Globalization and capitalism have opened up the doors to remote areas of the world and corporations have taken advantage of these new opportunities to exploit land and resources. The environmental effects of these trends are considerable. However, given the usual array of problems facing governments of lesser-developed countries, such as conflict, corruption, and lack of education and health care, environmental regulation and enforcement are usually the least of the government’s concerns. According to the organization Publish What You Pay, “Dependency on extractive resources tends to lead to unaccountable state institutions, many of which have inadequate infrastructure and expertise to manage the substantial size of revenues flowing in from this sector.” 16 The high revenues generated from contracts with MNCs are paid to the state government, and in weak states, politicians are often corrupt and pocket the money themselves instead of investing the revenue into longterm goals of social and environmental programs for their people, many of whom are amongst the world’s poorest citizens. Corruption is not the only motivation for weak environmental regulation. In an increasingly competitive world market, lesser-developed countries often argue that their lack of standards and regulations serve as competitive advantages in luring foreign corporate investment. Devising and enforcing strict environmental codes on corporations can discourage foreign direct investment and result in negative economic consequences. The role of international aid and financial institutions is also important to note. Many state recipients of foreign aid are pressured to generate money and encourage foreign investment and development. Through the use of international financial policy such as World Bank structural adjustment programs, lesser-developed countries are required to conduct their economic policies according to bank standards and direct their focus towards policy that encourages corporate investment. For example, in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC), home to the world’s second largest rainforest, the World Bank is now devising ways to formalize the timber industry in order to expand and include one of the most lucrative exports in the Congo. The motivation for this initiative lies both in the need for more state infrastructure and also for generating revenue to repay international debts. 17 Once again, the World Bank’s focus is on promoting free trade and generating revenue while the people of the Congo incur the costs of environmental degradation with little compensation from the extracting
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_____________________________________________________________ corporations. For example, in a contract between a foreign timber logging company and the DRC government, the abysmal compensation awarded to the displaced tribal peoples included several bags of salt, a couple cases of beer, and some bars of soap. Clearly the DRC government is unwilling or unable to require more adequate compensation for their people, and the corporation is taking advantage of this situation. 5.
Conclusion International Relations realists would argue that environmental compensation and protection are matters left to the state governments to regulate, monitor, and enforce. However, the difficult position lesserdeveloped countries are often put in due to weak governance, political corruption, economic dependence on natural resources, requirements of international aid donors, and desperate efforts to gain market competitiveness makes environmental protection not only seem like treehugging idealism, but worse yet, detrimental to the country’s economic development and advancement. Placing the responsibility for environmental protection on lesserdeveloped countries by expecting them to regulate the MNCs operating in their territory is an unrealistic approach for attaining true environmental protection. Instead of protection coming at such a high economic cost to already poor countries, the international community can be progressive and call for an entirely different type of international regulation over corporations themselves, regardless of the territories in which they are operate. Holding corporations responsible for maintaining internationally accepted standards regardless of their location would help to eliminate this race to the bottom in the name of economic competition. It would also help curb corruption at the state level by setting requirements on corporations and thereby prevent government officials from waiving regulations in return for bribes. While states have legal personality under international law, corporations do not. And given the fact that, of the top 100 economic entities in the world, the first 49 are industrialized countries while the remaining 51 are MNCs, it is time international law recognizes the immense wealth, power, and influence that these corporations have attained through globalization and free trade and start independently monitoring and regulating corporate actions and impacts on the environment.
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Notes 1
World Resources Institute. “Natural Resources: Decisions for the Earth.” Earthscan. 2003. p. 157. 2 Ibid, 161. 3 Vandana Shiva. “Free Trade Industrial Agriculture Rules Threaten the World’s Farmers.” International Forum on Globalization. [http://www.ifg.org/pdf/int'l_trade-shiva_AOA.pdf_1.pdf] 28 Apr 2006. 4 Laurance Jeremy, “The Real Cost of a Bag of Salad: You Pay 99p, Africa pays 50 Litres of Fresh Water,” The Independent (29 April 2006). 29 April 2006. 5 David Harper. “Kenya’s Lake Naivasha in Critical Condition.” 22 March 2006. EarthWatch Institute. [http://www.earthwatch.org/site/apps/nl/content2.asp?c=crLQK3PHLsF&b =453237&ct=2082865]. 29 Apr 2006. 6 Robert Paarlberg. “Rice Bowls and Dust Bowls,” Foreign Affairs, (May/June 1996): 131. 7 FreshWater Resources 2005. EarthTrends. World Resources Institute. [http://earthtrends.wri.org/pdf_library/data_tables/wat2_2005.pdf] 29 Apr 2006. 8 Jeremy, op. cit. 9 Ibid. 10 “An aquifer is an underground layer of water-bearing permeable rock, or unconsolidated materials (gravel, sand, silt, or clay) from which groundwater can be usefully extracted using a water well.” Wikipedia Online Encyclopedia. 11 Desertification is the degradation of land in arid, semi arid and dry subhumid areas resulting from various factors including climatic variations and human activities. Modern desertification often arises from the demands of increased populations that settle on the land in order to grow crops and graze animals. Wikipedia Online Encyclopedia. 12 Robert Paarlberg, “Rice Bowls and Dust Bowls,” Foreign Affairs (May/June 1996): 131. 13 Lucy Oriang, “A Market for Drylands and Deserts?” International Development Research Centre 22 (1997). 14 Paarlberg, 131. 15 World Resources Institute, 157. 16 Publish What You Pay, (15 March 2006).
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Theodore Trefon, Africa Research Centre, interview (28 April 2006).
Bibliography FreshWater Resources 2005. EarthTrends. World Resources Institute. [http://earthtrends.wri.org/pdf_library/data_tables/wat2_2005.pdf] 29 Apr 2006. Harper, David. “Kenya’s Lake Naivasha in Critical Condition.” 22 March 2006. EarthWatch Institute. [http://www.earthwatch.org/site/apps/nl/content2.asp?c=crLQK3PHLsF&b =453237&ct=2082865]. 29 Apr 2006. Jeremy, Laurance. “The Real Cost of a Bag of Salad: You Pay 99p, Africa pays 50 Litres of Fresh Water,” The Independent (29 April 2006). 29 April 2006. Oriang, Lucy. “A Market for Drylands and Deserts?” International Development Research Centre 22 (1997). Paarlberg, Robert. “Rice Bowls and Dust Bowls,” Foreign Affairs (May/June 1996):127-132. Publish What You Pay. (15 March 2006). Shiva, Vandana. “Free Trade Industrial Agriculture Rules Threaten the World’s Farmers.” International Forum on Globalization. [http://www.ifg.org/pdf/int'l_trade-shiva_AOA.pdf_1.pdf] 28 Apr 2006. Trefon, Thedore. Africa Research Centre. Interview. 28 April 2006. World Resources Institute. “Natural Resources: Decisions for the Earth.” Earthscan. 2003.
What Does It Mean To Regulate? A Review of Epistemological Frameworks and their Application Within the Indian Context Janak Rana Ghose Abstract The exercise and assertion of regulation and formal ownership of plant genetic resources is primarily based on scientific tenets quantifying risk and/or economic efficiency. These tenets are formalized in practice via the prescriptive mandate of the World Trade Organization. While such a framework facilitates a set of guidelines to direct member states in creating regulation, it also presents the spectre of an excessively narrow basis of consideration. This paper will first address what is meant by regulation within the disciplines of economics, law, and political science. Drawing from this review, a number of key questions arising from the Indian experience with genetically modified organisms will be posited. Keywords: Regulation, India, GM, Risk, Uncertainty, Review 1.
Introduction The movement of state sponsored regulation into social spheres in the 1960s and the resultant rise of legal mechanisms for enforcement occurred in tandem with the interlinkages of nation states bound by incentives to exploit or create comparative advantages of trade with minimal barriers. Governing these interactions and mandating regulatory architecture are a series of laws and best practices, more often than not determined at a multilateral or intergovernmental level and adopted or developed at a national level by member states. This regulatory environment exists to, on the one hand, facilitate trade efficiency, and on the other hand, protect the interests of a wide variety of parties, both private and public. Yet the creation of these frameworks exists within an explicit environment of uncertainty, and as a result, incalculable risk. Formal science has failed to adequately present a convincing picture of risk, alluding that this in itself characterises no risk. While the culture of uncertainty surrounding a new technology is not unprecedented, the nature of the response among a wide variety of groups within society and their engagement (either via invitation, direct action, or via advocacy efforts) is. But the role of governance in the age of multilateralism raises questions as what role civil society truly has to play in the formation or regulation, and what in effect truly constitutes “expertise” in attempts to navigate uncertainty. Similarly, the delineation of regulation into formal and informal spheres presents a dichotomy; the
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___________________________________________________________ former inhabited by governmental actors, and the other not, but with both playing the part of (not necessarily equally) relevant actors. Ultimately, these new technologies reach the market due to a combination of market demand and the resultant incentives to supply, though this relationship is not necessarily always deterministic in this stated direction. The key concern here is how and what mechanisms should exist to ensure that these technologies reach the market as the outcome of an implicit minimization of risk, and how market forces and their interaction with civil society ensure or hinder this introduction given the wide variety of stakeholders. 2. Established Perspectives 2.1 Economics. Posner defines regulation in an economic context as “taxes and subsidies of all sorts [and] explicit legislative and administrative controls over rates, entry, and other facets of economic activity” 1 . More broadly, Chang defines it as “…government activity that is intended to affect directly the behaviours of private sector agents in order to align them with the ‘public interest’” 2 . Both definitions - one implicitly, the other explicitly - casts a role of an agent that enforces control, which broadly can be described as some sort of regulatory authority, either informal or formal. A definition such as this places regulation firmly within the context of a market consisting of parties who, due to the incentives present within a capitalist system, engage in activities that can be characterized via various modes of production, with the end result being a good or service available for consumption in the market. However, such a characterization is somewhat in opposition to the neoclassical view of optimal market behaviour. Table 1: Neoclassical core assumptions • •
•
Market “efficiency” is best achieved via competition; Competition is best fostered via a large number of firms in the market (assuming perfect information), with prices adjusting to their Pareto optimal value due to these interactions; Intervening in the market creates distortionary incentives, thereby resulting in the misallocation of resources and perverting the process of attaining efficiency.
With particular reference to the final assumption, some individuals - initially Keynes - have presented arguments for government intervention within this system to address the “excesses and contradictions” of capitalism. His work was not limited to theoretical exercises, and his ideas
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___________________________________________________________ and presence were highly influential in the Bretton Woods conference of 1944, which acted as the catalyst for the World Trade Organzation (WTO). Yet while the Keynesian approach called for state intervention, particularly with regards to fiscal as opposed to monetary policy, current trends, particularly within the context of globalization and neoliberalism, have seen the implementation of privatisation schemes, the decreasing role of individual states in creating policy, and attempts at the harmonization of trade policy to facilitate the exchange of goods and services across borders 3 . Indeed, it is as though these are attempts to regulate deregulation. Regulation in post second world war context can be further characterized by two geographic distinctions; developed and developing economies. Chang refers to the post-colonial period beginning in the 1960s as the “age of regulation”, where the former group emphasized the correction of the neoclassical market failure via government intervention, and the latter had more of a focus on “developmental” objectives 4 . This began to change in the 1970s, with the former moving away from interventionist regulation and the latter becoming dissatisfied with ISI. Two of the primary arguments against intervention during this time was that of “regulatory capture” 5 , or where interventionist policies reflect the interests of particular groups such as lobbyists as opposed to the public, and “rent seeking” 6 , where monopolies allocate resources to ensure the excludable nature of their activities, this ensuring profits, or “rents”. Similarly, in the developing country context, concerns were raised about the notion of efficiency, and the fact that the “imposed” nature of policies aimed at speeding up industrialization via the promotion of efficient markets raised inefficiencies themselves 7 . Finally, in the 1980s, policies appeared to come full circle and were aimed more at deregulation and privatisation. 2.2 International Law. The definition and applicability of international law (IL) as a regulatory instrument has been debated at length. The rationale for these debates is rooted in the arguably lacking mechanisms for enforcement, apart from retortion and reprisal. Others have argued that the efficacy of an international legal system is directly a function of the capacity of domestic legal systems, rendering the notion of “international” law somewhat misleading as it is domestic law that ultimately implements international directives 8 . • • •
Three main functions of domestic legal systems Law making (legislature) Law determination (courts/tribunals) Law enforcement (police/army)
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___________________________________________________________ In contrast, international law is a horizontal legal system; it lacks any one supreme authority, a centralized source of force, or a manifestation of the three functions embodied in the domestic context. The WTO presents an ideal applied architecture for analysis of IL in practice. The legal implications of the WTO and the intrastate dynamics that result from the incentives to engage in trade, while still international in scope, are distinct from other international legal instruments due to the process and architecture of dispute settlement (DS) and the treaties that govern interaction. The WTO constitutes hard law, yet the DS Body is limited to demanding the “losing” member state to bring their domestic practices in line with WTO standards; there is no spectre of retortion or reprisal. Abbott and Sindal define hard law as legally binding obligations that delegate authority for implementation, such as covenants and contracts, while soft law as legal arrangements that are less precise in terms of obligation, precision, and delegation; for example, international best practices, and many UN agreements 9 . Some realists and international lawyers criticize soft laws in terms of relevance, while others are critical of hard laws due to the inefficacy of bodies such as the UN to enforce such legal instruments internationally 10 . Others have argued that in a trade context, hard law is better suited in regions such as the European Union that are closely connected, whereas globally, soft law - assuming full consensus - provides strategies for dealing with uncertainty, infringes less on sovereignty, and facilitates compromise among differentiated actors 11 . 2.3 Political Science. Regulatory reform in the current political context can be traced back to state initiated economic reform efforts in the US; first the Progressive Era of the late 19th century, followed by the New Deal - relief, recovery, and reform - during the Great Depression. These initiatives were characterized by state directed intervention, and most of these attempts were focused on economic regulation; to ensure, define and establish the preconditions for “good” market performance 12 . In the US at this time, intervention and regulation were almost interchangeable terms. After 1930, two issues arose: first, the acknowledgment of regulatory capture, rent seeking behaviour and concerns of regulatory independence 13 , and second, the movement of state sponsored regulation into unprecedented social spheres such as health and safety and the environment during the 1960s and 70s, with a corresponding rise in risk assessment activities. This era is considered by some to be the beginning of the modern regulatory era 14 . Movement into these spheres produced litigation and a growing legalization of regulation for maintaining authority, characterized in the literature as command and control. This was distinct from the prior negotiation of outcomes between state agencies and industry 15 . As a result of these changes, the notion of the Regulatory
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___________________________________________________________ State (RS) arose, in contrast with the Keynesian Welfare State (WS). The RS contains more emphasis on the use of authority, rules and standardsetting, and shifting the emphasis of control from traditional bureaucratic mechanisms towards instruments of regulation. This is in contrast to the WS emphasis on public ownership, public subsidies, and directly provided services, often offered via a partnership of local and central government 16, 17 , 18 . Table 2: Three core assumptions of the Regulatory State • • •
Regulation is instrumental and standardized in character The state is necessarily central to regulatory governance State law is a central instrument of regulatory governance
Given these movements of the state into social spheres and the broadening scope and Schumpeterian evolution of different approaches, the 1970s saw the Regulation Approach (RA) as an attempt to characterize the process 19 . Table 3: Key Tenets of the Regulation Approach • • • •
Modes of accumulation Regimes of accumulation Fordism Post-Fordism
The RA postulates that evolution of regulatory frameworks is characterized by regimes reaching a crisis point where the corresponding mode becomes dated, thus giving rise to a new mode, and a new regime. More recently, the 1990s have seen movement away from these assumptions, as some critics have viewed them as overly theoretical 20,21 . The Post RS shifts the focus of analysis from state law to the wider range of norms and mechanisms to assert or achieve control due to tensions between the social and economic goals of regulatory politics. Parker 22 and Morgen 23 present the notion of metaregulation, characterized as an instance of nonjudicial legality, situated at the intersection of two trends – an increasing legalization of politics and a growing reliance on nonjudicial mechanisms of accountability. Scott 24 characterizes the Post RS as follows: Table 4: The key tenets of the Post RS 25
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___________________________________________________________ • • •
The capacity of law to exert control is limited Control based on law is marginal to processes of ordering State law is most effective linked to other ordering processes
3.
Informal/Formal The general notion of informal vs. formal in the social sciences poses an institutional framework against something outside, or the other, often characterized as non-governmental. The primary point of departure for this delineation is well defined in economics, namely the notion of the informal economy. It can be characterized as where certain types of income and the means of their generation are unregulated by the institutions of society, namely government, in a legal and social environment in which similar activities are regulated 26 . While the classical notion of formal regulation is based on processes that are standards-based, government driven, and contingent on legal recourse in cases of noncompliance, or command and control, informal regulation is somewhat distinct 27 . Table 5: Primary Characteristics of Informal Regulation • • • • •
a response to absent or ineffective formal regulatory mechanisms created by communities seeking a way to translate their preferences into reality not using legal instruments, but social pressure, adverse publicity, threat/use of violence, and civil law pressure through politicians/administrators/religious leaders or reporting violations to formal bodies compliant to shared community determined standards of acceptable performance
Much of the literature on informal regulation is focused geographically within developing countries, particularly within the context of the race to the bottom debate rooted in the globalization literature 28 . In an applied context, most of the literature is placed in the context of pollution, and in the failure of formal regulatory regimes to mitigate harm to communities. Huq and Wheeler counter this assumption on two levels; first, newer plant technology exported by developed to developing countries arguably tends to be cleaner due to strict regulations in the country of origin, and second, governmental inaction does not necessarily imply passivity in communities which are downwind or downstream from
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___________________________________________________________ “polluting” facilities due to proactive community leaders 29 . Further, Huq details two additional agents apart from government and communities that have a role to play in informal regulation: NGOs, and donor agencies. The former as promoters of public awareness, and the latter in the context of technology bundling, where donors introduce new technologies that are tied to newer and cleaner processes. In the context of situations where incentives to regulate informally exist, the outcomes of such efforts and negotiations vary. Table 6: Example Results of Informal Action • • •
monetary compensation “end of pipe” treatment (as opposed to treatment prior to release) the creation of new, revised standards
Aside from the formal/informal dialectic exists two other forms of regulation that warrants consideration here; self-regulation, and the role of the firms pursuing market incentives as a catalyst for “informal” regulation. The former has also been cast in the rubric of autopoiesis, or self creation, where agents constitute their own boundaries, recreate conditions for their internal operations, and develop according to their own operational logic rather than obeying an external logic 30 . Table 7: Examples of Self Regulating Systems • • •
microfinance Internet content technology diffusion
With regards to the latter, there appears to be tacit characterization in the literature of informal regulation being the domain of civil society. de Senarclens uniquely includes another party: multinational companies. Neoclassical economic behaviour of the firm is in itself “informal” if the pursuit of profit maximization/cost minimization is accepted to be a key behavioural tenet of the firm. The pursuit of these goals in itself creates an informal dynamic, arguably outside of government framework. 4.
The Indian Experience The introduction of genetically modified technologies in Indian agriculture is recent, with the first legally authorized crop being released in 2002. Given the preceding review of the literature, a number of questions arise with regards to how these frameworks are negotiated in an
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___________________________________________________________ applied setting, namely that of the Indian experience with GMO regulation. Is the engagement of civil society in the formation of regulatory frameworks in a multilateral world actually genuine and/or effective in practice, or is it an orchestrated effort to appease notions of plurality? If it is not, what is the role of civil society in characterizing risk? Is it limited to informal engagement or is there the room for migration to the formal sphere? What do soft laws such as UN conventions really mean in practice? Given their lacking mechanisms for establishing culpability, what effect do they truly have, and how do “best practices” interact with the pressures exerted to implementing parties in a multilateral and often bilateral world? What do hard laws such as WTO dispute settlement and national law mean in an applied developing country context where access to legal representation may not be guaranteed, is beyond the means of most due to financial constraints, or is rendered ineffective due the incomplete implementation of centrally mandated ordinances at the local level? What does authority really mean in the present context where independent nation states exist in a global community dominated by a small number of powerful nation states and where the notion of sovereignty has deteriorated? Do nation states still have the authority to regulate new technologies at a local level, or are all frameworks really determined in a multilateral context where only limited movement is possible at the level of the sovereign state? What does risk really mean in the context of new technological uncertainty? If science is unable to determine a metric for risk due to uncertainty, is this where the debate stops? If not, then how can it possibly continue in an applied, non-theoretical/non-academic context where no one truly can characterize risk?
Notes 1
R Posner, ‘Theories of Economic Regulation’. The Bell Journal of Economics and Management Science. Vol.5, Autumn 1974, pp. 335-358. 2 H Chang, ‘The Economics and Politics of Regulation’. Cambridge Journal of Economics, Vol.21, November 1997, pp. 703-728. 3 Ibid. 4 Ibid. For instance, consider Import-Substitution-Industrialization (ISI) schemes. 5 Stigler, G., ‘The Theory Of Economic Regulation’, The Bell Journal of Economics and Management Science, Vol.2, Spring 1971, pp. 3-21.
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Tullock, G., 'The Welfare Costs of Tariffs, Monopolies and Theft.' Western Economic Journal, 5, pp. 224-232. 7 Toye, J., Dilemmas of Development. Basil Blackwell, Oxford, 1987. 8 P Malanczuk, Akehurst’s Modern Introduction to International Law. Routlege, New York, 2005. 9 K Abbott, ‘Hard and Soft Law in International Governance’. International Organization, Vol.54, pp. 421-422. 10 Cloghesy, M., ’Hard Choices, Soft Law: Combining Trade, Environment, and Social Cohesion in Global Governance’. November 9, 2001, Presentation at University of Toronto. Viewed April 13, 2006, < www.cpeq.qc.ca/apropos/HardChoices.pdf>. 11 Barcelo, J., ‘The Status of WTO Rules in U.S. Law’. Cornell Legal Studies Research Paper No. 06-004, Cloghesy, op. cit. 12 L Nichols, ‘State Regulation: What Have We Learned So Far?’. Journal Of Health Politics, Policy, and Law. Vol. 25, February 2000, pp. 175-196. 13 M Moran, ‘Review Article: Understanding the Regulatory State’. British Journal of Political Science. Vol. 32, March 2002, pp. 391-413. 14 J Wiener, ‘The Regulation of Technology, and the Technology of Regulation”. Technology in Society, Vol. 26, April 2004, pp. 483–500. 15 R Stewart, ‘Regulation and the Crisis of Legalisation in the United States’. in Terence Daintith, ed., Law as an Instrument of Economic Policy: Comparative and Critical Approaches, de Gruyter., Berlin, 1998, 97–133. 16 C Hood, The Government of Risk. Oxford: Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2001. 17 C Scott, ‘Regulation in the Age of Governance: The Rise of the PostRegulatory State’. National Europe Centre Paper No. 100, Australian National University, viewed March 12, 2006, . 18 M Jones, ‘Restructuring the Local State: Economic Governance or Social Regulation?’. Political Geography, vol 17, November 1998, pp. 959–988. 19 Jessop, B., ‘Capitalism and its Future: Remarks on Regulation, Government and Governance’. Review of International Political Economy, Vol. 4, September 1997, pp. 561–581. 20 G MacLeod, ‘Globalizing Parisian Thought-Waves: Recent Advances in the Study of Social Regulation, Politics, Discourse and Space’. Progress in Human Geography, vol 21, December 1997, pp. 530-553. 21 M Moran, ‘Review Article: Understanding the Regulatory State’. British Journal of Political Science. Vol. 32, March 2002, pp. 391-413. 22 D Parker, ‘Economic Regulation: A Preliminary Literature Review and Summary of Research Questions Arising’. Centre on Regulation and Competition, Working Paper 6, October 2001, viewed March 12, 2006,
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___________________________________________________________ . 23 B Morgen, ‘The Economization of Politics: Meta-Regulation as a Form of Nonjudicial Legality’, Social & Legal Studies, Vol. 12, December 2003, pp. 489-523. 24 C Scott, ‘Regulation in the Age of Governance: The Rise of the PostRegulatory State’. National Europe Centre Paper No. 100, Australian National University, viewed March 12, 2006, . 25 C Scott, ‘Regulation in the Age of Governance: The Rise of the PostRegulatory State’. National Europe Centre Paper No. 100, Australian National University, viewed March 12, 2006, . 26 De Soto, H., The Other Path. Harper & Row, New York, 1989. 27 Kathuria, V., ‘Does Informal Regulation of Pollution Work? Empirical evidence From Gujarat’. 39th Annual Conference of The Indian Econometric Society Working Paper, viewed April 12, 2006, . 28 S Afsah, ‘Controlling Industrial Pollution: A New Paradigm’. Policy Research Working Paper Series 1672, The World Bank. 29 M Huq, ‘Pollution Reduction Without Formal Regulation: Evidence from Bangladesh’. World Bank Environment Department Divisional Working Paper 1993-39. 30 B Jessop, ‘Capitalism and its Future: Remarks on Regulation, Government and Governance’. Review of International Political Economy, Vol. 4, September 1997, pp. 561–581.
Bibliography Abbott, K., ‘Hard and Soft Law in International Governance’. International Organization, Vol.54, pp. 421-456. Afsah, S., ‘Controlling Industrial Pollution: A New Paradigm’. Policy Research Working Paper Series 1672, The World Bank. Barcelo, J., ‘The Status of WTO Rules in U.S. Law’. Cornell Legal Studies Research Paper No. 06-004. Blackman, A., ’The Economics of Technology Diffusion: Implications for Climate Policy in Developing Countries’. Resources for the Future Discussion Paper 99-42. Burand, D. ‘How does Consumer Protection Relate to Microcredit?’ viewed March 19, 2006,
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___________________________________________________________ Vogel, D., ’The Hare and the Tortoise Revisited: The New Politics of Consumer and Environmental Regulation in Europe’. British Journal of Political Science. Vol.33, pp. 557-580. Wiener, J., ‘The Regulation of Technology, and the Technology of Regulation”. Technology in Society, Vol.26, April 2004, pp. 483–500. Wendt, A., ‘Anarchy is What States Make of it: The Social Construction of Power Politics’. International Organization, Vol.46, Spring 1992, pp. 391-425. White, L., ‘Technological Change, Financial Innovation, and Financial Regulation: The Challenges for Public Policy’. Centre for Financial Institutions Working Papers 97-33, Wharton School Centre for Financial Institutions, University of Pennsylvania, viewed April 12, 2006 .
Legal Impediments to the Survival of Organic Production? Martin Phillipson Abstract Both organic and GM methods of agricultural production are enjoying significant growth. However, given that these two forms of production are diametrically opposed, serious doubts arise as to the ability of these two methods to co-exist. If genuine co-existence is to be achieved, concrete legal measures must be developed to ensure such an outcome. In its present form the legal system cannot and will not provide for genuine coexistence. As such, it is arguable that the legal system is impeding not only the future growth, but perhaps the very survival, of organic agriculture. Keywords: Food- Agriculture-Organic-Genetic Modification-Law-Coexistence-Multinationals 1.
Introduction. In 1998, the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM) passed the Mar del Plata Declaration, which stated that: th
We, the undersigned participants at the 12 Scientific Conference of the International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements (IFOAM) at Mar del Plata, Argentina, call on governments and regulatory agencies throughout the world to immediately ban the use of genetic engineering in agriculture and food production since it involves: • Unacceptable threats to human health. • Negative and irreversible environmental impacts. • Release of organisms of an un-recallable nature. • Removal of the right of choice, both for farmers and consumers. • Violation of farmer’s fundamental property rights and endangerment of their economic independence. • Practices, which are incompatible with the principles of sustainable agriculture as defined by IFOAM. 1
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While the adoption of such a position helped to garner support for organics as a result of, inter alia, food scares in Europe, it also set organic producers on a practical (and philosophical) collision course with the manufacturers and users of Genetically Modified (GM) crops at some future point. That point is fast approaching. In the eight years since the Mar del Plata Declaration, the market for organic foods has grown exponentially. The UK Soil Association estimates that in Europe alone that “the market was worth €20.7 billion in 2004, and has been growing by 26 per cent since 2001.” 2 In the United States, the figures are similarly impressive. The New York Times reported that: With sales of roughly $12 billion, organic food remains a niche market within the $500 billion food industry. But the sector's growing appeal to consumers has fueled a 20 percent annual growth rate in recent years. 3 However, in roughly the same period, the amount of genetically modified crops being grown worldwide (particularly in the Americas) has also risen dramatically: Biotech farm crops around the world in 2005 grew by 11 percent over the previous year — the 10th straight year of double-digit increases, according to a new report from the nonprofit International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-biotech Applications (ISAAA). An estimated 8.5 million farmers in 21 countries now plant biotech crops — up from 8.25 million farmers in 17 countries in 2004. 4 It is becoming apparent that the survival of organic production (as we know it) is being jeopardized by the prevalence of GM production. Given the philosophical position of incompatibility adopted in the Mar Del Plata Declaration, the potential for unwanted “contamination” becomes ever more apparent as GM crops become more widespread. If an organic producer’s crop becomes heavily contaminated with GM material, loss of organic certification is inevitable. The question becomes one of co-existence. Is it possible for GM production and organic production to co-exist? This paper puts the question of co-existence in the context of the legal system and associated regulatory frameworks. Given that these diametrically opposed forms of production enjoy significant degrees of support amongst producers and
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____________________________________________________________ consumers, the legal system will at some point need to adjudicate in disputes between the two. Preferably, a system must be put in place to prevent disputes arising between the two by allowing them to co-exist. This shift frames the issue as one of producer and consumer choice. Canada, and more specifically Saskatchewan, proves an excellent starting point for this analysis. The uptake in usage of GM Canola (Rape Seed) in Canada has been extraordinary. 5 Since its introduction to the Canadian market in 1995 GM herbicide tolerant Canola accounts for over 80% of total Canadian production, with Monsanto’s Roundup Ready product accounting for 65% of the entire market. 6 This remarkable growth is mirrored with other crops: According to a January 2005 report from the International Service for the Acquisition of Agri-Biotech Applications (ISAAA), national acreage of biotech crops has risen from a few trial plot hectares in 1995 to 3.5 million commercial hectares in 2002. Since 1999 alone, plantings of biotech varieties of canola have increased by nearly 30 percent and biotech corn and soybean plantings have increased by five and 15 percent, respectively. 7 This rapid growth in production means the producers of organic Canola are in a tiny minority in the Province. They are surrounded by vast seas of GM Canola, in the main produced by Monsanto (Roundup Ready Canola) and Bayer Crop-Science (LibertyLink). Given the popularity of these products, it must be assumed that the vast majority of Canola growers in Saskatchewan are very happy with GM crops. However, this situation squarely raises the issue of co-existence in that a minority of farmers, for economic, strategic or philosophical reasons, has chosen to grow non-GM Canola (be it via conventional or organic means). Clearly, the opportunities for pollen drift and gene-flow are enormous, given the prevalence of GM material in the overall Provincial Canola crop. Before discussing the Saskatchewan experience I want to suggest that there are several different regulatory approaches to address the question of co-existence. I will also suggest that a rapidly emerging alternative may provide a non-regulatory resolution to the co-existence debate.
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2. Possible Regulatory Approaches to Co-Existence. A. The Laissez-Faire Approach In this context the laissez-faire approach is actually probably more accurately called the status quo. Essentially, this approach relies on existing legal and regulatory institutions to handle the conflict/interaction between GM crops and organic crops. This is clearly the approach favoured in Canada thus far. The case of Hoffman et al v Monsanto 8 is a clear indication of this. Hoffman is an organic canola grower (rape seed) in Saskatchewan. As stated above, since it entered the Canadian market in 1995, Monsanto’s Roundup Ready Canola has proved exceedingly popular. One of the major concerns for organic growers is the promiscuity of GM Canola and the consequent widespread emergence of “volunteer” Canola. Canola pollen can travel significant distances and Hoffman is suing Monsanto and Bayer Crop Science for damages relating to the widespread contamination of his organic fields by their GM Canola varieties. As stated above, if an organic farmer’s produce is contaminated with GM material, loss of certification is likely. Loss of certification results in the loss of the significant price premium associated with organic production. Thus far, Hoffman’s lawsuit has not been a success. The Province of Saskatchewan (along with most other Canadian jurisdictions) has legislation that facilitates the filing of class-actions by multiple parties against the same defendants. 9 This legislation usually speeds up the litigation process and reduces costs. Hoffman and many other organic canola growers are currently attempting to achieve certification for a class action against Monsanto & Bayer. In 2005, Justice Smith of the Court of Saskatchewan Queen’s Bench denied Hoffman’s application for certification in the Class Action suit. What is of most concern however is that her judgment (for the most part) rejected Hoffman’s application on the basis that he had no legal cause of action. 10 In his claim, Hoffman relied in part on the traditional common law causes of action such as nuisance, negligence and strict liability, the so-called property torts. In her judgment Justice Smith systematically rejected all these claims and could see no valid cause of action. Her decision has been appealed to the Saskatchewan Court of Appeal and they will hear the case in late 2006. While this litigation is not over, Hoffman epitomizes the laissezfaire/status quo approach. However, existing legal institutions (in this case the common law) appear severely lacking in this context. If Justice
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____________________________________________________________ Smith’s ruling is upheld, it will send a clear message that the common law cannot adequately address issues pertaining to co-existence. What further complicates the situation for Hoffman and many other Canadian farmers is that several jurisdictions in Canada have “right to farm” legislation that prohibits legal actions against farmers in nuisance, negligence and strict liability, if they follow “normally accepted agricultural practices.” In Saskatchewan that legislation 11 was amended in the 1990’s to include the “use of new technologies” in its definition of “normally accepted agricultural practices.” Clearly, in the Saskatchewan (and arguably the Canadian) context, the laissez faire/status quo approach will not provide for coexistence. Existing legal institutions have either been interpreted in a manner that renders them inapplicable, or more troublingly, legal institutions exist that formally prevent organic farmers (and others) from attempting to protect their right to co-exist. Literature also exists in Europe 12 that certainly casts doubt on the ability of existing legal institutions to address adequately issues pertaining to liability and compensation for the infiltration of organic crops by GMO’s. B. The “Redefine Organic” Approach. The second approach that could resolve issues of co-existence could be called the “redefining organic” approach. What this entails is the formal redefinition of organic production in a way that renders GM compatible with organic. This is essentially removing the philosophical objection by “watering down” organic standards to such an extent that no conflict remains. As with the laissez-faire approach, this is clearly unacceptable. It could be argued that such an eventuality is highly unlikely, but two cautionary tales are noteworthy in this regard. In the late 1990’s the USDA was under intense pressure from major food multinationals to amend its organic standards. The major food producers had begun to notice the large growth in the organic sector and wanted to grab a share of this growing market. Rather than amending growing and husbandry practices in their own operations, it was seen to be preferable to simply amend the definition of “organic” to encompass their existing production methods, allowing them to label previously unacceptable products as “organic.” A large, and ultimately successful, campaign was launched to ensure that the USDA did not water down its standards. 13 However, as with this experience in the late 1990’s, it is clear that as the organic market continues to grow, it is not beyond the realms of possibility that other attempts at redefining organic to expand market share
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will be forthcoming. In the context of co-existence, it is perfectly plausible that the purveyors of GM may seek to redefine “organic” in such a way as to allow their products access to the organic sector. The second cautionary tale is an ongoing one. While I am focusing more specifically on the Canadian and North American context, a debate currently occurring in Europe is highly relevant. In late 2005 the European Commission announced proposals 14 to update the regime governing organic production in Europe. Regulation 2092/91 as it stands is quite clear that crops and foodstuffs that contain GM material cannot be labeled “organic” in Europe. This approach is very much in keeping with the Mar del Plata declarations philosophy. However, the proposals released in December 2005 received a deluge of criticism from IFOAM and others because of a specific suggestion that a level of up to 0.9% GM material could contaminate (via adventitious presence as opposed to deliberate action) organic products and still fall within the protection of the term organic. The comments of IFOAM are representative: The IFOAM EU Group is very concerned that the proposal specifically allows GM contamination up to the labeling threshold of 0.9%. We recognise that it is the Commission's view that this is only a clarification of the existing text and not a legal change to regulation 2092/91. However, this and a number of other lesser differences significantly threaten the current GM-free status of organic food. Organic consumers do not want, and the organic sector does not tolerate, GMO contamination of organic products. This regulation should be supporting that, not undermining it. It is intolerable that the organic sector is effectively being forced to take on the problems of the GM industry by having to accept, either GM contamination of organic food up to 0.9%, or a separate threshold for organic food and seed –neither is acceptable. 15 The Commission proposal of December 2005 represents a formalized dilution of the term “organic” and, if adopted, will inevitably lead to the dominance of GM by stealth. Without wishing to sound alarmist, the 0.9% represents a genetically modified “Trojan Horse” by which GM material infiltrates the organic production system and destroys it from within. Co-existence becomes capture as the lines between the two methods of production are gradually blurred via the abandonment of zero tolerance towards GM material. 16
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____________________________________________________________ C. The “Regulate for Co-Existence” Approach. Given the highly unsatisfactory nature of the previous two options, a more satisfactory alternative should be considered. If existing systems are either ineffective (the first approach) or under constant threat of philosophically incompatible revision (the second approach), then a third approach is essential, a “regulate for co-existence” approach. In essence, this requires the formulation of new legal and regulatory structures that can ensure the survival of organic production. In this sense co-existence is ensured or achieved by providing mechanisms whereby organic producers can adhere to their traditional standards and, where necessary, take action to prohibit or prevent the infiltration of GM material into their fields and production facilities. This will not be an easy task. In 2003, the European Commission issued a Recommendation 17 on “guidelines for the development of national strategies and best practices to ensure the coexistence of genetically modified crops with conventional and organic farming.” In Finland, the Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry appointed an Expert Working Group in February 2004 to prepare recommendations for measures and instructions for enabling the coexistence of genetically modified crops and conventional and organic agricultural products in Finland. In its Mid-Term Report, the Working Group concluded that: [It is] very likely there is a need to prepare a completely new act which will define the general objectives and principles of coexistence as well as [define] …responsibilities and sanctions. 18 The Report also concluded that the new act would have to contain: Provisions on the use of sowing seed, isolation distances, buffer strips, crop rotation, cooperation between neighbouring farms and control measures and…[I]nstructions on the destroying of volunteers, weed control, harvesting, cleaning and maintenance of machinery, soil preparation, and size and shape of the field parcels. 19 In response to the EC position paper on 2902/91 IFOAM made a similar recommendation to that of the Finnish Working Group: It is crucial that routine contamination is not legalised. A further prerequisite is that co-existence measures be
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introduced which aim at zero contamination and put the full responsibility for any adventitious contamination on GM users, including economic liability for costs incurred and income lost. This would complement a process-based approach (all actors taking all necessary steps to minimise contamination) which should be the basis for excluding GMO’s from organic food and farming. 20 Finally, the European Environment Bureau notes that the only viable solution to dealing with co-existence is a mandatory EC measure. They describe the current non-mandatory approach as: The Commission opting for a “wait-and-contaminate” approach which could be very damaging for organic farming. The solution is an effective EU regulation on “coexistence” so as to prevent such contamination for both organic as well as conventional non-GM products. This is the only way to ensure that the production of organic and non-GM crops, seeds and food can thrive in the EU without the threat of any GMO contamination. In addition, it is vital for the future of this sector to ensure that organic farmers, processors and consumers will in no way have to carry the consequences of eventual GM contamination. To this end, the new EU regulation on coexistence should set up a mandatory insurance scheme for contamination – funded by GMOoperators. 21 Clearly, if governments are committed to ensuring co-existence in their agricultural production sectors they must act in a detailed and systematic fashion. A tailored suite of legislative and regulatory measures will be required if the goal of co-existence is to move from its status as a desirable proposition to a long-term policy outcome. 22 3.
A Non-Regulatory Solution? Multinationals As Surrogate Defenders of Co-Existence? The fourth possible option is one which does not involve the state at all. Rather, it is one in which organic production survives due to the demands of large commercial third parties who act as surrogate regulators. These parties demand that an ever-increasing amount of their supply be
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____________________________________________________________ produced by organic means. Major European supermarket chains such as Sainsbury and Carrefour have ever expanding organic product lines and the demand for reliable supplies of such products is only likely to increase 23 . By paying price premiums to producers for organic produce these firms will become surrogate environmental regulators whose market influence will dictate that co-existence become a reality. In the United States the recent announcements by Wal-Mart that they intend to start selling organic products has sent shockwaves through the organic industry. 24 On the one hand, if the world’s largest retailer starts selling organic produce this will drive up demand and perhaps persuade more primary producers to “go organic.” However, many commentators are concerned that the “Wal-Martisation” of organic production will lead to the industrialization of organic production, drive down prices and may ultimately destroy the industry. 25 Furthermore, some writers have suggested that if major corporations such as Wal-Mart “go organic” they may use their political leverage to persuade the USDA to re-examine its organic standards in a repeat of the 1998 process discussed earlier. As Michael Pollan puts it: Up to now, the Federal Standards have provided a bulwark against that pressure [to cut corners]. Yet with the industrialization of organic, these rules are themselves coming under mounting pressure [and]...it’s hard to believe that the lobbyists from Wal-Mart are going to play a constructive role in defending those standards from efforts to weaken them. 26 Whatever their motives, it may be that by virtue of their enormous market power and/or control of every aspect of their supply chains, that the global food giants may be more successful in facilitating co-existence than state regulators will ever be. Whether the resulting model of organic production bears any resemblance to that which we have now is an entirely different question. 27 4.
Conclusion A critical juncture has been reached where Governments must consciously decide if they wish to have a diverse food production system using a combination of GM, conventional and organic methods. If they view this diversity as desirable, then these different methods must be able to co-exist. The attainment of genuine co-existence is a prerequisite for the survival of organic production. This goal cannot be achieved by piecemeal reforms or an adherence to the status quo. Such an approach will
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inevitably lead to the dominance of GM production by stealth as the organic food chain gradually becomes ever more contaminated. In terms of providing a platform for co-existence, current legal and regulatory structures are either inadequate or actively discouraging in this regard. Tailored packages of legal and regulatory reforms must be developed in the short-term to ensure the long-term viability of organic agriculture. If governments do not address this task with some urgency, commercial third parties may fill this regulatory void and change the face of organic production forever.
Notes 1
IFOAM, “Mar Del Plata Declaration,” 19 November 1998 (15 June 2006). . 2 Anthony Fletcher, “Revision of EU Organic Rules Slammed,” 22 February 2006, (10 June 2006). < http://www.foodnavigator.com/news/ng.asp?n=65981-revision-of-eu>. 3 See: Melanie Warner, “What is Organic? Powerful Players Want A Say.” New York Times, November 1, 2005. (14 May 2006) 4 Biotech Acres, “Global Biotech Plantings Show Double-Digit Growth for Tenth Straight Year.” . 5 Following its introduction onto the Canadian market in 1995 GM herbicide tolerant Canola now accounts for over 80% of total Canola production. Canola is a particular cultivar of the Rape Seed family. Canola stands for Canadian Oil Low Acid. 6 A. David Morrow and Colin B. Ingram, “Of Transgenic Mice and Round-up Ready Canola: The Decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada in Harvard College v Canada and Monsanto v Schmeiser,” University of British Columbia Law Review 38 (2005): 189-223. 7 ISAAA, “Global Status of Commercialized Biotech/GM Crops: 2005.” January 11, 2006, (May 23, 2006).< http://www.isaaa.org.> 8 Hoffman et al v Monsanto et al, 2005 SJ No 304, 2005 SKQB 225. For a more detailed treatment of the issues in Hoffman, see Martin Phillipson, “Giving Away the Farm? The Rights and Obligations of Biotechnology Multinationals,” King’s.College.LawJ.ournal. 16 (2005): 362-372.
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____________________________________________________________ 9
Saskatchewan Legislature. Class Actions Act, SS 2001, c.C-
12.01. 10
For a thorough analysis of the legal reasons for the decision in Hoffman see Phillipson and see also Martin Z. P. Olszynski, “Hoffman v Monsanto Canada Inc” Journal of Environmental Law and Practice 16 (2005): 11 Saskatchewan Legislature. Agricultural Operations Act, SS 1995, c.A-12. 12 See, for example: Maria Lee and Robert Burrell, “Liability for the Escape of GM Seeds: Pursuing the Victim?” Modern Law Review 65 (2002): 517-537. 13 For a brief description and analysis of the circumstances surrounding the USDA’s proposed amendments in 1998, see: Virginia Cooperative Extension, “USDA’s Rule on Organic Agriculture and Biotechnology,” 20 June 2000, (12 April 2006). 14 See: European Commission, Proposal for a COUNCIL REGULATION on organic production and labeling of organic products and Proposal for a COUNCIL REGULATION amending Regulation (EEC) No 2092/91 on organic production of agricultural products and indications referring thereto in agricultural products and foodstuffs. EC, Brussels, 21.12.2005 COM (2005) 671 final. 15 IFOAM, Position Paper on the “Proposal for a Council Regulation on Organic Production and Labeling of Organic Products.” 27 February 2006, (24 May, 2006). 16 It has been reported that due to the amount of criticism received, a new approach to the revision of 2092/91 may be in the offing. See: Organic Europe, “Revision of EU Regulation 2092/21,” 28 July 2006, (24 April 2006). 17 Commission Recommendation (2003/556/EC) of 23 July 2003. 18 Government of Finland, Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, Expert Working Group, ENABLING THE COEXISTENCE OF GENETICALLY MODIFIED CROPS AND CONVENTIONAL AND ORGANIC FARMING IN FINLAND. MID-TERM REPORT. 31 May 2005, 64. 19 Ibid. 20 IFOAM Position Paper.
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21
European Environment Bureau, “EEB recommendations on: Proposal for a Council Regulation on Organic Production and Labeling of Organic Products,” April 5th, 2006 (May 6, 2006). 22 For one author’s opinion of the multitude of issues that such a regime must address see: Giorgios Balias, “Seeds of Distrust: The Coexistence of Genetically Modified and Conventional or Organic Crops in Greece,” (2005) 14 European Environmental Law Review 318-325 23 For a more detailed analysis of the role of such institutions in environmental regulation see Gunningham et al, “Harnessing Third Parties As Surrogate Regulators: Achieving Environmental Outcomes By Alternative Means.” Business Strategy and the Environment 8 (1999): 211-224 24 See for example, Warner. 25 Ibid. 26 See: Michael Pollan, “Mass Natural,” New York Times Magazine, 4 June 2006, 15. 27 See, for example: Michael Pollan, The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (London: Penguin Press, 2006).
Bibliography Balias, Georgias. “Seeds of Distrust: The Co-existence of Genetically Modified and Conventional or Organic Crops in Greece,” (2005) 14 European Environmental Law Review 318-325. Biotech Acres. “Global Biotech Plantings Show Double-Digit Growth for Tenth Straight Year.” . Commission Recommendation (2003/556/EC) of 23 July 2003. European Commission, Proposal for a COUNCIL REGULATION on organic production and labeling of organic products and Proposal for a COUNCIL REGULATION amending Regulation (EEC) No 2092/91 on organic production of agricultural products and indications referring thereto in agricultural products and foodstuffs. EC, Brussels, 21.12.2005 COM (2005) 671 final. European Environment Bureau, “EEB recommendations on: Proposal for a Council Regulation on Organic Production and Labeling of Organic Products,” April 5th, 2006 (May 6, 2006).
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____________________________________________________________ Fletcher, Anthony. “Revision of EU Organic Rules Slammed,” 22 February 2006, (10 June 2006). < http://www.foodnavigator.com/news/ng.asp?n=65981-revision-of-eu>. Government of Finland, Ministry of Agriculture and Forestry, Expert Working Group, ENABLING THE COEXISTENCE OF GENETICALLY MODIFIED CROPS AND CONVENTIONAL AND ORGANIC FARMING IN FINLAND. MID-TERM REPORT. 31 May 2005, 64. Gunningham, Neil, Grabowsky, Peter, Phillipson, Martin. “Harnessing Third Parties As Surrogate Regulators: Achieving Environmental Outcomes By Alternative Means.” Business. Strategy and the Environment 8 (1999): 211-224. Hoffman et al v Monsanto et al, 2005 SJ No 304, 2005 SKQB 225. IFOAM. “Mar Del Plata Declaration,” 19 November 1998 (15 June 2006). . IFOAM, Position Paper on the “Proposal for a Council Regulation on Organic Production and Labeling of Organic Products.” 27 February 2006, (24 May, 2006). ISAAA, “Global Status of Commercialized Biotech/GM Crops: 2005.” January 11, 2006, (May 23, 2006).< http://www.isaaa.org.> Lee, Maria and Burrell, Robert. “Liability for the Escape of GM Seeds: Pursuing the Victim?” Modern Law Review 65 (2002): 517-537. Morrow, David A. and Ingram, Colin B. “Of Transgenic Mice and Roundup Ready Canola: The Decisions of the Supreme Court of Canada in Harvard College v Canada and Monsanto v Schmeiser,” University of British Columbia Law Review 38 (2005): 189-223. Olszynski, Martin Z.P. “Hoffman v Monsanto Canada Inc” Journal of Environmental Law and Practice 16 (2005): Organic Europe, “Revision of EU Regulation 2092/21,” 24 April 2006, (28 July 2006). Phillipson, Martin.” Giving Away the Farm? The Rights and Obligations of Biotechnology Multinationals,” King’s.College.LawJ.ournal. 16 (2005): 362-372. Pollan, Michael. “Mass Natural,” New York Times Magazine, 4 June 2006, 15.
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Pollan, Michael. The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals (London: Penguin Press, 2006). Saskatchewan Legislature. Agricultural Operations Act, SS 1995, c.A-12. Saskatchewan Legislature. Class Actions Act, SS 2001, c.C-12.01. Virginia Cooperative Extension. “USDA’s Rule on Organic Agriculture and Biotechnology,” 20 June 2000, (12 April 2006).
The Sustainability Analysis Framework: A Whole of Government Model Kendal Hodgman Abstract Sustainability, governance and communication are concepts which must guide new millennium policy drafters, law makers and those charged with making socially just, economically responsible and environmentally sound decisions, if our planet is to be transmitted not irretrievably diminished to future generations. Such is the level of the global community’s concern for the urgent implementation of Sustainability principles, that, in the spirit of Sustainability, international treaties have been signed, conventions and protocols ratified, as well as international and domestic laws enacted. Despite all this, the world continues to slide backwards in the quest for a sustainable common future. This paper contends that many of the impediments to Sustainability are due to it being a paradoxically simple yet complex concept and practice. Communicating about Sustainability and models for its achievement remains a challenge, particularly for governments, which are charged with the prudent stewardship of the common wealth for the common good. A paradigmatic shift is required, one requiring that traditional disciplinary hubris be dissipated and that decision-makers be educated of the need to integrate social, economic and environmental considerations. This paper outlines the evolution of such a tool in the largest state government in Australia, New South Wales (NSW). The Sustainability Analysis Framework (SAF), devised by the author, and detailed in her report to the NSW Government, Sustainability: A New South Wales Whole of Government Approach, has been implemented across thirty-eight state agencies and demonstrates that a whole of government Sustainability perspective is achievable. The level of the NSW Government’s commitment to this process is evidenced by the fact that it was co-ordinated at the highest levels of the administration and engaged high-level input from a comprehensive portfolio of its agencies. The successful deployment of the SAF across this significant bureaucracy shows that this generally applicable mechanism is effective in data collation, information sharing, knowledge organisation and the communication of Sustainability practice and wisdom. Key words: Sustainability Definitions; Communication, Governance, Spirituality, Australia.
Knowledge
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___________________________________________________________ 1.
Who is fit to hold Power? We have come from across the world to share our ideas, thoughts and learning on the pressing issues of environmental justice and global citizenship. For this occasion we have gathered in this particular building, the Tower, Mansfield College, Oxford. I was immediately aware that this space has a sense of place and I was drawn to read the building’s dedication plaque, which reads in part: “This building has been erected…as a home for the cultivation of Sacred learning…” It is, therefore, appropriate for me to begin by asking you to open your minds to Stephen Mitchell’s translation of one of the ancient sacred texts from the Judeo-Christian tradition, Psalm 24: Who is fit to hold power and worthy to act in God’s place? Those with a passion for the truth, who are horrified by injustice, who act with mercy to the poor and take up the cause of the helpless, who have let go of selfish concerns and see the whole earth as sacred, refusing to exploit her creatures or to foul her waters and lands. Their strength is in their compassion; God’s light shines through their hearts. Their children’s children will bless them, And the work of their hands will endure.
The Psalms hold a special place in the Western psyche. These sacred songs, which are used in both Christian and Jewish worship, are traditionally held to have been written by David, the second king of the Hebrews, who united Israel and made Jerusalem the kingdom’s capital. David, in his youth was the archetypal Hebrew hero. The young shepherd who, armed with only a simple sling and stones overcame, against all odds, the mighty and armed giant, Goliath. The David and Goliath story has taken on mythical proportions. In the Western tradition it is still one of the most familiar spiritual stories even though nearly three millennia have passed since the event. It is a story which can offer hope and fortitude to those who consider the Sustainability threats facing our planet and the forces powering them overwhelming. David’s victory is an evergreen reminder to persevere in hope in times of adversity. It is indeed, a story for our time and the theme of the power of story to engender change is one which plays a significant role in the author’s Sustainability philosophy. Yet, King David’s legacy extends beyond his courage and faith in God, in the context of battle and threat. His capacity to wisely exercise
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___________________________________________________________ power and to deliver unity and justice is one of the great Western testimonies of a leadership based in a spiritual foundation. King David’s reliance on spiritually guided ethical principles is recorded in the Christian Old Testament and Hebrew Scriptures as an exemplar of good stewardship. Importantly though, it is through his Book of Psalms that David reveals his intense relationship and intimate communication with God. The beauty, wisdom, spiritual yearning, anguish and joy of The Psalms depicts David’s conscious contact with God and the great ancient king’s understanding of who really is fit to hold power and worthy to act in God’s place? Regardless of our religious conviction, we all would be well served to hear and heed David’s understanding, for it is a message of Communication, Governance and Sustainability.
2.
Communication, Governance and Sustainability Communication, Governance and Sustainability is the title of the author’s doctoral thesis. The thesis is centred upon research conducted in the Government of NSW, which governs the largest state of Australia, NSW. This paper is based upon the dissertation and will use, as its focus, one of the thesis’ key findings, namely that an effective system of communication, tailored to Sustainability issues, is necessary if large organizations, such as governments, are to fulfil their statutory and arguably ethical responsibilities to Sustainability. What the thesis reveals is that such a system is achievable, and that a whole of government Sustainability perspective is possible through the deployment of a simple communications mechanism - the Sustainability Analysis Framework. The SAF, devised by the author in the course of the research, has been effectively implemented across a significant sample of the NSW Government agencies and demonstrates that a whole of government Sustainability perspective is achievable. To describe the full extent of this large undertaking is beyond the scope of this one paper. It is depicted in full in the author’s report to the NSW Government entitled, Sustainability: A NSW Whole of Government Approach (‘The Report’). 1 It is notable that the project was undertaken through the NSW Premier’s Department and was given high priority status. The request for data, entitled The Sustainability Survey of NSW Government Agencies (‘The Survey’) was sent from the Director General of the Premier’s Department to other Directors-General or Chief Executive Officers. The project’s high status was critical in obtaining timely responses and gave the author extensive access to the Government’s Sustainability data. This paper is particularly concerned with the author’s contribution to the development of a common Sustainability language, including definitions and categorisations of Sustainability practice. The lack of such a common Sustainability language was identified by the
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___________________________________________________________ author as one of the key hindrances to Sustainability knowledge transfer and understanding in this organisational context and beyond. The structural formation of the SAF is described in other publications by the author, 2 as is the methodological approach. The latter is briefly outlined in the following diagram.
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___________________________________________________________
SUSTAINABILITY ANALYSIS FRAMEWORK PROCESS DATA SUBMITTED
Sustainability Issues common across NSW Government identified and defined.
AGENCY SPECIFIC SUSTAINABILITY REVIEW MATRIX Agency Initiatives are categorised into the Sustainability considerations of Social, Economic and Environment.
Issues are categorised into the Sustainability issues arising from the full data set. In the detailed project, ten prevailing issues were identified and defined. How the agency addresses a prevailing challenge is then detailed.
Integrated Outcomes and Models highlight innovation and notable practice in how the agency is dealing with a prevailing Sustainability Issue. This set of the SRM demonstrates integration of social, economic and environmental considerations as well as when an activity has a net Sustainability benefit.
WHOLE OF GOVERNMENT SUSTAINABILITY ISSUES & PRACTICE TABLE Each3.Sustainability Issue, categorized and defined in theContext course of the Sustainability in the NSW Statutory analysis is allocated a specific Integrated The Government of SIPT. NSW,The through its Outcomes rhetoric and andModels statutory, judged all 38 Agencies to be the to ‘Best Practice’ ofSustainability. each Issue policy andfrom program delivery,deemed is committed progressing are then transferred into the designated SIPT.
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___________________________________________________________ This commitment has been translated into considerable Sustainability achievements in various sectors. However, ‘The Report’, upon which this paper is based, identifies that continued and accelerated progress is necessary if NSW is to sustainably deliver a healthy environment, a dynamic economy and a society, which nurtures its citizens. For the purposes of ‘The Survey’ the Premier’s Department adopted the following definition of Sustainability: “meeting the needs of current and future generations through an integration of environmental protection, social advancement and economic prosperity.” 3 To date, however, in the NSW public sector, there has been no statutory direction given, as to how the social, economic and environmental considerations are to be integrated in decision-making processes. Indeed, the NSW statutory direction is limited to the concept of Ecologically Sustainable Development (ESD), which integrates only environmental and economic considerations. This definition was first enunciated in NSW in the Protection of the Environment Administration Act 1991 (NSW), s 6(2). It is obvious, however, that the NSW Government accepts the need to integrate the three social, economic and environmental considerations in delivering sustainable outcomes for the State. It has demonstrated this in many policy arenas. The most cogent articulation of this aspiration is contained in the NSW Government’s Four Key Commitments, 4 which, for the purposes of ‘The Survey’ and ‘The Report’, define the Core Sustainability Principles in the NSW Context: • • • •
Integrating environmental protection into all activities Encouraging economic development and sustainable employment Achieving greater social justice for all members of the community Delivering more financially responsible programs that reduce public debt and unfunded liabilities.
The processes for evaluating and reporting on economic and financial impacts are well established and procedures for environmental impact assessment have been developing over recent decades. However, a review of the NSW statutory and policy literature reveals that evaluating and reporting on social impacts of decisions and defining social justice/equity lags in comparison. Given ‘The Survey’ questions’ emphasis on impacts on communities and the social aspects of Sustainability, it was necessary to discern how Social Justice/Equity is defined in the NSW context. For the purposes of ‘The Survey’ and ‘The Report’ the definition was extrapolated from the intent contained in the NSW Social Justice Budget Statement 2003-04:
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___________________________________________________________ “We want all of the people of this State to have a fair go: a fair chance in life, a fair share of public resources, and a fair say in the decisions that affect their lives. Our social justice agenda has two foundations: a strong economy to provide jobs and opportunity for all, and social spending for those who need support.” 5
Within the statutory context, the NSW Government has embraced the Sustainability imperative for social inclusion and equity in s 3(1) of the groundbreaking Community Relations Commission and Principles of Multiculturalism Act 2000 (NSW). Indeed, NSW was the first Australian state to enshrine into law the principles of multiculturalism. This Act provides the framework for a broader, more inclusive concept of NSW community relations. The author anticipates that, as the NSW Government progresses its whole of government approach to Sustainability, there will be future discussion and consideration of the concepts of Social Sustainability and community impact in the NSW statutory and policy contexts. The author, thus, provided the Government with a number of definitions which were suggested to provide guidance for such future discourse. 4.
Rationale for Sustainability Issues Selection In the discharge of their functions, agencies face various Sustainability challenges depending on their roles, operations and statutory responsibilities this is, indeed, the case within the NSW Government context. Agencies in an overarching sector (e.g. electricity utilities, land development agencies, etc.) share similar Sustainability issues, yet, they will also face individual challenges which arise from their specific locale, service community and economic position. Thus, relevant Sustainability issues were evident from agency responses to ‘The Survey’. These various issues were broadly categorised and then detailed in subcategories. This method allowed for major commonalities to be defined, as well as detailing the challenges specific to agencies. Ten prevailing Sustainability issues emerged from the data. Definitions for these ten prevailing issues were then derived from an extensive survey of the international Sustainability literature. These definitions were then employed by the author for the analysis of ‘The Survey’ submissions. As noted previously, a comprehensive definition of such Sustainability issues had not been, hitherto, undertaken in the NSW Government context. The definitions were employed as principles for data analysis and do not seek to limit or define the scope of agency practice. Moreover, the author does not wish to limit to ten the number of common Sustainability issues facing NSW Government agencies. The ten issues identified and subsequently defined arose directly from ‘The Survey’ submissions, which were influenced by ‘The Survey’ questions. Thus, it is
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___________________________________________________________ likely that some other issues may arise from different questions and data sets. 5.
Defining the Sustainability Issues The ten prevailing Sustainability issues are: Conservation of Biological Diversity, Conservation of Resource, Partnerships & Synergies, Pollution Minimisation, Social Equity & Education, Social Equity as a Regional/Spatial Driver, Sustainability Reporting, Sustainability Tradeoffs, and Sustainable Quality of Life. A. Conservation of Biological Diversity Australia has ratified the international Convention on Biological Diversity (1992) negotiated under the auspices of the United Nations Environment Program. 6 NSW Government decision makers are directed that “conservation of biological diversity should be a fundamental consideration.” 7 The Threatened Species Conservation Act 1995,(NSW) s. 4, defines “Biological diversity” as the diversity of life and is made up of the following three components: (a) genetic diversity – the variety of genes (or units of heredity) in any population, (b) species diversity – the variety of species, and (c) ecosystem diversity – the variety of communities or ecosystems. The Objects of the TSC Act are: (a) to conserve biological diversity and promote ESD, and (b) to prevent the extinction and promote the recovery of threatened species, populations and ecological communities, and (c) to protect the critical habitat of those threatened species, populations and ecological communities that are endangered, and (d) to eliminate or manage certain processes that threaten the survival or evolutionary development of threatened species, populations and ecological communities, and (e) to ensure that the impact of any action affecting threatened species, populations and ecological communities is properly assessed, and (f) to encourage the conservation of threatened species populations and ecological communities by the adoption of measures involving cooperative management. B. Conservation of Resource Resources are categorised as: Material flows - Natural capital and Man-made capital; and Human Resource - Human capital and Social capital. “Natural capital refers to renewable and non-renewable natural resources, and ecosystem services, that make possible all economic activity, indeed all life. These services are of immense economic value; some are literally priceless, since they have no known substitutes. Failure to take into account the value of these limited assets results in natural capital being degraded and liquidated by the wasteful use of such
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___________________________________________________________ resources as energy, materials, water, fibre, and topsoil. Other types of capital that sustain well-being – because of their levels and distribution – include man-made capital (eg machinery, equipment, structures and infrastructures), human capital (eg knowledge, skills and competencies), and social capital (eg networks of shared values and understanding that facilitate co-operation within and between groups).” 8 “Human impact on the environment is largely associated with material flows into and out of an economy. As economic activity increases, there is an expansion in exploitation of resources, and a corresponding increase in waste. A primary objective of Sustainability is to reduce the material flows and decouple increases in resource usage and waste with economic activity. This can be achieved in three ways: Minimise the use of resources; Reduce waste generation; Recycle waste to be used again as a resource.” 9 C. Partnerships and Synergies “Partnerships should integrate the economic, social and environmental dimensions of sustainable development in their design and implementation. They should be consistent, where applicable, with sustainable development strategies… and foster discussion, including sharing lessons learnt, progress made and best practices… Partnerships should have a multi-stakeholder approach and preferably involve a range of significant actors in a given area of work. They can be arranged among any combination of partners, including governments, regional groups, local authorities, non-governmental actors, international institutions and private sector partners.” 10 Synergy: Production by two or more agents whose combined effect is greater than the sum of their separate effects. 11 D. Pollution Minimisation Pollution Minimisation aims to protect the environment through a range of initiatives to halt global warming (by reducing greenhouse gas emissions), ozone depletion, and the contamination of land, water and air. It also encompasses the management of effluent and other wastes, as well as noise and visual impacts. E. Research and Development “States should co-operate to strengthen endogenous capacitybuilding for sustainable development by improving scientific understanding through exchanges of scientific and technological knowledge, and by enhancing the development, adaptation, diffusion and transfer of technologies, including new and innovative technologies.” 12 F. Social Equity and Education “Education is critical for promoting sustainable development and improving the capacity of people to address environment and development issues. It is critical for achieving environmental and ethical awareness,
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___________________________________________________________ values and attitudes, skills and behaviour consistent with sustainable development and for effective participation in decision making.” 13 G. Social Equity as a Regional/Spatial Driver Social Equity as a Regional/Spatial Driver recognises that social and economic development are dependent on the health of individuals, communities and the environment. Thus regional/spatial strategies must promote initiatives that enhance productivity, community safety and identity, accessibility, transport, urban amenity, diversity and socioeconomic well being, through design and maintenance of the natural and built environment. H. Sustainability Reporting Sustainability Reporting provides a public account of an organisation’s performance against social and environmental indicators as well as the more traditional economic/financial measures. This process seeks to elevate social and environmental reporting to the same level of rigour, comparability, credibility, and verifiability expected of financial reporting. It also serves the information needs of a broad array of stakeholders and is built on the pillars of inclusiveness, transparency, and technical excellence. 14 I. Sustainability Trade-offs Whilst the aim of Sustainability is to integrate social, economic and environmental considerations in the decision making process, the author recognises that in some instances at least one of the three considerations suffers a loss at the expense of the others’ gain. It is useful in such instances of conflicting interest to separate Sustainability into its economic, environmental, and social components: “An economically sustainable system must be able to produce goods and services on a continuing basis, to maintain manageable levels of government and external debt, and to avoid extreme sectoral imbalances which damage agricultural or industrial production. “An environmentally sustainable system must maintain a stable resource base, avoiding over-exploitation of renewable resource systems or environmental sink functions, and depleting nonrenewable resources only to the extent that investment is made in adequate substitutes. This includes maintenance of biodiversity, atmospheric stability, and other ecosystem functions not ordinarily classed as economic resources. “A socially sustainable system must achieve distributional equity, adequate provision of social services including health and education, gender equity, and political accountability and participation.” 15 J. Sustainable Quality of Life “The real aim of development is to improve the quality of human life. It is a process that enables human beings to realise their potential, build self-confidence and lead lives of dignity and fulfilment. Economic growth is an important component of development, but it cannot be a goal
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___________________________________________________________ in itself… Although people differ in the goals that they would set for development, some are virtually universal. These include a long and healthy life, education, access to the resources needed for a decent standard of living, political freedom, guaranteed human rights, and freedom from violence. Development is real only if it makes our lives better in these respects.” 16 6.
Conclusion “The very term ‘sustainability’ is murky and difficult to define and will only evolve into a coherent discipline through well-informed debate.” 17
This statement, made only last year by Harvard’s Professor E.O. Wilson echoes a contention one hears through the halls of government, academia, the courts, the private sector and civil society, certainly in the author’s own country, Australia. There is no doubt that a consensus on definition is necessary, since Sustainability is one of the most contested and usurped concepts in the global arena today. Whatever the semantic dispute, it is clear that Sustainability practice has to move beyond issues of definition in order to be effectively implemented so that the big global, regional and local Sustainability crises can be confronted. This paper has outlined the wideranging definitions of the different aspects of Sustainability in a way that they can be operationalised and applied in the NSW Government. Such definition was vital in delivering the Sustainability message of empowerment and hope. It is the communication and sharing of successful Sustainability experience, practice and wisdom that will accelerate the dynamism of cultural change necessary to further environmental justice and global citizenship. The importance of ‘right language’ in the administration of important affairs is as ancient as it is modern, as is evidenced by one of the Analects attributed to the great Chinese philosopher, Confucius: “If language is not correct, then what is said is not what is meant. If what is said is not what is meant, then what ought to be done remains undone. If this remains undone, then morals and acts deteriorate and justice goes astray. Hence, there must be no arbitrariness in what is said. This matters above everything.” 18
Notes 1. Hodgman, K. (2005), Sustainability: A New South Wales Whole of Government Approach. Premier’s Department, Government of NSW, Sydney. 2. Queries regarding publication details should be directed to the author at
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___________________________________________________________ 3. Government of Western Australia (2003), Western Australian State Sustainability Strategy, Hope for the Future, Perth, p.12 4. These principles are generally known within the NSW Government context as ‘The Four Pillars’. They were first enunciated in 1998 in the Urban Infrastructure Management Plan, which was developed by the then Ministry of Urban Infrastructure Management 5 . Government of New South Wales, NSW Social Justice Budget Statement 2003-04, Foreword, p.2. 6. The Convention on Biological Diversity otherwise known as the Bratislava Convention, came into force legally in December 1993. 7. Protection of the Environment Administration Act 1992 (NSW),s.6(2)(c). 8. Parliamentary Commissioner for the Environment. 2002. Creating our Future: Development for New Zealand, p.39 (available at: www.pce.govt.nz). Also see Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Policies to enhance sustainable development: meeting of the OECD council ministerial level. Paris: OECD, 2001. And OECD Sustainable development: critical issues. Paris: OECD, 2001. 9. Based on Sydney Olympic Park Authority, Waste Reduction & Purchasing Plan 2002, Government of NSW, p.8. 10. Guiding Principles for Partnerships for Sustainable Development (‘type 2 outcomes’), World Summit on Sustainable Development 2002.(available: http://www.iisd.ca/wssd/download%20files/annex_partnership.pdf ) 11. The Shorter Oxford Dictionary, Oxford University Press, New York, 1993. 12. Principle 9, Rio Declaration on Environment and Development: The Principles of Agenda 21, United Nations Commission on Environment and Development (UNCED), 1992, Paris, United Nations. 13. Agenda 21 Report of the 1992 UNCED, Paris, United Nations, Chapter 36, p.2. 14. This definition blends ideas from Landcom Sustainability Report 2003, Government of NSW, p.4, and the 2002 Sustainability Reporting Guidelines, Global Reporting Initiative, p.1. (available at: www.globalreporting.org). 15. Harris, J, Basic Principles of Sustainable Development, Global Development and Environment Institute, Tufts University, Working Paper 00-04. June, pp. 5-6. (available at http://ase.tufts.edu/gdae ). 16 . Caring for the Earth; A Strategy for Sustainable Living, International Union for Conservation of Nature, United Nations Environment Program, World Wide Fund for Nature, Gland, Switzerland, 1991, pp. 9-12.
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___________________________________________________________ 17. Wilson, E.O. Editorial in ‘Sustainability’ e-Journal, Sustainability: Science, Practice and Policy, Volume 1, Edition 1, CSA, 2005. 18 . Confucius, Cited in Saunier, R., and Meganck, R., 2004. C.H.A.O.S.S.: An Essay and Glossary for Students and Practitioners of Global Environmental Governance, A.A. Balkema Publishers, U.K., 2004, p.27.
Utilisation of Voluntary Conservation Agreements in Australia: A Perspective on Queensland. Jo Kehoe Abstract Biodiversity continues its unrelenting demise on vast areas of privately held land within Australia, particularly Queensland. One means towards solving this problem is by voluntary conservation agreements between the agricultural community and government. To date such agreements are yet to be fully utilised, despite their potential to play an increasingly essential role in natural resource management. Varieties of voluntary agreements are currently being tested, for example, the vegetation incentives program in Queensland. The aim of this paper is to explore particular aspects of the utilisation of voluntary conservation agreements in Queensland. There are important lessons to learn from the initial implementation stages that may be usefully employed by interested stakeholders. Keywords: conservation agreements, voluntary agreements, Queensland, Australia. 1.
Introduction Voluntary conservation agreements represent a dynamic and evolving policy area in environmental law. They range from covenants in perpetuity binding successors in title, to short-term contracts binding only on the parties to the agreement. The agricultural community in Queensland under utilises such agreements. Nonetheless, effective longterm conservation of natural resources on private land requires that landholders become an integral part of the solution to biodiversity loss. Voluntary agreements alone are not a solution; but they present an important aspect of the move towards sustainable agricultural management. 2.
Voluntary agreements - an under utilised policy option Within Australia, and particularly in Queensland, biodiversity continues its unremitting decline. 1 While some sectors of the agricultural community routinely take account of biodiversity conservation in their management strategies, there is much room for improvement. 2 Such agreements should complement and be supported by traditional command and control legislation. Here is an aspect of environmental policy making which highlights the overarching philosophical dilemma of ‘balancing the collective against the individual interest’ 3 and of the intrinsic tensions of public approaches to sustainable land management on private property owners. 4
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___________________________________________________________ Agriculture is the most extensive form of land use in Australia accounting for 58 per cent of the total land area, or 447 million hectares, of which 141.4 million hectares is devoted to agriculture in Queensland. 5 Much of the agricultural activity is centred on livestock grazing with relatively small pockets of the state currently under nature conservation or managed resource protection. 6 In Queensland, land tenure is primarily divided into private freehold ownership and Crown leasehold or pastoral leases. 7 3.
Types of voluntary agreements Voluntary agreements may encompass various types of arrangements from the most extensive; being a covenant in perpetuity registered on the land title, to the least extensive being, for example, a one off payment to a landholder for a particular task such as fencing an area. In between these two ends of the spectrum lie various contractual and noncontractual arrangements including combinations of both covenants and contracts. For example, a covenant may run in perpetuity alongside a contractual management plan that runs for a five-year period with annual payments. Generally, covenants run with the land and bind successors in title. Because of the doctrine of privity, a contract only binds the original parties to the agreement. Agreements may contain provision for the landholder to encourage a successor in title to take over the contract; but the limitation of this type of arrangement is that it is directly linked to the current owner of the land. This paper will consider voluntary agreements that are the result of direct bargaining between individual landholders and Queensland government agencies. Initial consideration is given to the centralised approach to natural resource management currently taken by the Natural Resource Management Ministerial Council (NRMMC). It is beyond the scope of this paper to explore all the factors that contribute towards the utilisation of voluntary agreements, accordingly consideration will be given to two factors: economic incentives and design and implementation of agreements. This is followed by a brief analysis of the statutory framework for voluntary agreements under both federal and state legislation, noting that commonwealth legislation is not utilised at all. In order to provide a perspective on Queensland the paper then focuses on two current incentive schemes both statutory and non-statutory. Finally, the two contributing factors will be re-visited in relation to the two incentive schemes examined, to address the central question of the extent to which voluntary agreements are utilised in the state, particularly by the agricultural community.
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___________________________________________________________ 4.
The Natural Resource Management Ministerial Council Meaningful employment of voluntary agreements requires a centralised and consistent approach; the latest body established to do this in Australia is the NRMMC. According to the NRMMC, there are indications that voluntary agreements with landholders have the potential to play an increasingly important role in natural resource management within Australia. 8 Equally, the National Action Plan for Salinity and Water Quality (NAP), National Markets Based Instruments (MBI) Pilots Program is a recent example that is likely to encourage utilisation of voluntary agreements. 9 Varieties of MBIs are currently being tested, for example, the bush tender in Victoria and the vegetation incentives programme in Queensland. 10 These instruments are heralded by the NRMMC as being more cost effective than legislation and more flexible in that participants negotiate an agreement which, in turn, encourages innovation and changes in behaviour. 11 5.
Utilisation of voluntary agreements - contributing factors Future use and likelihood of success with voluntary agreements is very much dependent on various contributing factors. For the purpose of this paper, just two contributing factors will be considered: economic incentives and the design and implementation of such agreements. 12
A. Economic incentives The success of voluntary agreements is likely to depend upon available and worthwhile incentives and, importantly, the availability of sufficient funding. Significant steps in fiscal commitment were taken in 1997 in Australia, when the Commonwealth government established the Natural Heritage Trust (NHT) the purpose being to restore and preserve the environment and natural resources. 13 This financial obligation was extended in the 2004 Federal budget to provide funding until 2007-2008 making the overall NHT investment $3 billion. 14 This is in addition to $1.4 million from the NAP. Both the NHT and the NAP will combine an integrated delivery of management of natural resources at a regional level. 15 The NRMMC oversee the implementation of natural resource management programs. Adequate funding therefore does not appear to be an issue. B.Design and implementation of voluntary agreements Effective utilisation of any instrument will be more readily facilitated and acceptable to potential parties if their rights, duties and obligations are clarified. It is possible with a voluntary agreement to enter into an oral contract or an arrangement lacking the basic legal
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___________________________________________________________ requirements of a contract. However, a basic standard form incorporating the relevant criteria ensures certainty and need not be legally overwhelming. This paper sets down the following criteria, which incorporates the basic requirements not only of an agreement but also to assist in focusing the direction of negotiations. 16 • Parties - to the agreement. • Property - a description of the land, title number and plan. • Recitals - background to the conservation target/goal the agreement is set to achieve. • Landholder obligations - if a financial incentive is to be paid the amount and details of how payment is to be made. The contractual consideration here would be the landowner’s obligations under the agreement in return for the incentive payment. • Term - the period during which the agreement will run, either for a fixed term or in perpetuity to bind successors in title. If the agreement is a perpetual covenant, the remaining criteria may be included in a management plan. The advantage of a management plan being that it can be adapted to changing circumstances and landowners. • Target/goal - should be clearly outlined after prior consultation with the landholder. • Monitoring - regulator or non-government body inspection of conservation land to be at agreed intervals, for example each year. Prior notice should be given of the inspection and assistance should be provided, if necessary, if the target/goal is falling short. • Breach - details of what will constitute a breach. Some flexibility should be included here to take account of, for example, drought or climatic changes beyond the control of the landholder. • Enforcement - may be set down in statute. In the absence of regulation potential penalties must be clearly articulated. At the very least the landholder should be obliged to return any incentive paid for failing to comply with the contract obligations. • Provision for modification, extinguishment and release – of the agreement should be included. • Mediation - in the event of any dispute arising under the agreement the parties should have the option to refer the matter, at least in the first instance, to mediation. This would be in keeping with the voluntary aspects of these arrangements and may promote their use.
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___________________________________________________________ 6.
Commonwealth legislative provision: The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth) The potential role for the Commonwealth in the voluntary agreement domain lies with The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth) (EPBC). This statute commenced in 2000 and initial analysis generally described this law as a major and key reforming agent to existing environmental law. 17 The Act brought Australia into line with the international environmental arena and signalled an important role for the Commonwealth. The objects of the EPBC Act are wide-ranging and make provision, amongst other things, for the promotion of ecologically sustainable development and the conservation of biodiversity. 18 One particular vehicle for the conservation of biodiversity is by means of conservation agreements. 19 To date no agreements have been made. 20 This would appear to be a policy decision as Commonwealth funding in natural resource management is currently unparalleled. Voluntary agreements may however lend themselves more readily to regional bodies and non-government organisations where local knowledge is invaluable. 7.
State legislative provision: The Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Qld) In Queensland, provision is made under the Nature Conservation Act 1992 (NCA) for landowners to enter into voluntary conservation agreements. The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administers this statute and deals with negotiations on the agreements. The object of the Act is the conservation of nature. 21 There are twelve classes of protected areas under the Act, which include nature refuges. 22 The emphasis is on community participation in the administration of the NCA. 23 Within Queensland there are currently 182 nature refuges covering 412,700 hectares. 24 The first nature refuge was declared in 1994. 25 This was the Berlin Scrub refuge and covered some 41.9 ha. 26 Total areas for each refuge vary enormously, for example, most recently the range is from less than one hectare to 215,454 hectares. 27 This latter refuge is the Mulligan River refuge and is the largest in Australia. 28 It was declared in 2005, this refuge alone amounts to just over half of the total area devoted to refuges in the state. Importantly, in terms of utilisation of this type of agreement by the agricultural community, this refuge was made with the North Australian Pastoral Company. 29 Ordinarily information on the landholder entering into the agreement is not in the public domain, this particular refuge however received much publicity within the state. Available information on each refuge includes the name of the refuge and description of the land, the significant cultural and natural
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___________________________________________________________ resources and values of the area, the proposed management intent and use and the duration of the agreement. This information therefore does not provide any indication of the land usage and it is therefore impossible to determine if the nature refuges are situated on areas otherwise used for agriculture. In particular if farmers are entering into these voluntary agreements. At present landowners entering into this scheme range from primary producers to eco tourism ventures. 30 To what extent are nature refuges utilised on agricultural land in Queensland? The total area of agricultural activity in the state amounts to 141.4 million hectares. 31 The total current area of 412,700 hectares devoted to nature refuges therefore amounts to 0.29% of this. This extremely low percentage does not reflect the true picture, as the 412,700 figure also incorporates nature refuges that are not on agricultural land. It is apparent that nature refuges are utilised and that their use is growing but there is much room for expansion. One means to encourage utilisation is to target particular areas, which the vegetation incentives programme has recently done. 8.
Non-statutory voluntary agreements - the vegetation incentives programme The Queensland government has committed $12 million towards a vegetation incentive programme. Under this scheme, a voluntary conservation agreement may be negotiated between the Department of Natural Resources and Mines (DNRM) and landholders. Originally, this programme envisaged using a perpetual covenant registered on the land title and a management plan. The covenant was particularly onerous and restrictive. The management plan was a contract intended to run for five years with periodic payments during the term. It was not clear what would happen at the expiry of the management plan or if further funding would be available. Landholders were invited to submit an expression of interest; the DNRM then assessed each application and invited applicants with suitable land to submit a tender. The state was divided into regions and the first round, which targeted the southern region, saw 21 expressions of interest, of these 16 were invited to submit a tender and eight did so. 32 Ultimately, the bids were high from this final group and not regarded by the DNRM as good value, the tenders were not accepted. 33 This scheme has evolved and landholders may now choose to enter into a perpetual covenant as part of the nature refuge scheme run by the EPA, a limited term covenant or a declaration, in which the landholder declares the vegetation as remnant and therefore protected by applicable legislation. 34 An important lesson was learned from round one – the very
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___________________________________________________________ strict covenant probably contributed to the low participation rate and inflated bids. 35 Utilisation may also be encouraged by providing more assistance towards the difficult task of collating a bid. The second round of this scheme covered the remainder of the state with the exception of southeast Queensland. 36 Of the 87 expressions of interest 46 were invited to submit a tender and 38 took the opportunity to do so. 37 The North Coastal region accounted for 31 of those 38 tenders. 38 This area includes the Atherton Tablelands and is characterised by smaller non-farming properties, the average size of the applications being 11.55 hectares. 39 9.
Voluntary agreements in Queensland – the impact of contributing factors A. Economic incentives Financial incentives are the most significant and direct means to promote utilisation of voluntary agreements. 40 Australia is currently experiencing an unprecedented availability of financial resources. Nonetheless voluntary conservation agreements appear to primarily attract the conservation minded. Are current economic incentives sufficient to be meaningful to property owners? Such incentives have been denounced, in the past, as inappropriate for failing to take account of the long-term requirements of sustainable land management. 41 The provision of permanent financial incentives may generate more interest in voluntary agreements; but this must be weighed against the reality that enduring fiscal commitments are beyond the scope and political life of governments. There is a general view that landholders ought not to receive monetary assistance in return for environmental compliance. 42 A voluntary conservation agreement however is arguably beyond requisite compliance. The dilemma appears to be in deciding the amount of financial tender and here the government is shifting the onus on to the landholder. The most recent voluntary schemes in Queensland have made use of a competitive tender system. The NRMMC have found this to be a significant cost saving in terms of the delivery of such instruments. 43 It is clear however, from the vegetation incentives tender, that landholders need more assistance in the complicated task of developing a financial bid and taking part in a tender process. B .Design and implementation of voluntary agreements The implementation and design of voluntary agreements is enhanced by a statutory framework as presently exists for perpetual covenants under the NCA. To be as effective as possible voluntary
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___________________________________________________________ agreements need a legislative under pinning to cover matters such as obligations under the covenant, how incentives are to be paid and re-paid in the event of breach. Such matters are set down in the NCA. 44 Moreover, voluntary agreements require a multi-discipline approach that incorporates economics, ecology and law. In the absence of legislation, guidelines and a basic standard form contract covering the essential contractual requirements could be provided by, and are within the terms of reference of, the NRMMC. This would be an important strategy for developing a national approach to the conservation of Australia’s natural resources. Equally, it would ensure - in view of the funding that is provided – that non-statutory voluntary agreements are legally binding. 10. Conclusion The dilemma is that sustainable agriculture requires long-term solutions which, in terms of voluntary agreements, are best suited to perpetual statutory covenants. Such instruments, however, tend to include very limiting land use restrictions and are less likely to be taken up by landholders. Contracts appear more acceptable to property owners and may promote the transition to more sustainable natural resource management. Such agreements however are bound to the original owner by the doctrine of privity and potentially bound to a five-year term if further funding is not forthcoming. To date voluntary agreements remain under-utilised by the agricultural community in Queensland.
Notes 1
Australia State of the Environment Report, Biodiversity Theme Report, CSIRO,2001, (15 /2/06 ) http://www.deh.gov.au/soe/2001/biodiversity/index.html 2 Ibid 3 Tim Bonyhady, “Property Rights” Environmental Protection and Legal Change, ed. Tim Bonyhady (Sydney: Federation Press, 1992) p30. 4 Gerry Bates, Environmental Law in Australia (Sydney, Butterworths, 2002) p362. 5 Australian Bureau of Statistics, 24 March 2006, ( 15 February 2006). http://www.abs.gov.au/Ausstats/
[email protected]/46d1bc47ac9d0c7bca256c4700 25ff87/F7635B38F792374BCA256DEA000539DA?opendocument 6 See, for example, the national land use map in Australian Natural Resource Atlas, 2001, (14 March 2006)
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___________________________________________________________ http://audit.deh.gov.au/anra/agriculture/gifs/ag_report/section_1/figure1_2 .gif 7 For a map depicting land tenure within Australia see Australian Government, Geosciences Australia (13 March 2006) http://www.ga.gov.au/education/facts/images/tenure1.gif 8 Natural Resource Management Ministerial Council Communiqué, October 2005,(14 February 2006) http://www.nrm.gov.au/publications/nrm-mbi/mbi.html#what 9 Australian Government, Management of natural resources, “Managing our natural resources: can markets help”? 26 August 2004, (14 February 2006) http://www.nrm.gov.au/publications/nrm-mbi/mbi.html#what 10 In Victoria, the bush tender incentive scheme has had much success, 2006, ( 23 March 2006) http://www.dse.vic.gov.au/ 11 Australian Government, n 9. 12 Neil Gunningham, “Voluntary and Negotiated Agreements in Agriculture: Towards a partnership approach to Resource Management” The Australasian Journal of Natural resources Law and Policy 8 (2003) p25 - 28. Gunningham cites additional factors which European evidence suggests are crucial to public-private partnerships, these include: the degree of mutual respect and trust; the accessibility of the target group and their representative body; and soft effects. 13 Natural Heritage Trust, 23 May 2006,(14 March 2006) http://www.nht.gov.au/index.html 14 Ibid 15 Australian Government, Natural Resource Management, 12 January 2005 ( 27 March 2006) http://www.nrm.gov.au/about-nrm.html 16 Commentary on the criteria for the content of voluntary agreements is also considered in the following: Gunningham, n 12, p23-25, who cites the OECD criteria. Alexander Danne,” Voluntary environmental agreements in Australia,” Environmental Planning & Law Journal 20 (2003) p291 who collates the criteria of other commentators. Patrick Ten Brink P “Future Use: Tools for developing agreements” in “Voluntary Environmental Agreements: process, practice and future use.” ed. Patrick Ten Brink ( UK:Greenleaf Publishing, 2002) reproduces the European Commission Guidelines on voluntary agreements. 17 Lisa Ogle, “The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth): How Workable is it?” Environmental Planning & Law Journal 17 (2000) 468; Sophie Chapple, “The Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth): One year Later” Environmental Planning & Law Journal 18 (2001) 523.
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Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999 (Cth) s3 (1) (a) (b) (c). Volume 1:(6 February 2006) http://www.frli.gov.au/comlaw/Legislation/ActCompilation1.nsf/0/B958A 90F4DB0AAF3CA2570000009230A/$file/EnvProtBioDivCons99Vol1W D02.doc 19 Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation Act 1999(Cth) Part 14, Volume 2.(6 February 2006) http://www.comlaw.gov.au/comlaw/legislation/actcompilation1.nsf/0/400 F5C3D07430F99CA25700000094F3A/$file/EnvProtBioDivCons99Vol2 WD02.doc 20 Australian Government, Department of Environment & Heritage, Notices.14 April 2004, (8 March 2006) http://www.deh.gov.au/epbc/publicnotices/species/index.html#makingagreements This was confirmed as at 8 March 2006 by e-mail correspondence from the Database and Internet Management Section, Approvals and Wildlife Division, at the DEH. 21 Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Qld) s4, (15 March 2006)http://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/LEGISLTN/CURRENT/N/Nature ConA92.pdf . 22 Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Qld) s 14 (a) to (l). 23 Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Qld) s6. 24 The Hon. Desley Boyle MP, Environment, Local Government, Planning & Women, “Queensland native refuge network continues to grow” Media release, 8 March 2006, ( 20 March 2006) http://statements.cabinet.qld.gov.au/ 25 It is possible to track all declared nature refuges by going through the superseded to current versions of the Nature Conservation (Protected Areas) Regulation 1994.(26 March 2006) http://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/SL_AsMade/SL_AsMade.htm 26 Nature Conservation (Declaration of Nature Refuges) Regulation 1994.(26 March 2006) http://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/LEGISLTN/SLS/1994/94SL135.pdf 27 Environmental Protection Agency, Annual Report on the administration of The Nature Conservation Act, 2004-2005. (27 March 2006) http://www.epa.qld.gov.au/register/p01702ar.pdf 28 Nature Conservation (Declaration of Nature Refuges) Regulation (No 1) 2005.(14 March 2006) http://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/LEGISLTN/SLS/2005/05SL137.pdf 29 Environmental Protection Agency, Nature Refuges. (14 March 2006) http://www.epa.qld.gov.au/nature_conservation/nature_refuges/ The ABC Landline coverage on the Mulligan River refuge is available at this site.
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E-mail correspondence with the state wide nature refuge coordinator, EPA, Brisbane,13 February 2006. 31 See Australian Bureau of Statistics, n 5. 32 Emma Commerford & Jim Binney, “Lessons learned to date from the Queensland Vegetation Incentives Program in moving from a conceptual ideal to practical reality” paper presented to the Sustainable Agriculture State Level Investment Program, Resource Economics Workshop, Department of Primary Industries, Rockhampton, Queensland, 28 October 2005. 33 Ibid 34 Commerford & Binney p 2-6. 35 Commerford & Binney p 2-6. 36 Emma Commerford & Jim Binney “ Lessons learned from the Queensland Vegetation Incentives Program – applying auction theory to vegetation protection” (2006) unpublished paper. 37 Ibid 38 Commerford & Binney p3-4. 39 Commerford & Binney p3-4. 40 Carl Binning & Michael Young, “Motivating People: Using management agreements to conserve remnant vegetation,” (Australia: Land & Water Resources, Research & Development Corporation, 1999), p33. 41 Neil Gunningham and Peter Grabosky, Smart Regulation: Designing Environmental Policy (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1998) p287. 42 Bates, p35 cites a wealth of commentary in support of this view. 43 NRMMC, Resolution, Market based instruments – Agreement for round two funding. 15 April 2005, (5 April 2006) :http://www.mincos.gov.au/pdf/nrmmc_res_08.pdf 44 Nature Conservation Act 1992 (Qld) s44.
Part II
… Or Bottom Up? The Participation of ‘Laypeople’
Environmental Justice: Bridging the Gap between Experts and Laymen Kim Loyens Abstract Sustainable Development deals with highly technological issues (e.g. genetic manipulation, brain science, environmental protection, etc.). The decision making process therefore tends to be very complex. Especially the involvement of different stakeholders, such as experts, public organizations and unorganized citizens, makes the task for policymakers extremely difficult 1 . The importance of lay knowledge in technological and complex policy domains is often underestimated. Opponents of citizen participation use arguments related to NIMBY (Not In My Backyard), lack of interest and knowledge deficiencies. Nevertheless, obtaining public support for policy decisions in the domain of Sustainable Development is essential. In this paper we will examine if and how integration of expert and lay knowledge is possible in complex policy issues and how we can reduce the gap between experts, policymakers and citizens. The main focus will be on the integration of expert and lay knowledge in design and policymaking processes. We first analyse the conditions for successful citizen involvement in policymaking, distinguishing between participants in lay and in professional roles 2 . We will discuss some specific techniques 3 and international initiatives for citizen participation in the domain of Sustainable Development. We then focus on three best practices of citizen (lay), expert, and organizational participation in highly technological or complex issues. In Belgium the King Baudouin Foundation is specialised in dialogue with citizens and experts about Brain Science (e.g. ‘Meeting of Minds’) and Food Safety 4 . In the Netherlands we examine the policy programme ‘Policy with Citizens’ of the Dutch Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment (2005). The third case is the Danish Board of Technology that is specialised in active citizenship in technological issues. Key words: citizen participation, participatory methods, citizen involvement, risk escalator, King Baudouin Foundation, VROM, Danish Board of Technology. 1.
Introduction “Sustainable development seeks to meet the needs and aspirations of the present without compromising the ability to meet those of the future” 5 .
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___________________________________________________________ It deals with highly technological issues. ‘Genetic manipulation’, ‘brain science’, ‘food safety’, ‘nanotechnology’ and ‘environmental protection’ are all complex issues that are relevant in sustainable development policy. Policymakers often lack the competence to deal with those topics. “New developments in science (…) put public authorities under stress as they are faced with uncertainty about the consequences of these developments” 6 . Therefore the involvement of diverse stakeholders is extremely important. Both experts and public organizations try to increase their influence on public policy in the domain of sustainable development. And their expertise definitely means an enrichment of policy decisions. The importance of lay knowledge in technological and complex policy domains is, however, often underestimated. There is scepticism whether unorganized citizens can make a valuable contribution to policymaking. The most fundamental counter-arguments of citizen participation refer to the fact that citizens lack the knowledge and skills to contribute to the decision process and the fact that citizens are only after their own profit, without regard for the public interest 7 . Moreover citizen participation in highly technological issues would be – according to certain literature – impossible, given the complexity. Professor Lieve Goorden, however, considers those well-known arguments ‘mythical’. In her work, she opposes three ‘myths’ 8 : -
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“Citizen participation is impossible in highly technological issues”: According to Goorden, citizen participation is possible in highly technological issues. Moreover, Goorden states it is essential and even more pertinent. Alter all, experts can not offer all the answers, because of the existing scientific and social uncertainties in those issues. Individual citizens can definitely play an important role in answering ethical questions about the acceptability of certain developments in science. Through social debate, policy decisions become more and more legitimate 9 . “Citizens can not deal with the uncertainties in highly technological policy domains”: Although experts and policymakers often assume that citizens can not deal with those uncertainties, Goorden states they can. Citizens are well aware of the fact that risks and uncertainties are a part of our way of life. They do have a problem with the fact that policymakers do not
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reckon the existence of those uncertainties in the decision process. “Not In My Backyard”: According to Goorden, citizens are not only after their own profit. Based on some concrete participation initiatives, she states that people attach great importance to the public interest. When they are involved in a participation project they manage to look at the issue from another angle, so they can see the broader perspective.
2.
Conditions for successful participation of citizens and experts In this part we analyse the conditions for successful citizen participation in policymaking concerning highly technological issues. We focus on those conditions that are important when involving participants in both lay and professional roles. First, we have to make an important remark: there is not one issue that can a priori be determined as too complex or too complicated to involve individual citizens. Most essential is the question: “How do you translate the complex and technological issue into a topic that is relevant for the everyday life of the public?” The willingness and capability to participate increases as the theme is more connected with the everyday life of the general public 10 . Secondly, one has to bear in mind to not underestimate the “the wisdom of the crowds”, because: “large groups of people are smarter than an elite few - no matter how brilliant - better at solving problems, fostering innovation, coming to wise decisions, even predicting the future” 11 . It is essential to have confidence in the capabilities and expertise of individual citizens. Nevertheless, beware of attempting to transform them into experts. One has to make a clear distinction between participants in lay and professional roles. Obviously, individual citizens require certain information about complex topics, in order to make a valuable contribution. The main role of individual citizens, however, is not to solve complex and technical problems, but to make a judgement about the social acceptability of certain developments. Therefore a balance between expertise and value judgement is essential. This last remark is closely connected to the ‘Risk Escalator’ of Ortwin Renn. His model is consisted of three characteristics of risks, including complexity, uncertainty and ambiguity 12 . According to Renn, the ‘nature’ of a policy issue is the most important factor when
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___________________________________________________________ determining target groups for participation. When a problem is only complex, the involvement of experts is the best option. When dealing with ‘uncertainty’ - experts can not solve - one has to broaden the group aimed at. Then all stakeholders and directly affected groups should be involved, because they are familiar with the interests, values and uncertainties concerning their domain of expertise. According to Renn, the involvement of the general public is necessary when dealing with ‘ambiguity’. Developments in science often lead to ethical questions about acceptability and social values. In that case, citizens can make a value judgement and determine whether certain policy plans are acceptable and/or desirable. Although reality can not be easily subdivided into categories, this model can certainly be a guiding principle in citizen participation.
Figure 1 – “The Risk Escalator”
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Methods for citizen participation One can distinguish between many techniques of stakeholder participation in policymaking 13 . Some methods are suitable for the participation of individual citizens, in particular focus groups, Deliberative Polling®, Open Space Technology and World Café. Some other techniques can rather be used to collect expertise from social organizations and leading experts in certain areas. Delphi method, expert panel and advisory committee are useful tools in this case. However, in this paper we are mainly interested in participatory methods that allow the integration of expert and lay knowledge. In this paragraph we will concentrate on those techniques unorganized citizens and experts can be engaged in. For each method we will give a brief description and indicate how the integration of expert and lay knowledge can be accomplished. A. Citizen’s jury The participatory method ‘citizen’s jury’ is developed in America and England. It is a tool for including citizens’ attitudes in the political decision making process and technological debate. The idea behind citizen’s jury is to let a small group of citizens - who as far as possible are representative of the population - participate in a process in which they are comprehensively informed about a technological issue. “That way, policymakers can acquire an informed, wellconceived and constructive expression of citizen’s opinions and gain an insight into the values, attitudes, priorities and ideas of citizens in relation to a current technological issue” 14 . A jury is composed of 12 to 20 lay citizens, carefully composed so that it represents a cross-section of the public in terms of age, gender and employment 15 . During several days (4 or 5) they act as some kind of ‘court’ that is charged with the assignment to take a decision in a complex matter. Because the members of the jury only have lay knowledge, leading experts in the field play the role of ‘witnesses’ 16 . They are summoned and then questioned by the citizen’s jury about the ‘evidence’, i.e. expert knowledge about the issue at hand. The members of the jury decide independently which questions will be asked and which ‘witnesses’ will be selected. After deliberation the lay jury makes a final decision, in which they may or may not achieve consensus. Alternatively they can vote on different possible answers. On the last day of the citizen’s jury a concluding conference is held with an official presentation and
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___________________________________________________________ distribution of the jury’s final document. Key stakeholders, policymakers and the press are invited to comment on the jury’s findings and discuss them with the members. Following this, policymakers hold a short presentation in which they give their feedback to the work of the citizen’s jury. According to the Danish Board of Technology: “The method is particularly well suited to current subjects of relevance to society, from which politicians and interested parties require an indication about the direction the population wishes a particular technological development to take” 17 . B. Fish bowl discussion A fishbowl discussion is an interesting method for the participation of the broad public concerning complex and controversial issues. First, a small panel of experts presents different positions or point of views in a figurative ‘fishbowl’, i.e. the fact that all the other (lay) participants gather around the panel. After the presentations and short debate, those laymen can enter the ‘fishbowl’ and emphasize their own opinion. All perspectives are noted down. Later, they form small discussion groups (8 to 10 persons a group with at least one expert included in each group) to analyse the issue in detail. Every group focuses on one specific perspective and lists the advantages and disadvantages. Eventually all those viewpoints are integrated so the issue can be discussed entirely in a plenary session. Based on this debate the participants formulate conclusions and recommendations 18 . C. Consensus conference The ‘consensus conference’ - or citizen’s panel - originally is a Danish participatory method, specially designed to integrate lay and expert knowledge. The Danish Board of Technology uses it frequently as “a method which involves citizens and gives them the central role in assessing a technological problem or problem area” 19 . Citizens can participate without any specific relationship of interest in the issue of the conference. In other words, they only need lay knowledge, because the main focus of a consensus conference is dialogue between ‘ordinary people’. Their contributions mainly consist of visions, concerns, values and everyday experiences. This method is based on the premise that policymakers need more than professional knowledge of
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___________________________________________________________ experts when dealing with highly technological issues. For example, lay citizens can give their opinion about what new technologies (e.g. brain science, genetic testing, nuclear power, etc.) must and should be used for in the future. That way, the debate about technological policy issues is enriched and developed. Of course, participants of a consensus conference need some ‘basic expertise’ to maintain the conversation. That is where the real experts appear. First of al - in the preparation phase - a group of 15 to 20 lay participants receives introductory material about the issue at hand. This brochure is compiled by experts who provide comprehensible 20 basic information about the issue. Moreover, the lay participants attend two preparatory weekend sessions where they can broaden their knowledge of the issue and receive a training ‘how to pose qualitative questions’. The citizens are also informed about the purpose and planning of the consensus conference. When the conference - that usually lasts 2 to 4 days -commences, they can question experts, professionals, stakeholders, politicians, interested parties, etc. Different kinds of experts with opposing views are summoned to answer the panel’s questions. That way, the experts bring their technical insight and overview to bear onto the topic. Often the organizers provide a budget that the participations can use as desired, for example to arrange excursions, invite leading experts or visit certain organizations. This phase is public and in attendance of the press and other interested citizens. Next, the participants debate on the issue. In the deliberation process a diversity of opinions, experiences and alternative solutions is discussed. The members, however, need to achieve consensus, because only those advices and suggestions everyone agrees upon, will be integrated in the final report that is compiled in the next phase. At last, policymakers give feedback about the implementation or rejection of those policy recommendations. Since 1987, the Danish Board of Technology has held a number of consensus conferences in Denmark, and over the years has acted as inspirer and consultant for conferences based on the Danish model held in such countries as Holland, England, France, Switzerland and Norway and such non-European countries as Canada, Australia, Japan, Korea and Israel 21 . 4.
Best practices In this paragraph we focus on three interesting cases concerning participatory methods to integrate expert and lay knowledge. First, we describe the programme ‘Governance’ of the King Baudouin Foundation. Secondly, we turn to the programme ‘Policy with citizens’ of the Dutch Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment. Finally, we mention some interactive initiatives of the Danish Board of Technology.
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___________________________________________________________ A. King Baudouin Foundation: ‘Governance’ The King Baudouin Foundation considers citizen participation to be a multistakeholder dialogue, i.e. the involvement of individual citizens, experts and social organizations. In their programme ‘Governance’ 22 (2002-2005) they focused on the development of innovative methods for citizen participation considering two topics, namely ‘biomedical science’ and ‘production, consumption and trade’. In diverse projects they organized citizen’s panels, focus groups and Deliberative Polling 23 . Especially dialogue and deliberation in small groups were important in those initiatives. We will focus on the European project ‘Meeting of Minds’, an interesting initiative considering the integration of lay and expert knowledge. Brain science was the central topic in the European Citizen’s panel ‘Meeting of Minds’ 24 . This project was started and coordinated by the King Baudouin Foundation in cooperation with several partner organizations: University of Westminster (United Kingdom), Flemish Institute for Science and Technology Assessment (Belgium), Danish Board of Technology (Denmark), Cité des Sciences et de l’Industrie (France), Stiftung Deutsches Hygiene-Museum (Germany), Fondazione IDIS - Città della Scienza (Italy), Rathenau Institute (The Netherlands), Science Museum (United Kingdom), University of Debrecen (Hungary), Eugenides Foundation (Greece), University of Liège - SPIRAL (Belgium). This initiative had some essential objectives (KBF): - To identify differences as well as commonalities between involved citizens from different European national and cultural contexts regarding their attitudes towards, and assessment and expectations of social and ethical aspects of brain science; - To invite the citizens involved to assess and consider the scientific-technical possibilities vis-à-vis the social desirability of current and new developments in brain science; - To set the issue of brain science on the policy and wider political agenda; - Etc. During one year, a European Citizen’s panel of 126 citizens from nine European countries entered into dialogue about the future of our brain, discussing what they think should be done with our new-found knowledge on the brain. Through this process, a great number of experts researchers, ethicists and stakeholders - was invited to participate in the debate. The usual division of roles between experts and lay citizens was, however, radically turned over.
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___________________________________________________________ “European Citizens’ Deliberation… put a European public face on areas previously stamped ‘experts only’” 25 . The interaction between experts and lays citizens led to interesting in-depth deliberations. After diverse meetings the debate on brain science eventually resulted in a final report consisting recommendations for European research and science communities on the one hand and policymakers at European, national and transnational level on the other hand 26 . B. The Dutch Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment ‘Policy with Citizens’ is an interactive policy programme, created in 2003 by the Dutch Ministry of Housing, Spatial Planning and the Environment (VROM). It aims to increase participation by citizens and other stakeholders in resolving environmental and sustainable development problems. The organization of Citizen’s forums is an interesting tool they use to integrate lay and expert knowledge 27 . A group of twenty citizens is selected to discuss issues on VROM’s agenda and give advice. Comparable to citizen’s juries this group is carefully composed, so that - as far as possible - It represents a cross-section of the public in terms of age, gender, employment, education, area and world view 28 . Because of this there is no real representativeness, but some kind of a ‘variety under control’ 29 . A citizen’s forum is consisted of three meetings, namely an ‘agenda meeting’, ‘advice meeting’ and ‘feedback meeting’. At the agenda meeting the members of the forum get to know each other and are introduced to policymakers of VROM. They also receive introductory information about the issue - e.g. ‘requirements of nuclear power’ (2005) that will be discussed. Interesting is the fact that the members can decide independently which specific topics will be dealt with. During the following weeks, they get the chance to gain more in-depth knowledge about the issue, through excursions, documentation and conversations with experts. Due to this, a citizen’s forum stimulates the connection between experts, stakeholders and individual citizens. Based on the expertise from diverse stakeholders, the participants formulate an advice at the advice meeting and present the results in front of policymakers. Eventually the authorized Minister provides feedback. C. Danish Board of Technology The Danish Board of Technology disseminates knowledge about technology, its possibilities and its effects on people, society, and the environment. Interaction with individual citizens plays an important role
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___________________________________________________________ in obtaining this goal. For that reason they develop participatory methods of technology assessment 30 while existing methods are constantly being updated and adjusted 31 . Furthermore, the Danish Board of Technology already launched several concrete projects of citizen participation in complex policy issues. Prior to setting out on a particular project, the subject is evaluated according to certain parameters: - Does the subject possess a technological content? - Is the subject essential to a large number of people democratically, economically or environmentally? - Does the subject cause problems or conflicts? Is there a need for decision making? - Is the subject of current interest to politicians and citizens? In several projects lay citizens were involved to deal with ethical dilemmas concerning current and new developments in science. An interesting example is the ‘New GM Crops - New Debate’ (2005). For several years now, in Denmark as well as in other European countries, a heated debate has been going on about genetically modified food. The Danish Board of Technology wanted to focus the debate on following issues: - What are the advantages and disadvantages of the new GM crops in relation to health and environmental issues? - What are the economic prospects and consequences of growing the new GM crops? - How will Danish citizens asses these crops and which pros and cons will they focus on? To examine those issues, the Danish Board of Technology put together a citizen’s jury consisting of 16 laymen who - during the spring 2005 - gave their assessment of the topic. During 5 days, the jury met with invited experts to discuss advantages and disadvantages of GM crops. Informed by this dialogue with many different stakeholders and experts, the members of the jury made up their own minds and subsequently presented their assessments on the 2nd of May in the Danish Parliament 32 . 5.
Conclusions Integration of expert and lay knowledge is not a utopia. Previous examples of citizen participation in Belgium, the Netherlands and Denmark prove that it is possible to organize meetings where experts and lay citizens come together and discuss certain dimensions of highly technological policy issues. Even though these complex and scientifical areas are often stamped ‘experts only’, a multi-stakeholder dialogue
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___________________________________________________________ between participants in both professional and lay roles can enrich the debate. This can be accomplished by using certain methods like citizen’s panel, consensus conference and citizen’s forum. Based on the information of experts and stakeholders, citizens can make a value judgement and determine whether certain developments are acceptable and/or desirable. However, it is essential to translate the complex and technological issue into a topic that is relevant for the everyday life of the public. Therefore experts face the challenge to provide a clear overview of the most relevant and necessary information that is comprehensible for laymen. As a result of this and other efforts the gap between experts and citizens can be bridged… or at least narrowed.
Notes 1
Environmental Protection Agency. Stakeholder Involvement & Public Participation at the U.S. EPA. Lessons Learned, Barriers & Innovative Approaches. Washington DC: Office of Policy, Economics and Innovation, 2001; Environmental Protection Agency. Plan and Budget for Public Involvement. Washington DC: National Centre for Environmental Innovation, 2003; Howell, R, M Olsen, and D Olsen. Designing a Citizen Involvement Program. A Guidebook for Involving Citizens in the Resolution of Environmental Issues. Oregon: Western Rural Development Centre, 1987. 2 OECD. Citizens As Partners. Information, Consultation and Public Participation in Policy-Making. Paris: OECD, 2001; Thomas, J. C. Public Participation in Public Decisions. New Skills and Strategies for Public Managers. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Publishers, 1995. 3 Elliott, J, S Heesterbeek, C Lukensmeyer, and N Slocum. Participatory Methods Toolkit. A Practitioner’s Manual. Brussels: viWTA and KBS, 2005; Hinshelwood, E, and D McCallum. Consulting Communities: A Renewable Energy Toolkit. London: Crown, 2001. 4 Koning Boudewijnstichting. Voedselveiligheid: Tegen Welke Prijs? De Mening Van De Burger Over Voedselveiligheid. Presentatie En Analyse Van De Resultaten Van Een Dialoog Tussen Dertig Belgische Burgers. Brussels, Koning Boudewijnstichting, 2004. 5 Universele Commissie voor Milieu en Ontwikkeling. Our Common Future. 1987. 6 Nentwich, M. The Role of Participatory Technology Assessment in Policy-Making. Vienna: Institute of Technology Assessment, 1999.
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Loyens, K, and S Van de Walle. Participatie Voor Iedereen? Wenselijkheid En Haalbaarheid Van Gelijke Participatie in De Consultatie Over Het Federaal Plan Duurzame Ontwikkeling. Leuven: Instituut voor de Overheid (K.U. Leuven), 2006; Verba, S. "Would the Dream of Political Equality Turn Out to Be a Nightmare?" Perspectives on politics, 4 (2003): 663-679. 8 Goorden, L. “Draagvlak of Voedingsbodem? Het Hoe En Waarom Van Participatie.” in FRDO - CFDD Symposium: Participatie En Beleid DO. Hoe Publieke Consultaties Doeltreffender Maken?, 22-27. 2003. 9 Goorden, L. and J. Vandenabeele. “Publieksparticipatie Aan Besluitvorming Over Technologie. Burgers En Experts Uitgedaagd”. Ethiek en Maatschappij 5 (2002): 32-47. 10 Beierle, T, and J Cayford. “Designing Public Participation Processes.” in Democracy in Practice. Public Participation in Environmental Decisions, edited by T Beierle, and J Cayford, 147. Washington DC: Resources for the future, 2002. 11 Surowiecki, J. The Wisdom of Crowds: Why the Many Are Smarter Than the Few. New York: Random House, 2004. 12 Renn, O. “Acrylamide: Lessons for Risk Management and Communication”. Journal of Health Communication 8 (2003): 407-32. 13 We based our analysis on following toolkits of stakeholder participation: OECD, 2001a ; OECD, 2001b; Elliott, Heesterbeek, Lukensmeyer & Slocum, 2005; Ministerie van VROM, 2002; Ministerie van Binnenlandse Zaken, 1998; XPIN, 2003; VLGA, 2001; Hinshelwood & McCallum, 2001; Raad voor het openbaar bestuur, 2005; CRC, 2006; XPIN/IPP, Gemeente Zoetermeer & Gemeente Dordrecht, 2006; Warringah Council Strategy Unit, 2000; New Economics Foundation & UK Participation Network, 1998; Public Participation Team, 2004; COSLA, 1998; Davis & Vincent, 2005; Lenos & Buurman, 2000; Gemeentebestuur Hengelo, 2005; Howell, Olsen & Olsen, 1987; Landcom, 2002; Keygnaert, 2005a; Keygnaert, 2005b; King, 1999; iPlan, 2006; Vandenabeele & Goorden, 2004. 14 The Danish Board of Technology. “The methods of technology assessment.” 2006. . 15 This composition is achieved by sending out a great number of invitations to a randomly selected section of the public. A representative jury is then formed on the basis of the received response.
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These include professional experts as well as other players and interested parties. There must be a balanced mix of experts to ensure that all relevant aspects of the issue are described and discussed. 17 The Danish Board of Technology. “The methods of technology assessment.” 2006. . 18 More information: http://www.ag.ohiostate.edu/~bdg/pdf_docs/d/F03. pdf. 19 The Danish Board of Technology. “The methods of technology assessment.” 2006. . 20 i.e. in ordinary language, without using jargon. 21 More information: http://www.tekno.dk. 22 Meeting of Minds Europe. Meeting of Minds. European Citizens' Deliberation on Brain Science. Report on the 1st European Citizens' Convention. Brussels: Meeting of Minds Europe, 2005. 23 This is a combination of a broad opinion poll and in-depth dialogue in small groups. 24 More information: http://www.meetingmindseurope.org. 25 Tayart de Borms, L. “Meeting of Minds. European Citizens' Deliberation on Brain Science.” Brussels: KBS, 2005. 26 Meeting of Minds Europe. Meeting of Minds. European Citizens' Deliberation on Brain Science. Report on the 1st European Citizens' Convention. Brussels: Meeting of Minds Europe, 2005. 27 Ministry of VROM. Apparent Impenetrability. Can Citizens Participate in Europe? Delft: Environmental Resources Management B.V., 2005. 28 Based on the ‘Mentality-model’ of Motivaction (http://www.motivaction.nl) or the classification of TNS NIPO Consult (http://www.tns-nipo-consult.com). 29 Ministerie van VROM. Beleid Met Burgers: Publieksagenda. The Hague: VROM, 2006; QA+. Burgerparticipatie in Het Milieubeleid. Ervaringen Met Methoden En Instrumenten in Het Stimuleringsprogramma Burger En Milieubeleid. The Hague: Onderzoek en Adviesgroep. Questions, Answers and More bv, 2003. 30 “Technology assessment is the study and evaluation of new technologies. It is based on the conviction that new developments within, and discoveries by, the scientific community are relevant for the world at large rather than just for the scientific experts themselves, and that
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technological progress can never be free of ethical implications” (Wikipedia). 31 e.g. café seminar, citizen’s jury, future panel, consensus conference, etc. 32 The Danish Board of Technology. “The methods of technology assessment.” 2006. .
Using Facilitative Processes to Achieve Sustainable Environmental Outcomes Tania Sourdin Abstract It is now relatively common in many countries to use facilitative dispute resolution processes where public policy disputes occur. Facilitation and mediation are used where planning disputes arise over land use and government policies change. Such processes are often supported by government agencies and may vary according to the individual dispute and the facilitators involved. Public issue disputes or “disputes which affect members of the public as well as the principal parties” 1 can be divided into three main categories: enforcement disputes (relating to compliance with laws and regulations); permitting disputes (relating to planned construction of new facilities); and policy or law-making disputes (relating to the establishment of new policy or standards in management). 2 There are few guidelines available to assist in the development of approaches to deal with complex public disputes 3 which can present environmental, economic and social dilemmas. Wootten divides these categories into “site-specific disputes and policy-related matters”. 4 Increasingly, Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) processes are being used to help plan and manage discussions about these disputes. This approach is a departure from the “Commission” or “Inquiry” approach where recommendations appear to be largely unimplemented and the discussions often feature positional rather than interest- or needs-based approaches. In many public disputes there appears to be some reluctance to use ADR processes, particularly among those in the conservation movement: This caution aris[es] in part from the observation that some proponents of EDR [environmental dispute resolution] appear to believe that the use of such techniques will help to restore the ‘proper balance’ between environmental and development interests, the
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___________________________________________________________ premise being that environmental interests have been accorded too much weight recently by governments. 5 On the other hand, such processes can be viewed as encouraging more participatory decision making. This paper discusses the use of facilitative dispute management processes in managing environmental conflict, focussing on system design issues including broader definitional issues, negotiation dilemmas as well as framework constraints. Key Words: Dispute resolution, conflict resolution, mediation, negotiation, environment, sustainable outcomes 1.
Introduction Facilitative dispute management processes have emerged in response to a growing recognition that adversarial approaches to environmental conflict resolution do not ordinarily address underlying interests (as they focus on positions), promote lasting outcomes, comply with outcomes or support the development or maintenance of relationships. However, facilitative processes have been the subject of criticism in the environmental area for a range of reasons. Lack of “court” oversight, suggestions about “secret” deals, concerns about the impartiality or credentials of “facilitators” as well as concerns about outcomes and compliance with core environmental principles are primary issues where facilitative processes are used in environmental conflict management. 6 These criticisms have related mostly to mediation processes, rather than the full range of facilitative processes. Horn has stated: On balance, mediation is not suited to environmental conflicts where the risk of damage to the environment is serious because there is no certainty that the environment will be protected. More progress is needed to establish an appropriate institution which can monitor standards, consider complaints and enforce accountability on the part of mediators. There are also no means of ensuring that environmental policies and legislation are taken into account when the mediated settlement is agreed to. The practice of mediation of environmental conflicts is not adequately monitored to ensure that the process is ethical and that the outcome prevents degradation to the environment and protects the interests of present and future generations. 7
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___________________________________________________________ Are such concerns valid when the entire range of facilitative processes is considered (rather than mediation only)? And, if they are valid, can such concerns be addressed by ensuring that conflict resolution and management processes are adequately planned and considered prior to and during their use? Many conflict resolution theorists and practitioners consider that mediation may not be the “answer” to complex environmental conflict but that carefully facilitative structured processes may assist in most so-called “intractable” disputes. 8 On the other hand, mediation has clearly played a major role in the resolution of many complex national and international conflicts over the past two decades. However, in complex environmental disputes most commentators suggest that the broader range of facilitative processes that may incorporate mediatory aspects are of greater assistance. Questions about the utility of facilitative processes cannot be considered without also considering why this fuller range of conflict resolution processes has developed in recent years. Perhaps it is not surprising given the abundance of conflict in many societies, particularly those with an individualistic focus. Clearly, conflict exists at all levels of society. Humans fight, go to war, injure each other, compete, avoid, submit and use other more cooperative or peaceful processes when in conflict. Conflict can exist between states, at home, at work and in the neighbourhood. Conflict is ubiquitous. As one eminent conflict theorist, G Tillett, has noted: “It can focus on trivia or the future of life on earth.” 9 Strategies to deal with the resolution of conflict (even in the environmental arena) have included reference to principles of justice, morality and divine guidance. 10 Conflict is a constantly changing phenomenon. Perceptions and interpretations are used to translate the past, present and future. Small, seemingly irrelevant actions (or a lack of action) by one party in conflict have the capacity to shape large changes in the perceptions of others and to influence outcomes in significant ways. It is probable that many conflicts grow out of disputes after events, actions and responses have been interpreted, re-interpreted, exaggerated and in part distorted or “hallucinated” by the perceptual filters of all those concerned. Conflict is as individual as those who are involved in it. Conflict has also been described as the product of unmet needs (physiological and/or psychological) and of differences that remain unrecognised and acknowledged. Conflict is a normal product of our interaction as humans. The effects of conflict vary; it produces change that can be viewed as positive or negative. Arguably, without conflict our society could not change and develop.
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___________________________________________________________ Individuals and groups can deal with conflict in a range of ways. The most common way of describing variations in terms of conflict approaches is by reference to power-based, rights-based or interest-based strategies. A further description is related to processes used. They can be facilitative, advisory or determinative or may be hybrid processes (that is a mixture of processes). Within Australia, the National Alternative Dispute Resolution Advisory Council (NADRAC) has more closely examined definitions and descriptions of conflict resolution processes and in particular ADR processes that provide alternatives to traditional adversarial or inquisitorial court-based determinative approaches. 11 NADRAC has suggested that dispute resolution processes may be classified as facilitative, advisory or determinative: 12 •
•
•
Facilitative processes involve a third party, often with no advisory or determinative role, providing assistance in managing the process of dispute resolution. These processes include mediation and facilitation. 13 Advisory processes involve a third party who investigates the dispute and provides advice on the facts and possible outcomes. These procedures include investigation, case appraisal and dispute counselling. Determinative processes involve a third party investigating the dispute, which may include a formal hearing, and the making of a determination which is potentially enforceable. These processes include adjudication and arbitration 14 and may be binding or nonbinding.
In the environmental context, advisory and determinative approaches (rather than facilitative approaches) were widely used in the first half of the 20th century. More recently, there has been a shift to use more facilitative approaches. This shift has occurred with little evaluation and has been based, in part, upon the success of facilitative and collaborative processes in other areas where conflict occurs, such as in community and commercial conflict. In respect of the broad range of disputes that occur in many Western societies, facilitative processes are often viewed as faster, cheaper, promoting compliance with outcomes and capable of encouraging more appropriate options for resolution. ADR literature refers to “win–win solutions”, options for mutual gain and integrative bargaining. 15 There is also reference to the capacity of facilitative processes to promote “wise” 16 agreement. Parker has suggested that it is appropriate for ADR practitioners to set standards for
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___________________________________________________________ parties in conflict; options should be “mutually beneficial”, 17 and that any defined outcome should be realistic as well as mutually beneficial. One of the most widely known facilitative processes is mediation. Its use has tended to be related to court processes or the potential for court action. In particular, mediation has been used in enforcement disputes (relating to compliance with laws and regulations) and permitting disputes (relating to planned construction of new facilities). Broader conflict, focusing on land use, water use and other environmental issues, has been addressed by a combination of facilitative and ad hoc approaches (which are noted above) are often not well examined or explored. This paper considers variables that can impact upon the resolution of environmental conflict through the use of facilitative conflict resolution processes. 2.
Evolution of Processes The extent to which there has been uptake of facilitative processes to deal with environmental conflict, rather than advisory or determinative processes is largely related to cultural variations in different countries and regions. In some societies there has been a far greater emphasis on collaborative problem-solving approaches and the facilitated resolution of disputes (rather than the determination of disputes by a third party). While this emphasis appears to stem in part from a greater emphasis upon social harmony and the role of the society (rather than the individual’s rights), it also stems from some fundamental differences in communication and negotiation patterns, and cultural contexts that have become more apparent as our world has become more globalised. In much of Europe the dominant decision making processes are determinative and inquisitorial. In other countries the decision making processes may be more facilitative or advisory. The dominant decision making processes and point of evolution of these processes both impact upon the acceptability of facilitative processes in respect of internal environmental conflict. A lack of sophistication in terms of understanding and use of facilitative processes can, for example, mean that collaborative and facilitative processes, when used to resolve or manage environmental conflict, are doomed to fail. 3.
The impact of organisations and institutions There are other factors which will also impact upon the success of collaborative efforts. One leading social conflict theorist, John Burton, suggested that a “major source of social conflict at all levels is within institutions and structures, and not within the discretion of the individual, or the identity groups to which individuals look for support.” 18 This
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___________________________________________________________ approach assumes that in tribal communities and societies “natural law” operated so that there was a high level of conformity with traditional norms. When authoritative systems developed, “positive law systems” were created and supported so that those who held power in the society declared and enforced rules; the emergence of analytical and complex problem-solving processes in this context is a challenge to more conventional structures and processes. 19 Maslow, a famous early conflict theorist, has noted that conflict relationships within society can be related to individual strengths and skills as well as societal behaviours that can display differing wealth distribution systems, use and ownership patterns and whether the religious institutions are benevolent or “frightening”. 20 This approach assumes that many natural societies approached conflict differently; some viewed the world with aggression, others with affection. In this context, the recent growth in ADR processes can be viewed as a response to changing dynamics within societies and individuals. The growth of cooperative conflict and dispute resolution processes has also emerged in response to changing management and organisational trends. As organisations grew in size and complexity the creation of hierarchical management structures occurred. In such structures, formal and defined roles are adopted, initiative and individuality is viewed as disruptive and consistency is the driving force. Conflict occurs between the individual and the controlling structure. 21 Changes in education and social patterns have challenged such structures. Management approaches emerged that suggested that intelligent organisations should be run “by persuasion and consent” 22 where individuality and creativity is supported. Such approaches have created a need for the development of human and communication skills at all organisational levels. This in turn has had implications for the way in which conflict is dealt with at all levels of society. In terms of environmental conflict, the maturity and character of the organisations and groups involved in the conflict will impact upon the way in which they are able to engage in collaborative arrangements. The underlying organisational values and nature of an organisation may mean that it can only model adversarial or inquisitorial behaviour and that attitudinal change (required if facilitative behaviour is called for) will be difficult to achieve. 4.
Conceptual and historical changes The nature of the relationships between those involved in the conflict can impact upon the likelihood of success of the environmental conflict resolution process. For example, if the group involved in the
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___________________________________________________________ conflict is not cohesive and there are few opportunities for trust or relationship building, then it may be more difficult to promote cooperative behaviour. With groups who display such “distance”, facilitators may use techniques to encourage and support the development of relationships and shared understandings. Such techniques can include using shared interestbased negotiation learning strategies; ensuring groups have social opportunities and paying adequate attention to group dynamics. There has been a recognisable shift from decisional models of dispute and conflict resolution – where one party made a decision that could be accepted by the parties to a dispute – to the emergence of models where the third-party neutral intervenes in a variety of different ways that are often not determinative. In the history of ADR in Australia it is clear that decisional models, where a third party exercised either an advisory or determinative function, were most popular until the early 1970s. Theorists such as Burton and Parker 23 have approached the development of this “new paradigm” by plotting the evolutionary trends and by reference either to preventing problems from escalating into damaging conflict, or building relationships, networks and structures that promote interactive problem-solving processes. In environmental conflict the extent to which these notions are well developed will be essential in determining the likely fate of a facilitative process. In a cultural context where the primary modes of decision making are advisory or determinative (rather than facilitative) it is probable that facilitative processes will be of benefit only when blended with fact finding or “hearing” processes. Notably however, in most societies where indigenous participants are involved in the environmental conflict, the use of facilitative processes may be culturally more appropriate. This means that if blended processes (for example, facilitative and advisory) are to be used, careful explanation and planning of the process steps needs to occur. In complex environmental conflict that involves many parties, these differences can be magnified. Conflict management processes (facilitative or advisory) must therefore devote considerable time to assist in creating understanding between parties and to manage responses so that the process remains collaborative. Where numerous groups are involved in the conflict, there is now a considerable shift in the way in which collaborative processes are used to manage it. Simplistic facilitative approaches that focussed on individual differences are no longer seen as optimal. Approaches based on broader facilitative processes, mapping of past conflict and communication, and value differences are seen as essential. In complex environmental conflict
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___________________________________________________________ areas there is also a greater focus upon determinative and advisory processes and using blended processes. Simplistic and unplanned approaches to conflict resolution in the environmental area will not produce sustainable outcomes. Elix has noted that: The adoption of collaborative approaches in taking on a political or policy role has occurred with little, if any evaluation and arguably, without appropriate strategies being put in place for managing the “people” aspects. Such collaborative processes can for example combine large numbers of disparate individuals in a room with an untrained chairperson, a controversial agenda to develop a plan for a region, an unrealistic timeframe, and an inadequate level of resources. Under such circumstances agreement may be unlikely and subsequently concepts of partnership and collaboration may be discredited. 24 In short, as Elix has stated, it is essential to pay attention not only to group dynamics (the nature of the groups) which can be supported by reference to dialogue work 25 but also to the characteristics and skills of the facilitator and the resources available to support the process. 5.
Conclusion Within most western societies, mediation, facilitation and other ADR processes have emerged as part of a response to the lack of effectiveness of informal structures that would otherwise be used to negotiate outcomes. In addition, the rigidity and complexity of formal structures means that courts, tribunals and other rights-based structures are often inaccessible to all but a few. The incapacity of these structures to resolve conflict, although they may determine rights, has also been a relevant factor in ADR development. A lack of negotiation skills and reliance upon positional negotiation (usually an approach adopted in oneoff relationships) is another reason why alternatives to unassisted negotiation have continued to flourish over the past 20 years. In the environmental context they have also been extended because of their capacity to encourage wise or beneficial outcomes. However, concerns arise about “secret” deals and deals that represent the interests of the participants involved in the environmental conflict, rather than the interests of the environment (which may be broader, non site-specific and different to those put forward by those in conflict). There are many ways in which these concerns can be alleviated.
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___________________________________________________________ Facilitative processes can be public, reporting can take place, “approval” mechanisms can be inserted and strategies for ensuring representation can all assist to alleviate these concerns. Another strategy, borrowed from the family dispute resolution sector where the “voice of the child” has been introduced in child inclusive mediation, is to introduce a “voice of the environment” process. However, there are issues about who would provide that voice. In the family dispute resolution sector, a child psychologist may interview children and report to parents involved in the mediation, providing a voice that is impartial and informs parents in their decision making process. In the environmental context there is a role for environmental scientists, who are not engaged as “duelling experts”, to provide a “voice” or for facilitators that are active in this area to provide a focus and ask questions about the impact of decisions on the environment. Other concerns may arise due to structural considerations. In the environmental global context there are significant variations between groups and individuals in terms of negotiation learning, cultural preferences for processes and the availability of rights-based frameworks. Arguably, the absence of a rights-based process and system “shadow” may prevent facilitative processes from working effectively in the environmental context, particularly if the relationships between conflict participants are “distant” and not well formed. In the global and local contexts there is also a need to carefully consider the system design aspects. The development of facilitative processes to manage intractable environmental conflict has arguably not been “successful” in a range of contexts for a range of reasons. Elix, in citing Eckersley, comments that: ...many of the new and widely-heralded experiments in community participation in natural resource management have not achieved their full potential owing to the failure on the part of the political executive to relinquish sufficient control to, or to adequately empower, fund and resource/support and publicise or continue these new initiatives. 26 This comment is of interest if one considers standards and environmental guidelines. Elix, in her ground breaking thesis, noted that system design is particularly relevant in the environmental context as such conflicts are likely to involve significant differences in the values held by the many participants. They are also unlikely to result in outcomes that are satisfactory to stakeholder groups, which means that without careful
100 Sustainable Outcomes through Effective Conflict Management ___________________________________________________________ planning and adequate resourcing, it is likely that facilitative process will be unsuccessful.
Notes 1
Peter Condliffe, “The Mediation of Public Issue Disputes: Seven Key Issues,” Australian Dispute Resolution Journal 9 (1998): 257-264. 2 ibid. 3 Jane Elix (PhD thesis, 2005, La Trobe University). 4 Hal Wootten, “Environmental Dispute Resolution,” Adelaide Law Review 47 (1993): 65-66. 5 Rob Fowler, “Environmental Dispute Resolution Techniques - What Role in Australia?,” Environmental and Planning Law Journal 9 (1992). 6 Laura Horn, “Mediation of Environmental Conflicts,” Environmental and Planning Law Journal 22 (2005): 369-384. 7 ibid. 8 Jane Elix, “New Approaches in Adversarialism and Politics – Three Facilitative Tools in use in Australia,” Australasian Dispute Resolution Journal 17 (2006): 105-112. 9 Gregory Tillett, Resolving Conflict (Sydney: Sydney Uni Press, 1991), 1. 10 Michael Emin Salla, “Conflict Resolution, Genetics and Alchemy – The Evolution of Conflict Transmutation,” The Online Journal of Peace and Conflict Resolution 3.3 (2000). 11 National Alternative Dispute Resolution Advisory Council (NADRAC), Alternative Dispute Resolution Definitions (Canberra: AGPS, 1997). 12 Adopting the terminology used in National Alternative Dispute Resolution Advisory Council (NADRAC), Alternative Dispute Resolution Definitions (Canberra: AGPS, 1997) see also originating Standards Australia, Australian Standard 4269-1999: Complaints Handling. (Australia: Standards Australia, 1999). 13 NADRAC, (1997). 14 Adopting the terminology used in National Alternative Dispute Resolution Advisory Council (NADRAC), Alternative Dispute Resolution Definitions (Canberra: AGPS, 2003). 15 James Gillespie and Max Bazerman, “Parasitic Integration: Win–Win Agreements Containing Losers,” Negotiation Journal 13 (1997) 271-282. 16 Roger Fisher, William Ury, Bruce Patton, Getting to Yes – Negotiating an Agreement Without Giving In (Sydney: Random House, 1991). Note
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___________________________________________________________ that “a wise agreement is one which meets the legitimate interest of each side to the extent possible, and takes community interest into account”. 17 Allan Parker, The Negotiator’s Toolkit (Sydney: Peak Performance, 1998), 156. 18 John Burton, Conflict: Resolution and Prevention (USA: St Martins Press, 1990), 147. 19 ibid, 83. 20 Abraham Maslow and L Gross, “Synergy in the Society and in the Individual,”Journal of Individual Psychology 20 (1964) 153-164. 21 Robert Heller, Charles Handy (London: Dorling Kindersley, 2001), referring to Handy’s view that these cultures that are defined as “Apollonian” are over-tightly designed and can be “hijacked” by dissatisfied cogs or work units who may withhold labour. 22 Charles Handy, Gods of Management (London: Arrow, 1995). 23 Peter Fritz, Allan Parker and Sherry Stumm, Beyond Yes (Sydney: Harper Publishing, 1998). 24 Elix. 25 William Isaacs, Dialogue: The Art of Thinking Together (USA: Currency, 1999). 26 Robyn Eckersley, “Politics and Policy,” in Managing Australia’s Environment, ed. Stephen Dovers and Su Wild River (Sydney: The Federation Press, 2003), 485-500.
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Bibliography Barrett, Jerome and Barrett, Joseph. A History of Alternative Dispute Resolution. San Francisco, California: Jossey Bass, 2004. Bohannan, Paul. We, the alien: an introduction to cultural anthropology. Illinois: Waveland Press, 1992. Burton, John. Conflict: Resolution and Prevention. USA: St Martins Press, 1990. Bush, Robert and Folger, Joseph. The Promise of Mediation: Responding to Conflict through Empowerment and Recognition. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1994. Condliffe, Peter. “The Mediation of Public Issue Disputes: Seven Key Issues,” Australian Dispute Resolution Journal 9 (1998): 257-264. Cornelius, Helena and Faire, Shoshana. Everyone Can Win – How to Resolve Conflict. Sydney: Simon and Schuster, 1989. Davis, Albie. “An Interview with Mary Parker Follet,” Negotiation Journal 5 (1989): 223-235. Dewdney, Micheline. “Transformative Mediation; Implications for Practitioners,” Australasian Dispute Resolution Journal 12 (2001): 20-26. Eckersley, Robyn. “Politics and Policy.” In Managing Australia’s Environment, edited by Stephen Dovers and Su Wild River, 485-500. Sydney: The Federation Press, 2003. Elix, Jane. PhD thesis, 2005, La Trobe University. Elix, Jane. “You can lead a horse to water… overcoming impasse in consensus building group processes,” Australasian Dispute Resolution Journal 15 (2004): 59-69. Elix, Jane. “The meaning of success in public policy dispute interventions,” Australasian Dispute Resolution Journal 14 (2003): 113123. Elix, Jane. “New Approaches in Adversarialism and Politics – Three Facilitative Tools in use in Australia,” Australasian Dispute Resolution Journal 17 (2006): 105-112. Fisher, Roger, Ury, William and Patton, Bruce. Getting to Yes – Negotiating an Agreement Without Giving In. Sydney: Random House, 1991. Fritz, Peter, Parker, Allan and Stumm, Sherry. Beyond Yes. Sydney: Harper Publishing, 1998. Folger, Joseph and Bush, Robert. “Transformative Mediation and Third Party Intervention: Ten Hallmarks of a Transformative Approach to Practice,” Mediation Quarterly 13 (1996): 263-278.
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___________________________________________________________ Fowler, Rob. “Environmental Dispute Resolution Techniques - What Role in Australia?,” Environmental and Planning Law Journal 9 (1992): 122– 131. Gillespie, James and Bazerman, Max. “Parasitic Integration: Win–Win Agreements Containing Losers,” Negotiation Journal 13 (1997): 271-282. Handy, Charles. Gods of Management. London: Arrow, 1995. Heller, Robert. Charles Handy. London: Dorling Kindersley, 2001. Horn, Laura. “Mediation of Environmental Conflicts,” Environmental and Planning Law Journal 22 (2005): 369-384. Isaacs, William, Dialogue: The Art of Thinking Together. USA: Currency, 1999. Johnson, Barry. “The Role of Adaptive Management as an Operational Approach for Resource Management Agencies,” Conservation Ecology 3 (2003): 302-318. Maslow, Abraham and Gross, L. “Synergy in the Society and in the Individual,” Journal of Individual Psychology 20 (1964): 153-164. National Alternative Dispute Resolution Advisory Council (NADRAC), Alternative Dispute Resolution Definitions (Canberra: Alternative Dispute Resolution Definitions, 1997). National Alternative Dispute Resolution Advisory Council (NADRAC), Dispute Resolution Terms (Canberra: AGPS, 2003). Parker, Allan. The Negotiator’s Toolkit. Sydney: Peak Performance, 1998. Salla, Michael Emin. “Conflict Resolution, Genetics and Alchemy – The Evolution of Conflict Transmutation,” The Online Journal of Peace and Conflict Resolution 3.3 (2000). Spegal, Nadja, Rogers, Bernadette and Buckley, Ross. Negotiation Theory and Techniques (Sydney: Butterworths, 1998) Standards Australia, Australian Standard 4269-1999: Complaints Handling. (Australia: Standards Australia, 1999). Tillett, Gregory. Resolving Conflict. Sydney: Sydney University Press, 1991. Wootten, Hal. “Environmental Dispute Resolution,” Adelaide Law Review 47 (1993): 65-66. Zartman, William and Rasmussen, Lewis (editorss). Peacemaking in International Conflict. United States Institute of Peace Press: Washington, 1997.
Going Local? Public Participation and Future Mobility in Ireland Henrike Rau and John McDonagh Abstract Recent changes in Ireland’s economic and socio-political fabric have coincided with an increase in physical mobility, car dependency and commuting while transport policies and trends in spatial planning and land use contributing to the ‘locking-in’ of car-based mobility. Government initiatives for fast-tracking road projects and the persistent weakness of local government regarding infrastructural decisions such as transport initiatives further exacerbate these unsustainable mobility patterns. While the socio-economic and cultural consequences of hypermobility and car dependency for Irish society have attracted much attention lately, few studies have been carried out to date to investigate public opinion on transport and mobility issues and explore possibilities for participatory decision-making that would help reduce car dependency. This paper will present qualitative data from ongoing interdisciplinary research at NUI, Galway to show how transport planning in Ireland offers limited opportunities for active participation. In addition, the paper will offer some suggestions for culturally sensitive decision-making structures that could increase the sustainability of future mobility patterns in Ireland. Key Words: mobility, transport planning, public participation 1.
Introduction Voter apathy and low levels of public participation have been identified as problematic outcomes of current democratic practices in Ireland and elsewhere. 1 Lack of public support and waning levels of trust in scientific arguments have also brought about a “legitimation crisis”, with more and more people either actively challenging or withdrawing from prevailing decisionmaking processes. 2 As a result, policy-making that largely excludes members of the public and their practical and cultural knowledge has increasingly come under pressure. 3 Active and inclusive public participation is now advocated by some as essential to successful environmental decision-making. 4 Yet others acknowledge the potential benefits of public involvement but simultaneously criticise its drawbacks such as erosion of state institutions, exclusion of
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_______________________________________________________________ dissenting voices and cooption of more radical elements. 5 Despite these complexities, inclusive, future-oriented participation which facilitates collaboration and creates ‘decision spaces’ for power sharing and joined decision-making is seen by some as crucial to successful environmental policy design and implementation. 6 Transport planning with its transformative effects on people’s physical and social environment constitutes a prime area in which participation is highly relevant. 7 The planning system in Ireland offers opportunities for public involvement, though these are still mostly confined to development processes such as planning applications rather than forward planning and future-oriented environmental decision-making. 8 Moreover, public involvement often involves traditional forms of consultation such as written submissions and formalised oral hearings that limit opportunities for active and collaborative participation by local groups and activists. Nowhere does this become more evident than in the context of oral hearings facilitated by An Bord Pleanála (ABP), the Irish planning appeals board, whose functional and spatial arrangements frequently resemble court hearings unsuitable to open and inclusive deliberation. 9 This paper looks at public participation in Irish transport planning, starting with a brief assessment of current consultation practices. Subsequently, the paper will consider the effectiveness of oral hearings as important component of public involvement in Irish (transport) planning. Based on documents covering the controversial oral hearing on the Ballinasloe-Galway motorway in 2004/5 (henceforth BGOH), section 3 of the paper will then identify reasons why this particular oral hearing failed to create a forum for open and fair deliberation. In section 4, propositions suggesting that active participation promotes more inclusive environmental decision-making will be critically assessed. Finally, some tentative suggestions will be made regarding future participatory solutions to transport problems in Ireland. Here it will be argued that participatory approaches must be culturally sensitive to accommodate members of different mobility cultures. Throughout the paper, more general suggestions will be supported with empirical evidence drawn from official documents such as the ABP inspector’s report for the Ballinasloe-Galway oral hearing, the authors’ ethnographic fieldnotes, and focus group material. 10 All primary data was collected in Galway City and its environs as part of the NUI, Galway Transport Study 2004-6, an interdisciplinary project bringing together sociological and geographical approaches to transport research.
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_______________________________________________________________ 2.
Towards Individualised Mobility: Public Participation and Transport Planning in Ireland In Ireland initial responsibility for planning for transport projects lies with the local authorities, subject to funding. Subsequently, the public can inspect and comment on planning applications at the local level and make submissions to An Bord Pleanála to appeal planning decisions and request oral hearings. Finally, decisions made by ABP can be legally challenged at national and supranational level (EU), though the threat of high costs can deter individuals, smaller pressure groups and NGOs from seeking judicial review. Transport planning in Ireland provides only limited opportunity for active participation and is instead restricted to conventional forms of consultation and negotiations between key interest groups. This tends to solidify existing power gradients and the relative rigidity of the process largely eliminates any possibility for adjustments to changes in circumstances, thereby ‘time-locking’ the initial decision, sometimes over decades. This became particularly evident in high-profile cases of conflict over transport infrastructure in Ireland such as Glen of the Downs, Carrickmines/M50, Sligo Inner Relief Road and the Ballinasloe-Galway section of the Dublin-Galway motorway (see section 3 below). Moreover, public involvement is largely confined to the advanced stages of the planning process, with few opportunities for forward planning. 11 Inclusive planning thus remains an aspiration and certain groups continue to be excluded from the process: I do wonder sometimes […] especially in terms of planning, do they ever walk around […] to see what it’s gonna be like from a pedestrian’s point of view, or is it totally geared towards traffic? 12 Overall, objections to already established plans are often the only way for members of the public to voice their concerns. The Irish government is currently seeking to exempt large infrastructural projects such as motorways from the regular planning process. The Strategic Infrastructure Bill 2006 aims to extend the list of developments that will be dealt with exclusively by ABP. Some provisions have been made in the bill to allow environmental NGOs to seek judicial review and its proponents claim that it will transpose into Irish law supranational attempts at increasing public
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_______________________________________________________________ participation in environmental decision-making. 13 However, those opposed to the bill have criticised that the bill would in fact reduce opportunities for citizen involvement. Regardless of the outcome of this debate, we would argue that the bill promotes the continued use of established consultation practices inadequate to modern (transport) planning and essentially ignores the potential of participation for preventing conflicts over infrastructural projects. This is not to suggest that increased participation alone could resolve transport-related conflicts – the perils of political inclusion such as the cooption of more radical groups serve as a caution against the uncritical adoption of participatory practices. 14 Nevertheless, the potential of some culturally sensitive forms of participation to resolve seemingly intractable disputes and overcome democratic deficits within Irish transport planning must be explored. The following section – section 3 - will focus on a particular instance of public involvement in transport planning in Ireland – the ABP oral hearing on the Ballinasloe-Galway dual carriageway - to identify its strengths and weaknesses. Sections four and five will then ask whether inclusive public participation can help solve existing conflicts between groups with different stakes in the transport planning process, some of which are related to the specific culture of their members. Furthermore, some suggestions will be made how to move beyond the current system of oral hearings, ‘reluctant consultation’ and consensus-driven governance and what a novel system of culturally sensitive, collaborative participation could look like.
3.
New Decision Spaces or Business as Usual? The Practice of Oral Hearings in Irish Transport Planning Traditional consultation processes in Irish transport planning are often dominated by ‘official’ technical-legalistic arguments and managerial rhetoric which frequently ignore local people’s concerns and their alternative decisionmaking cultures. Oral hearings as the key form of face-to-face public involvement exemplify the hegemony of the technical-legalistic stance over alternative views of mobility as an important socio-cultural practice. 15 It thus appears useful to consider one particular case - the ABP oral hearing 2004/5 on the Ballinasloe-Galway dual carriageway (BGOH) - to illustrate how technical-legalistic arguments come to dominate the hearing process itself as
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_______________________________________________________________ well as the value system that underpins it, thereby marginalising alternative views. A. The BGOH - Success Story or Missed Opportunity? The ABP inspector’s report for the oral hearing on the BGOH illustrates the formalisation and bureaucratisation of transport planning problems and the inherent potential for further conflict that emanates from this. 16 Both officials and objectors reacted to an already existing conflict over the routing of the road and deployed various strategies to validate and legitimise their claims. In some cases, both parties deployed similar techniques such as the use of experts. At other times, officials and objectors relied on contrasting discursive and behavioural practices, some of which directly challenged the officially sanctioned modus operandi of the BGOH. Interactions between officials and members of the public revolved around three key rhetorical strategies – 1) quantification, 2) legalistic and instrumental reasoning, and 3) uncertainty reduction - used initially by officials to legitimise their line of argumentation and later adopted by some objectors to further their own cause. BGOH documents suggest that whenever officials and objectors resorted to different argumentative strategies, their behaviour seemed to conform to the ‘rules of the game’. However, objectors who spoke or reasoned in ways similar to rhetoric used by officials became the target of attempts to discredit their arguments. This confirms Garavan’s argument that oral hearings do not allow for any real debate but impose a rather rigid framework of roles and expectations on those involved in the process. 17 Firstly, quantification dominated the line of argumentation pursued by officials during the BGOH and was also imposed on submissions made by members of the public during the initial consultation period. Submissions by members of the public were counted and presented in a highly condensed format, thereby removing any specific meanings or relational connections between arguments presented: A formal public consultation process was undertaken commencing in April 2000. Over 5,000 people attended the various sessions. Submission were received which were largely concerned about impacts on properties, communities and community facilities. Statutory Bodies and Non-Government Organisations (N.G.O.) were also consulted. 18
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_______________________________________________________________ Similarly, arguments in favour or against specific aspects of the road project were summarised numerically rather than being presented in the entirety. The report includes a reference to the routing of the Ballinasloe bypass which states that 57% of the people in the vicinity of the town who took part in the consultation process favoured a southerly bypass. 19 In contrast, no comments were made regarding those who opposed the southerly option, their motives and arguments. Schwarze observes similar trends in US forest services rhetorics and suggests that the quantification of public involvement “helps make the process transparent, both in the sense of making the process clear to the reader and emptying it of substantive content.” 20 Some objectors repeatedly criticised the quantification of the social, environmental and archaeological impact of the road. They presented detailed arguments related to the actual content of the E.I.S. (Environmental Impact Statement) and argued for a more holistic assessment. Direct criticism of the authorities’ reductionist assessment procedures, the nature of the consultation process and the oral hearing itself also emerged during the course of the BGOH. Restrictions regarding the format in which members of the public could present their arguments were heavily criticised, as was the imposition of rigid time limits: [Submission made by] M/S B. [Ohlig] Schaefer and Messers Hession and Grealish [state that they] have been impeded in relation to the presentation of their cases. […] A significant example was the application of time limits within which issues could be raised. This was unfair and prejudicial to the interests of the parties represented. 21 Secondly, the inspector’s report showed how council and board officials persistently used legalistic and instrumental arguments which effectively excluded alternative strands of debate favoured by some members of the public. This “rhetoric of instrumentalism” prevailed on many occasions during the BGOH and coincided with a strong emphasis on specialised expertise, as is evident from the following excerpt: 22 Galway County Council presented twenty four (24) expert witnesses in support of the scheme. […] Each witness presented a summary of evidence in relation to an identified topic relating to
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_______________________________________________________________ the relevant section of the scheme. Witnesses were questioned by the objectors and/or their representatives. 23 Instrumental rhetoric also dominated comments on risk and risk assessment. Concerns raised by members of the public regarding the potential risk of damages to their homes from blasting were replied to in terms of technical data and expert terminology: There is little risk to house being damaged once the peak particle velocity is kept to the specified standards. The vibration velocity has to be less than 8mm/sec at a frequency of 10 hertz at the closest part of any sensitive property to the blast. 24 Furthermore, individual people’s storylines and concerns were treated as subordinate to the greater good of society (i.e. the road). Again, experts attempted to exert power over members of the public through the use of technical language and the bureaucratisation of their personal concerns about their health and safety: No assessment was made in the E.I.S. in relation to the impact of the road and the health of individuals including Mrs. Gre[al]ish (Parcel No. 19, Chainage 350). 25 Finally and closely related to quantification and the use of instrumental and legalistic rhetoric, experts and officials attempted to reduce and possibly eliminate uncertainty through the use of scientific-technical language and insisted on what they saw as rational-objective course of action. They did so through the a priori establishment of rules regarding the course and set-up of the oral hearing, the use of evidence, managerial-instrumental lines of argumentation and, where possible, the suppression of queries that were likely to introduce uncertainty into this discursive framework. Occasionally members of the public tried to challenge the officials’ discourse by questioning these ‘certainties’ and presenting alternatives. For example, a heated argument erupted between An Taisce’s representative and officials over the historical significance of the Battle of Aughrim (1691) site to be traversed by the road, which culminated in the eviction of An Taisce’s representative from the hearing. The Battle of Aughrim site is of particular interest to the Orange Order in Northern Ireland and the impact of the proposed road on the site had
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_______________________________________________________________ already been discussed at the highest political level both in the Republic and Northern Ireland prior to the BGOH. Some objectors utilised the prominence of this issue and presented an alternative interpretation of the historical events to push for the re-routing of the road. Overall, the BGOH clearly illustrates how power gradients between (local) government representatives and objectors clearly impact upon both the nature and content of oral hearings. In fact, the BGOH did not offer a real opportunity for exchange of information and fair and open deliberation but presented itself as intense struggle for power and legitimacy. But could alternative participatory approaches to transport planning really prevent such conflicts and mitigate some of the negative effects of current consultation practices? 4.
Public Participation in Environmental Decision-Making: A Critical View Collaborative public participation is hailed by some as an opportunity for greater democratic co-determination that counterbalances technocratic and elitist approaches. “Public participation is best understood as a challenge to the traditional management of government policy by experts in administrative agencies.” 26 But how effective are participatory alternatives to top-down decision-making? Some forms of participation certainly have the capacity to challenge the hegemony of technocratic decision-making and mitigate conflicts over contentious environmental legislation. Fischer suggests that environmental decision-making frequently throws up “wicked problems” that require political solutions, including participatory approaches. 27 Others argue that full collaboration between stakeholders can increase public support for controversial projects while helping to detect potentially negative effects on the environment and society. Overall, the effectiveness of participatory processes often depends on a plethora of socio-political and cultural factors such as the distribution of decision-making power in society (see section 5). This said, proponents of participatory schemes do not always acknowledge that time- and resource-intensive participatory processes can undermine the capacity of social movements to sustain themselves into the future, or that participation can develop into cooption which helps legitimise unsustainable projects and solidifies existing power relationships, thereby preventing more radical reform. 28 Some environmental movements, specifically those committed to direct action, may view political inclusion as an attempt by
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_______________________________________________________________ powerful elites to weaken environmentalist counterarguments and ‘green wash’ their unsustainable practices. These objections to the uncritical introduction of participatory processes into the policy process indicate the importance of power in democratic decision-making. 29 To conclude, the extent to which public participation can address democratic deficits remains subject to debate. Local and national transport planning decisions in Ireland such as the BGOH can be a major source of conflict between stakeholders because they favour experts and resource-rich groups. At the same time, they highlight the need for more collaboration in transport planning from design to implementation and the inclusion of previously marginalised groups such as users of alternative modes of transport. 5.
Public Participation and Future Mobility: Some Tentative Suggestions This paper has shown that collaborative public participation can assist sound environmental decision-making in principle but that current consultation practices in Ireland often fail to mitigate disputes over transport projects. But can public participation processes in Ireland be changed to facilitate more inclusive transport planning and, if so, how? It is suggested here that environmental decisions with considerable potential for conflict and irreversible environmental damage, such as the routing of motorways through ecologically and archeologically significant areas, could benefit from a fully developed, culturally sensitive approach to participation. Maximum transparency and inclusion from the beginning could also present a more sustainable alternative to the current practice of limited stakeholder involvement and late consultation. Some features of the Irish political system and aspects of everyday culture appear to lend themselves to alternatives participatory practices such as community-based decision-making while others seem to prevent them. The list of reasons for the emergence and relative stability of the current system of limited consultation, at least until recently, cannot be dealt with in detail here. However, at least four political and cultural particularities of the Irish state and civil society deserve to be mentioned, together with proposals about their role in future participatory planning. Firstly, the centralisation of state power and administrative functions in the Greater Dublin Area adversely affects small-scale, regional and local decision-making structures and weakens local government; this imbalance has
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_______________________________________________________________ been criticised by those in favour of local government reform and ‘real’ devolution. Furthermore, legislation such as the Strategic Infrastructure Bill further reduces local government powers with regard to infrastructural projects such as roads and public transport. Reform of local government structures and genuine decentralisation through devolved responsibilities for transport solutions could thus assist participatory transport planning in the future. 30 Secondly, Ireland’s clientelist political culture continues to shape people’s perceptions of their influence on political decisions. Recent changes in the economic and social structures of Irish society have partially loosened these (perceived) ties between politicians and their voters, thereby reducing public confidence in the ability of individual parliamentarians to bring about change. Alternative governance networks could replace these seemingly disintegrating ties between politicians and their constituents and rekindle public interest in political decision-making, perhaps through the reinvigoration of communicative networks and the creation of local and regional alliances. Thirdly, the voluntary sector remains a fundamental building block of Irish society, despite a gradual decline in voluntarism. As regards public involvement in transport planning, the onus is often on volunteers to gather information on proposed projects and act as watchdog where necessary. This is certainly not unique to Ireland, though the extent to which the Irish state relies on the voluntary sector for monitoring functions and the provision of essential services often exceeds demands placed on such organisations elsewhere. Undoubtedly transport issues will become more prominent in years to come, increasing the need for regular state funding and support for community-based mobility services. Fourthly, certain cultural values and practices such as prevailing attitudes towards time which merge short-term planning, flexible time frames and a greater tolerance for uncertainty appear to greatly influence Irish planning practices. 31 Future sustainable transport planning will depend on the identification and accommodation of such cultural specificities and the development of culturally sensitive forms of public participation. But what could such culturally sensitive approaches look like? After all greater citizen involvement does not guarantee public support, in particular if powerful stakeholders only use it to legitimise their plans. Giving the importance of cultural factors, future participatory processes in Irish transport planning must assign a greater role to alternative mobility cultures and promote intercultural understanding as a form of conflict resolution. This
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_______________________________________________________________ clearly requires a departure from instrumental approaches to consultation, including those evident during the BGOH. Innovative local and regional decision-making structures could act as catalyst for more inclusive, culturally sensitive transport planning. Local and regional roundtables, improvements to existing local Special Policy Committees (SPCs) and the fusion of local knowledge, socio-cultural expertise and technical know-how may also assist the transition to more sustainable planning practices. The visualisation and subsequent normalisation of existing tensions could also aid the participatory process. Apparently intractable conflicts between stakeholders may become more open to resolution if made visible to participating parties, for example through constellation analysis. 32 Also, clashes between different (mobility) cultures could be re-framed as ‘normal’ features of everyday life, encouraging actors to detect similarities with conflicts they experienced in the past and for which they already have successful coping strategies. Another positive step could be to treat technical expertise and lay people’s cultural rationalities as different types of cultural competence with contrasting linguistic-deliberative practices. The hegemony of technical-managerial lingo during the BGOH could thus be re-framed as an expression of a specific set of cultural conventions, opening up decision spaces for alternative knowledge and mobility cultures. This could help place local socio-ecological perspectives in a more advantageous (though not necessarily equal) position to counterbalance dominant technical-instrumental arguments. 6.
Conclusions Current forms of public participation in Irish transport planning such as written submissions and oral hearings are subject to considerable limitations. Firstly, they offer a forum within which to deal with already existing conflicts over transport planning decisions but do little to prevent conflicts in the first place. Moreover, current consultation practices seem to perpetuate power gradients between different interest groups while excluding marginal and dissenting voices. This became evident in the BGOH case discussed in this paper which showed how rhetorical strategies such as quantification, the use of technical-legalistic argumentation and attempts at reducing uncertainty solidified conflicts between officials and objectors. Moreover, the BGOH case showed how seemingly intractable disputes and differences between stakeholders often relate to their diverse cultural conventions and how
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_______________________________________________________________ resulting clashes between officials, technical experts and members of the public reflect their specific cultural values and competencies rather than their (lack of) technical expertise. This suggests that alternative approaches to mobility and transport planning sensitive to these cultural differences that facilitate greater intercultural understanding between all parties involved could help address these issues.
Notes 1
Michael Laver, “Voting Behaviour,” in Politics in the Republic of Ireland, 4th ed., eds. John Coakley and Michael Gallagher (London: Routledge, in association with PSAI Press, 2005), 183-210. 2 Jürgen Habermas, Legitimation Crisis (Boston: Beacon, 1975). 3 Enid Wistrich, The Politics of Transport (London: Longman, 1983). 4 Frank Fischer, “Citizens and Experts in Risk Assessment: Technical Knowledge in Practical Deliberation,” Technikfolgeabschätzung 13(2004):9098; Thomas C. Beierle and Jerry Cayford, Democracy in Practice: Public Participation in Environmental Decisions (Washington: RFF Press, 2002). 5 Bill Cooke and Uma Kothari (Eds), Participation: The New Tyranny? (London: Zed Books, 2004). 6 Mary Daly, “Governance and Social Policy,” Journal of Social Policy 32 (2003):113-128; Walker. 7 Beierle and Cayford. 8 Paddy Prendergast and Krysia Rybaczuk, “Using Visualisation Techniques in Planning to Improve Collaborative Governance in Ireland,” Proceedings of the 10th International Conference on Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in Urban Planning and Spatial Development and Impacts of ICT on Physical Space, Vienna, February 2005 (Vienna: CORP GeoMultimedia, 2005), 235-243. 9 Adrian Peace, “Environmental Protest, Bureaucratic Closure. The Politics of Discourse in Rural Ireland,” in Environmentalism: The View from Anthropology, ed. Kay Milton (London: Routledge, 1993), 189-204; Mark Garavan, “Seeking a Real Argument,” in Uncertain Ireland: A Sociological Chronicle 2003-4, eds. Mary P. Corcoran and Michel Peillon (Dublin: IPA, 2006), 73-88.
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All three focus groups took place in April 2006 and included both undergraduate and postgraduate students (F1, F2 and F3; nTOTAL=11). 11 Prendergast and Kybaczuk 12 Female undergraduate, FG1 2006 13 Both EU directive 2000/35 and the Aarhus Convention represent important supranational agreements aimed at increasing and regularising citizen participation. Ireland has yet to ratify the Aarhus convention. 14 Dryzek et al., Green States and Social Movements (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2003). 15 In Ireland oral hearings do not form an integral part of the consultation process but are almost always initiated by objectors. Proponents of projects may on occasion decide to call a hearing to address issues of public concern. 16 ABP Inspector’s Report PL07.CH.2150 17 Garavan 18 ABP Inspector’s Report PL07.CH.2150, 7 19 Ibid. 25 20 Steve Schwarze, “Public Participation and (Failed) Legitimation: The Case of Forest Service Rhetorics in the Boundary Waters Canoe Area,” in Communication and Public Participation in Environmental Decision Making, eds. Stephen P. Depoe, John W. Delicath and Marie-Frances Aepli Elsenbeer (New York: State University of New York Press, 2004), 141. 21 ABP Inspector’s Report PL07.CH.2150, 70 22 Killingsworth and Palmer, 1992; cited in Schwarze, 140 23 ABP Inspector’s Report PL07.CH.2150, 5 24 Ibid, 15 25 Ibid, 16 26 Beierle and Cayford, 2. 27 Frank Fischer, “Citizen Participation and the Democratization of Policy Expertise: From Theoretical Inquiry to Practical Cases,” Policy Sciences 26 (1993):165-187. 28 Harry Taylor, “Insights into Participation from Critical Management and Labour Process Perspectives,” in Participation: The New Tyranny?, eds. Bill Cooked and Uma Kothari (London and New York: Zed Books, 2004), 122138. 29 Bent Flyvbjerg, “Bringing Power to Planning Research,” Journal of Planning Education and Research 21(2002):353-366.
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_______________________________________________________________ 30
James Wickham, Gridlock: Dublin’s Transport Crisis and the Future of the City (Dublin: Tasc at New Island, 2006). 31 Henrike Rau, Time Perspectives and Temporal Practices: A Cross-Cultural, Comparative Study of Time Cultures in Ireland and Germany (NUI, Galway: Unpublished PhD dissertation, 2004). 32 Constellation analysis is an innovative research technique that helps visualise both congruent and conflicting opinions in the decision-making process (Kruse, 2004; in conversation with H. Rau in April 2006).
Knowledge Production and Citizens’ Participation in the Implementation of the EU Water Framework Directive in Finland 1 Timo Peuhkuri Abstract The EU Water Framework Directive (WFD) entails a concrete step towards an ecological approach in European water protection. The core of the WFD is a classification system of waters based on biological indicators. However, information of human impacts on waters and effectiveness and costs of protection measures is also needed and the directive emphasises participation as a prerequisite for successful implementation. The WFD illustrates the contradictory tendencies of environmental policies: the top-down model leaning on science, versus the emphasis on citizen participation and local knowledge. Policy contradictions and knowledge related uncertainties result in challenges for the implementation of the directive. First, the use of knowledge implies choices that cannot be grounded solely on science. Moreover, the weighing between socio-economic and environmental values requires social negotiation processes. This paper addresses the role of participation and different types of knowledge in the implementation of the WFD. The focus is on the possibilities that the directive creates for participation as a means to integrate local knowledge and social dimensions into the water protection. Further, the paper examines, whether the legal framework and institutional arrangements in Finnish water protection create opportunities for broader public involvement. Key words: water protection, EU Water Framework Directive, knowledge production, local knowledge, scientific knowledge, participation 1.
Introduction Since the 1970s water protection in Finland has been based on national programmes setting targets for the hydrological and chemical condition of waters. The central means of water protection have comprised juridical permits, which traditionally have compromised on environmental protection targets and calculations of economic profitability. 2 Lately the policies have also increasingly emphasized the protection of whole ecosystems. The EU Water Framework Directive (hereafter referred to as the WFD), which came into force in 2000, entails a concrete step towards an ecological approach while it also emphasises broadening participation. The development of European water protection policy is a good example
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___________________________________________________________ of two partly conflicting tendencies of environmental policies and the potential problems their reconciliation might bring up: the top-down model, including universal goals based on science, versus the emphasis on local empowerment by means of citizen participation. Policy contradictions and knowledge related uncertainties result in challenges for the implementation of the directive. The use of knowledge implies choices that cannot be grounded solely on biological knowledge. Moreover, the weighing between socio-economic and environmental values inevitably results in social negotiation processes. This paper looks at the WFD and its implementation strategy from the point of view of production and use of knowledge and citizen participation. It examines first, how public participation and roles of knowledge are understood in the directive and its implementation strategy. The focus is on the uncertainties of knowledge and the possibilities that the directive creates for the integration of local knowledge and social dimensions into the water protection. Secondly, it examines, whether the legal framework and institutional arrangements in Finnish water protection create opportunities for broader public involvement. The paper is based on a preliminary content analysis of administrative key documents and on research literature concerning the WFD and European water protection in general. I have analysed policy and planning documents from divergent levels of decision-making. The central EU documents include the WFD 3 , the Common Implementation Strategy for the WFD 4 , along with programmes and reports on the assessment of water quality and implementation policies by the European Environmental Bureau (EEB 2000; 2001) and the European Environment Agency (e.g. EEA 1999; 2000). Core documents also include the statements on these official documents given by important stakeholders such as environmental NGOs and industry. Key national documents include the Water Act (264/1961) and the proposal for the new Water Act (2004), the Nature Conservation Act (1096/1996), the National Water Protection Programme up to 2005 (1998), statements concerning the national programmes and legislation issued by interest groups and, finally, regional reports on water quality submitted to the EC. In the next phase, I will also conduct thematic interviews with representatives of the main interest groups. Interviews will focus on how knowledge is produced, selected, interpreted and used in the regional and local implementation processes. Key actors consist of regional and municipal environmental authorities and members of the working groups preparing River Basin Management Plans for the regional and local implementation of the WFD.
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___________________________________________________________ 2.
Knowledge and the role of participation It is basically a matter of political struggle, who is able to define the meaning of environment in public and to get ones goals articulated in policy processes. Scientific knowledge plays typically a central role in the identification of environmental problems, invoking policy responses, and defining solutions. Correspondingly, the core of environmental legislation and decision-making is based on concepts emerging from natural scientific research. Even if scientific knowledge is fundamentally uncertain and open to differing interpretations, its outcomes, such as natural scientific classifications or economic calculations, tend to limit the scope of the viewpoints seen as legitimate and relevant. 5 The discrepancy between expert knowledge and lay knowledge is a widely discussed issue in the field of environmental social science. 6 Disagreements are basically understood as conflicts between different rationalities and social positions. Cognitive conflicts may stem from differences in the ways scientific and laypersons observe and interpret their environments 7 , or conflicts may arise from distrust laypersons show towards the experts’ cultures and political uses of expert knowledge. 8 In environmental politics and research there have been calls to develop scientific expertise into a more transparent and democratic direction. The recognition of uncertainties and value-ladenness of environmental problems require developing new forms of legitimization of environmental policies through broadened public participation. 9 Various attempts to increase public participation in the production and use of knowledge can be seen as reactions to the perceived scientization of politics and to the simultaneus decreasing authority of science among the public. 10 However, there is no easy way to get rid of scientific dominance. Procedures and mechanisms designed to promote public influence are often based on a limited, instrumental view of knowledge. Approaching lay knowledge purely as representational information leads easily to marginalisation of lay perspectives. 11 The concept of deliberative democracy has been from the 80’s in the centre of theoretical debates on environmental politics. 12 Deliberative democracy means argumentation in which participants consider the underlying principles for different standpoints. 13 This dialogical aspect distinguishes deliberative models from pluralist approaches, which emphasize aggregation of interests and bargaining among them. 14 The central argument used to support the deliberative perspective is cognitive by its nature. Deliberative institutions are seen to be ecologically rational because they incorporate all the relevant information into the decision-making and take the uncertainties of environmental problems as their starting point. In addition, deliberative participation implies the idea of social learning among parties.
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___________________________________________________________ The main criticisms against the arguments of deliberative democracy concern the problem of inequality between parties in terms of power and possession of other resources, and the incommensurability of different worldviews, problem definitions and cognitive views. Further, in deliberative thinking main interest is on issues of democracy as a value in itself and may lead to ignoring of environmental values. Despite these limitations, broadening the participatory basis and enhancing the dialogical approach is seen as a prerequisite for empowering citizens with resources, realizing ideas of political autonomy and enhancing the legitimacy of decisions. 15 Within EU-policy making it has been widely accepted that public participation is a crucial element of democratic and effective environmental policy. In EU the right of the public to information, participation and access to justice was formulated in 1998 in the Aarhus Convention. According to Lee there has been a strong trend in EU legislation to emphasize the procedural aspects of environmental policies. 16 She interprets this phenomenon as a counter balance to the increased flexibility of substantial requirements. However, the types of required participation are mostly left unspecified in EU directives and the approach to participation is unambitious concentrating mostly on access to information. Further, the uncertainties of scientific knowledge are not used as an argument for participation but as requests of more science. 3.
The EU Water Framework Directive The EU WFD sets a framework for comprehensive management of water resources in the European Community, within a common approach and with common objectives, principles and basic measures. The directive rationalises and updates existing water legislation by setting common EU wide objectives for water. The core of the WFD is a classification system based on biological indicators. The central concept of the WFD is ‘ecological status’, the reference value being the natural, untouched state of water bodies. The fundamental objective of the Water Framework Directive aims at maintaining “high status” of waters where it exists, preventing any deterioration in the existing status of waters and achieving at least “good status” in relation to all waters by 2015. Member States will have to ensure that a co-ordinated approach is adopted for the achievement of the objectives of the WFD and for the implementation of programmes of measures for this purpose. In addition, information of human impacts on waters and effectiveness and costs of protection measures is also needed in support of action plans. To understand the nature and innovative elements of the WFD it is useful to look at the earlier phases of European legislation on water
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___________________________________________________________ protection. Page & Kaika separate three waves of European water legislation. 17 In the first wave (1975-1988) the emphasis was on health issues and directives set quality standards for waters that could affect public health (Surface Water Directive 1975, Drinking Water Directive 1980). In the second phase (1988-1996) the emphasis shifted from public health issues towards pollution control, environmental management and developing of common European environmental policy. Particularly, more attention was paid on pollution from urban wastewater and agriculture by setting limit values for different pollutants in different types of waters (Urban Wastewater Treatment Directive 1991; Nitrates Directive 1991). In addition, an effort was made to integrate member states’ monitoring and designating water areas vulnerable to pollution (Integrated Pollution and Prevention Control Directive 1996. The new Drinking Water Directive (1998) also introduced requirements for an improved public access for information. The EU directives from these first two phases were important driving forces behind investments in water treatment infrastructure. These investments lead to decrease in point source pollution of waters. However, diffuse source pollution has still remained a problem and around 20 % of Europe’s surface waters are still badly polluted. The EU Water Framework Directive means clearly a new phase in European water protection. It introduces a combined approach to pollution control by linking emission limit values to environmental quality standards. Source controls alone can lead to a cumulative pollution load. Quality standards, in turn, can underestimate the effect of a particular substance, due to the limitations in scientific knowledge. For these reasons, a consensus has developed that a combined approach is needed. 18 Further, the WFD links for the first time physical planning with water resource planning by introducing a new approach to water management based on river basins instead of administrative regions. 4.
Uncertainties and contradictions of knowledge The main information task of the WFD is to establish a coherent EU-wide classification system with goals for the protection of water bodies. This system is based on biological indicators, but a detailed picture of human actions and their impacts is also needed in support of various action plans. Policy contradictions and knowledge related uncertainties result in obvious challenges for the implementation of the WFD. 19 The use of knowledge implies choices that cannot be grounded solely on biological information. First, the reference value, ‘the natural state’, cannot be
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___________________________________________________________ deduced from unambiguous criteria (e.g. ‘the state before any human influence’). Ecosystems are constantly changing whether they are influenced by human action or not. In addition, today it is impossible to find ecosystems, which are not under human impact. 20 Further, the deviation from the chosen reference conditions will give a wide range of apparent ecological status from good, through moderate to bad depending upon the definition of an acceptable quantity of deviation. The determination of an acceptable deviation will thus ultimately be a political decision. 21 Second, as biological constructions the protection goals are not all that sensitive to the various pressures on water bodies set by local groups. The River Basin Management Plans include an economic analysis of the major activities that affect the state of the water in each river basin district. Economic analysis of water use is the basis for assessing the necessary investments and judging the cost-effectiveness of various measures. Economic analysis can, however, also be used to justify dilutions concerning protection goals. The WFD allows weaker protection for artificial and heavily modified waters. Nevertheless, the line between natural and modified waters is problematic. 22 Furthermore, the quality levels where less stringent goals should be applied cannot be deduced directly from science but require social negotiations. 23 Thus it seems, that economic analysis has the potential to function as a counter balance to the underlying ideology of minimisation of anthropogenic influence and the dominating role of ecological quality criteria in the WFD. 5.
The WFD, participation and knowledge production The implementation process of the WFD is only at its preliminary phase in Finland. However, it is possible to look at the principles and goals regarding participation set in the directive. Given the strong ecological approach of the WFD it is also interesting to assess, which kind of possibilities the directive and its implementation strategy create for participation as a means to integrate social and economic dimensions into the planning. Is there room for local knowledge and views or are the locals left as mere commentators and protectors of their particular interests? The Water Framework Directive follows the principles of Aarhus Convention seeing participation as a prerequisite for successful implementation. However, the WFD is quite short and general as regards to public involvement. It sets broad involvement of citizens, interested parties and NGOs as a general principle of implementation. Widening public participation is seen as a means to increase transparency of environmental policies and citizens’ compliance with it. The transparency
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___________________________________________________________ in the establishment of objectives, the imposition of measures, and the reporting of standards is seen to empower the citizens to influence the direction of environmental protection. However, the WFD does not require the involvement of citizens or stakeholders to decision making. It only requires, that the stakeholders have access to central planning documents and possibility to express their opinions. The authorities neither have any judicial obligation to take into account the views, which come up along the participatory process. Further, the WFD does not deal with the interactive planning or the institutional preconditions of the planning processes. This type of providing only minimum obligations for participatory procedures is typical in EU directives. Because use of waters, pollution problems and cultures vary greatly between member states, the directive naturally leaves significant part of the operationalization of protection goals and selection of policy measures for national and regional authorities. The common Implementation Strategy for the WFD (EC 2003) sets the general principles for participation, but the responsibility for selecting the means for public involvement is left for the member states. This is well grounded because the national and regional authorities know best the local conditions and are able to find the most functional solutions. Moreover, the procedural requirements have to fit also for those member states, which do not have traditions of participatory planning. In order to understand the nature and goals of participation in the global context it is fruitful to analyse how divergent dimensions of international water protection are integrated in the directive. From the 1990’s promotion of the principles of Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) has been the central goal of the major international conferences of water protection. The most influential of these have been the International Conference on Water and Environment (Dublin 1992), the Second World Water Forum (Hague, 2000) and the International Conference on Freshwater (Bonn, 2001). The EU member states have been the central actors in these international forums. The principles that IWRM highlights are integration of different sectors and their interests in water protection, women’s role in decision-making, decentralisation of water management, and, finally the participatory approach. In many respects the principles of the WFD differ essentially from the way stakeholder participation is understood in Integrated Water Resources Management. 24 The WFD does not set any guidelines for the promotion of decentralization in water management and it ignores the need to integrate different water related sectors. By drawing exclusively on biological information in its goal setting the WFD represents a
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___________________________________________________________ rationalistic and narrow view on the preconditions of water protection. While the background reasons given for the WFD emphasize people’s need for pure water, it ignores the wide range of roles that water plays in economic development and human activities in general. 25 The drafting process of the WFD has thus been detached from the social contexts of water use and participation is understood as a purely technical and procedural issue. There is an obvious inherent tension in the WFD between the quest for wide and active public participation and the required complicated knowledge base. When most of the knowledge the laymen are facing is natural scientific, technical and economic by nature, this implies the risk to exclude most actors from the planning and decision-making. 26 The topdown character of the decision process still strengthens this tension. In the water protection the realm of expertise has traditionally been closed and bound to technical expertise and particular monitoring techniques. Further, it is a complicated task to involve the public in the economic evaluations on the level of methodological details. However, there are still needs and opportunities for participation and interactive policymaking. The first step in the implementation of the WFD is establishing the River Basin Management Plans, which are tailormade planning instruments for each river basin. These plans leave certain degrees of freedom to define the specific goals and means of implementation for each river basin district. First, the overall goals of the WFD must be translated into concrete goals. The application of ecological standards requires that specific features of each water area be taken into account in the definition of protection goals. Ultimately the ecological information gets its exact content and meaning only in the local conditions. Second, there is a need to determine the weight that is given to economic evaluations in relation to other types of evaluations. Localizing environmental policy goals based merely on natural scientific concepts has repeatedly caused severe tensions and conflicts in Finland. 27 Although the WFD defines river basin districts as the appropriate spatial scale for economic analysis, specific local conditions may require exceptions to this guideline. 28 However, the WFD is weak in case of decentralization of responsibilities for management of waters. In Finland a new law sets the framework for the renewing of water management. This law is the central national means in the implementation of the WFD. It defines the division of tasks between regional environmental authorities and the new planning organs. However, it does not put any more emphasis on requirements of active participation compared with the WFD. The regional environment centres must organise the cooperation groups for the river basin districts. These groups are
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___________________________________________________________ responsible for collecting information on local conditions and introducing strategies for the management plans. The groups cover the various interests of water use; the first groups started their work in 2005. The regional environment centres still have the power and responsibility to present the final plans. Thus, officially the position of the cooperation groups is ambiguous. They are central actors in the planning but the authorities have no obligation to take into account their suggestions. According to Mäkinen the groups can be good forums for citizens to take actively part in the decision-making. There are a number of chances to define the contents and emphasis of plans at different phases of the drafting process. 29 Nevertheless, the power of them depends much on the on the level and timing of public involvement, the way the authorities define potential influence when protection goals and other goals clash and the definition of the realm of relevant knowledge. 6.
Discussion In the light of the literature dealing with the preconditions and obstacles of successful environmental policy the EU Water Framework Directive contains several problems and potential risks as a basis for policy strategies. First, it is based on presuppositions of the characteristics of ecosystems, which can be questioned by ecological knowledge. Second, it represents a view of a sharp dichotomy between human society and nature. The ideal state of nature is seen to be an untouched state, and all other states are seen as unwanted deviations caused my human action. Taking this kind of dichotomies as the starting point there is the risk that the WFD furthers the traditional interest oriented approach where environmental protection interests and socio-economic interests are set against each other and planning is understood as trading between them. The literature on the WFD gives a very controversial picture of the degrees of freedom left for the regional and local levels to define the protection goals. Naturally it is also a question of definition whether the local application of ecological standards is seen to include elements of goal setting or whether it is seen merely as implementation of goals set from above. There is a clear discrepancy in the directive and its implementation strategy between the strong emphasis put on broadening participation on a general level and the quite weak minimum requirements that the WFD sets for citizens’ influence. In Finland, the environmental authorities have this far mainly concentrated on informing the public. Further, due to a very narrow problem definition, which concentrates merely on the biological state of waters, the WFD does not deal with the
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___________________________________________________________ socio-cultural and economic dimensions of the water protection issue or the need to take them into account as preconditions of implementation. Different institutional settings applied in participatory policy processes approach uncertainties in different ways and their potential in conflict management varies. The central question in the implementation of the WFD is, how the new policy institutions are able to enhance communication, to cope with uncertainties of knowledge and to integrate different practices to produce knowledge.
Notes 1
The study is part of the research project “Redefining the concepts and the practices of environmental law and decision-making”. The project belongs to the Environment and Law Research Programme (Academy of Finland 2005-08) and is led by Dr. Olli Loukola (Univ. of Helsinki). 2 Timo Peuhkuri, Tiedon roolit ympäristökiistassa. Saaristomeren rehevöityminen ja kalankasvatus julkisen keskustelun ja päätöksenteon kohteena. Turku, Turun yliopisto, 2004. 3 European Commission (2000) Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and the Council of 23rd October 2000 establishing a framework for Community action in the field of water policy. Official Journal 22 December L 327/1. European Commission, Brussels. 4 European Commission (2001) Common Strategy on the Implementation of the Water Framework Directive, DG Environment, Strategic Document. European Commission, Brussels. 5 Geoffrey C. Bowker and Susan L. Star, Sorting Things Out. Classification and Its Consequences (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1999). 6 Brian Wynne, “May the Sheep Safely Graze? A Reflexive View of the Expert-lay Knowledge Divide.” In Risk, Environment and Modernity. Towards a New Ecology, ed. Scott Lash, Bronislaw Szerszynski and Brian Wynne (London: Sage, 1996), 44-83; Frank Fischer, Citizens, Experts, and the Environment. The Politics of Local Knowledge. (London: Duke, 2000). 7 Fikret Berkes, “Indigenous Knowledge and Resource Management Systems: A Native Canadian Case Study from James Bay. In Property
Rights in a Social and Ecological Context. Case Studies and Design Applications, ed. Susan Hanna and Mohan Munasinghe (Washington: The Beijer International Institute of Ecological Economics and The World Bank, 1995).
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Wynne; Alan Irwin, Citizen Science. A Study of People, Expertise and Sustainable Development. (London: Routledge, 1995); Howard Margolis, Dealing With Risk. (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996). 9 Silvio Funtowicz and Jerry Ravetz, “Science for the Post-normal Age.” Futures 25, no. 7, 1993: 739-755. 10 Luigi Pellizzoni, “Knowledge, Uncertainty and the Transformation of the Public Sphere.” European Journal of Social Theory 6, no. 3 (2003): 327-355; Frank Fischer, Citizens, Experts, and the Environment. The Politics of Local Knowledge. (London: Duke, 2000); Linda Soneryd, Environmental Conflicts and Deliberative Solutions. A Case Study of Public Participation in EIA in Sweden. (Örebro: Örebro University, 2002). 11 Wynne; Stephen Healy, “Power, Knowledge and Sustainability.” In Proceedings of the 2002 Berlin Conference on the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change Knowledge for the Sustainability Transition. The Challenge for Social Science, ed. Frank Bierman, Sabine Campe and Klaus Jacob (Amsterdam, Berlin and Oldenburg: Global Governance Project, 2004), 193-201. 12 E.g. John Dryzek, Deliberative Democracy and Beyond. Liberals, Critics, Contestations (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000). 13 Soneryd, 21 14 James G. March, Johan P. Olsen, Rediscovering Institutions. (New York: Free Press, 1989). 15 Soneryd, 21 16 Maria Lee, EU Environmental Law. Challenges, Change and DecisionMaking. (Oxford and Portland, Oregon: Hart Publishing, 2005), 152. 17 Ben Page and Maria Kaika, “The EU Water Framework Directive: Part 2. Policy Innovation and the Shifting Choreography of Governance.” European Environment 13 (2003): 328-343. 18 Page and Kaika, 328-343. 19 Ana Barreira and Giorgos Kallis, “The EU Water Framework Directive and Public Participation in Transboundary River Basin Management,” Chapter 7 in Environmental Information in European Transboundary Water Management, ed. JosTimmerman and Sindre Langaas, (London: IWA Publishing 2004, 92-107; Jens Newig, Claudia Pahl-Wostl and Katja Sigel, “The Role of Public Participation in Managing Uncertainty in the Implementation of the Water Framework Directive.” European Environment 15 (2005), 333-343. 20 William Howarth, “The Progression Towards Ecological Quality Standards.” Journal of Environmental Law 18, no. 1, (2005): 3-35. 21 Jesper H. Andersen, Daniel J. Conley and Soren Hedal, “Palaeoecology, Reference Conditions and Classification of Ecological Status: the EU
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___________________________________________________________ Water Framework Directive in Practice.” Marine Pollution Bulletin 49, no. 4, 2004), 283-290. 22 Erkki Hollo, ”Yhteisön vesipolitiikan puitedirektiivi ja Suomen oikeusjärjestys - osa II: vedet sääntelyn kohteena.” (Ympäristöjuridiikka 1/2002), 42-55. 23 Newig et al 24 Muhammad M. Rahaman, Olli Varis and Tommi Kajander, ”EU Water Framework Directive vs. Integrated Water Resources Management: The Seven Mismatches.” Water Resources Development 20, no. 4 (2004): 565575. 25 Rahaman et al 26 Richard Burroughs, “When Stakeholders Choose: Process, Knowledge, and Motivation in Water Quality Decisions.” Society & Natural Resources 12, no. 8 (1999): 797-809. 27 Matti Nieminen and Kimmo Saaristo, ”Suomalaisen luonnon lait.” Alue ja Ympäristö 27, (1998), 72-89; Annukka Oksanen, Paikallisuuden ja kansainvälisyyden kohtaaminen luonnonsuojelussa. Tapaustutkimuksena Natura 2000 -ympäristökonflikti Lounais-Suomessa. Turun yliopiston julkaisuja Sarja C osa 192. Turun Yliopisto, 2003; Timo Peuhkuri, “Knowledge and interpretation in environmental conflict. Fish-farming and eutrophication in the Archipelago Sea, SW Finland.” Landscape and Urban Planning 61, no. 2-4 (2002): 157-168. 28 Ast, J. A. van & Boot, S. P. Participation in European Water Policy. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth, 28, no. 12-13 (2003): 555-562. 29 Heikki Mäkinen, Vesienhoidon hallinta Suomessa. Vesipolitiikan puitedirektiivin toimeenpano vuorovaikutteisen suunnittelun näkökulmasta. (Helsinki: Helsingin yliopisto, 2005).
Bibliography Andersen, Jesper H., Daniel J. Conley and Soren Hedal. “Palaeoecology, Reference Conditions and Classification of Ecological Status: the EU Water Framework Directive in Practice.” Marine Pollution Bulletin 49, no. 4 (2004): 283-290. Ast, J. A. van and Boot, S. P. Participation in European Water Policy. Physics and Chemistry of the Earth 28, no. 12-13 (2003): 555-562. Barreira, Ana and Giorgos Kallis, “The EU Water Framework Directive and Public Participation in Transboundary River Basin Management.”
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___________________________________________________________ Chapter 7 in Environmental Information in European Transboundary Water Management, edited by Jos Timmerman and Sindre Langaas, 92107. London: IWA Publishing 2004, Berkes, Fikret. “Indigenous Knowledge and Resource Management Systems: A Native Canadian Case Study from James Bay.” In Property Rights in a Social and Ecological Context. Case Studies and Design Applications, edited by Susan Hanna and Mohan Munasinghe. Washington: The Beijer International Institute of Ecological Economics and The World Bank, 1995. Bowker, Geoffrey C. and Susan L. Star, Sorting Things Out. Classification and Its Consequences. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1999. Burroughs, Richard. “When Stakeholders Choose: Process, Knowledge, and Motivation in Water Quality Decisions.” Society & Natural Resources 12, no. 8 (1999): 797-809. Dryzek, John. Deliberative Democracy and Beyond. Liberals, Critics, Contestations. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000. European Commission. Directive 2000/60/EC of the European Parliament and the Council of 23rd October 2000 establishing a framework for Community action in the field of water policy. Official Journal 22 December L 327/1. European Commission, Brussels, 2000. Fischer, Frank. Citizens, Experts, and the Environment. The Politics of Local Knowledge. London: Duke, 2000. Funtowicz, Silvio and Jerry Ravetz. “Science for the Post-normal Age.” Futures 25, no. 7, 1993: 739-755. Healy, Stephen. “Power, Knowledge and Sustainability.” In Proceedings of the 2002 Berlin Conference on the Human Dimensions of Global Environmental Change Knowledge for the Sustainability Transition. The Challenge for Social Science, edited by Frank Bierman, Sabine Campe and Klaus Jacob, 193-201. Amsterdam, Berlin and Oldenburg: Global Governance Project, 2004. Hollo, Erkki. ”Yhteisön vesipolitiikan puitedirektiivi ja Suomen oikeusjärjestys - osa II: vedet sääntelyn kohteena.” Ympäristöjuridiikka 1/2002, 42-55. Howarth, William. “The Progression Towards Ecological Quality Standards.” Journal of Environmental Law 18, no. 1, (2005): 3-35. Irwin, Alan. Citizen Science. A Study of People, Expertise and Sustainable Development. London: Routledge, 1995. Lee, Maria. EU Environmental Law. Challenges, Change and DecisionMaking. Oxford and Portland, Oregon: Hart Publishing, 2005. March, James G. and Johan P. Olsen, Rediscovering Institutions. New York: Free Press, 1989.
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___________________________________________________________ Margolis, Howard. Dealing With Risk. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1996. Mäkinen, Heikki. Vesienhoidon hallinta Suomessa. Vesipolitiikan puitedirektiivin toimeenpano vuorovaikutteisen suunnittelun näkökulmasta. Helsinki: Helsingin yliopisto, 2005. Newig, Jens, Claudia Pahl-Wostl and Katja Sigel. “The Role of Public Participation in Managing Uncertainty in the Implementation of the Water Framework Directive.” European Environment 15 (2005), 333-343. Nieminen, Matti and Kimmo Saaristo. ”Suomalaisen luonnon lait.” Alue ja Ympäristö 27, (1998), 72-89 Oksanen, Annukka. Paikallisuuden ja kansainvälisyyden kohtaaminen luonnonsuojelussa. Tapaustutkimuksena Natura 2000 -ympäristökonflikti Lounais-Suomessa. Turun yliopiston julkaisuja Sarja C osa 192, Turun Yliopisto, 2003 Page, Ben and Maria Kaika. “The EU Water Framework Directive: Part 2. Policy Innovation and the Shifting Choreography of Governance.” European Environment 13 (2003): 328-343. Pellizzoni, Luigi. “Knowledge, uncertainty and the transformation of the public sphere.” European Journal of Social Theory 6, no. 3 (2003): 327355. Peuhkuri, Timo. “Knowledge and interpretation in environmental conflict. Fish-farming and eutrophication in the Archipelago Sea, SW Finland.” Landscape and Urban Planning 61, no. 2-4 (2002): 157-168. Rahaman, Muhammad M., Olli Varis and Tommi Kajander. ”EU Water Framework Directive vs. Integrated Water Resources Management: The Seven Mismatches.” Water Resources Development 20, no. 4 (2004): 565575. Soneryd, Linda. Environmental Conflicts and Deliberative Solutions. A Case Study of Public Participation in EIA in Sweden. Örebro: Örebro University, 2002. Wynne, Brian. “May the Sheep Safely Graze? A Reflexive View of the Expert-lay Knowledge Divide.” In Risk, Environment and Modernity. Towards a New Ecology, edited by Scott Lash, Bronislaw Szerszynski and Brian Wynne, 44-83. London: Sage, 1996.
Environmental Justice and Hazardous Waste Controversies in Taiwan Mei-Fang Fan Abstract This paper examines environmental justice in the context of sitng disputes over industry waste and incinerator ash in a Hakka town (a unique ethnic group of Han Chinese) in Hsinchu County, Taiwan. Discourses on environmental justice are not limited to the distribution dimension. However, there has been less written on the specific issues of recognition, the explicit connection between distributive dimension, participatory justice, recognition of difference and the particular concerns of nature. It is important to broaden the depth of current understandings of environmental justice issues and their complexity by exploring how they are regarded differently in a local context. The research is based on documentary analysis and in-depth interviews, supplemented by focus groups and numerous inform conversations. The analysis presents citizen activism in safeguarding their homeland and local reasoning. It highlights citizens’ demand for recognition of local contextual knowledge of ordinary citizens and more participation in decision-making, and the stakeholders’ perspectives on environmental justice. Observations of the politics of the siting disputes between local residents, industry and government are made. Key Words: environmental justice, hazardous waste management, environmental risk, local knowledge, public participation 1.
Introduction On 19 August 2004, hundreds of residents from Hengsan, a Hakka town of Hsinchu in Taiwan, protested against the project of siting the facility that contains industry waste and incinerator ash in their hometown. Among the Hakka activists were several spirit-mediums, who performed their rituals and appealed so that the Yimin, the spirits of Hakka warriors who sacrificed their lives during the wars against the local bandits in the days of the Qing Dynasty will guard over the town. This paper will use the disputes about hazardous waste facility siting to explore the meaning of environmental justice in a specific local context. It will pose and answer questions such as: What are the local residents fighting for? How do members of local community perceive the potential risks and understand the conceptions of environmental justice? What relevance might this case have for environmental justice in Taiwan? The environmental justice movement emerged in the American context as a combination of environmental activism and civil rights advocacy, which links environment, race, class, gender, and social justice
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_________________________________________________ concerns in an explicit framework. 1 Claims for justice made by environmental justice activists includes the equitable distribution of environmental goods and bads, as well as issues of recognition of difference, diversity of languages used in environmental conflicts, procedural equity, democratic participation, and the interconnected relationship between human and nature. Environmental justice has been developed into an area of academic research, and is also starting to be addressed by researchers in many countries around the world, such as Britain, Australia and Taiwan. 2 Discourses on environmental justice are not limited to the distribution dimension, but there has been less written on the specific issues of recognition, the explicit connection between distributive dimension, participatory justice, recognition of difference. 3 Zerner argues that a vision of environmental justice needs to “examine critically the cultural dimensions of competing visions and struggles over citizenship, rights, and cultural identity in concrete situations.” 4 Hence, it is important to broaden the depth of current understandings of environmental justice issues and their complexity by exploring how they are regarded differently in a local context. This paper aims to seek a greater understanding of environmental justice implications of hazardous waste in Taiwan. The research is based on documentary analysis and in-depth interviews, supplemented by focus group discussions conducted among the residents of Hengsan town in January 2006. The interviews were conducted among local residents of different generations, local government officers, environmental regulators, activists, and others. One focus group was composed of local activists. After sketching the context of siting disputes over industry waste and incinerator ash in Hengsan town, it was followed with a discussion on how local residents perceive the potential risks of the facility and citizen action. Then a discussion on local politics and ordinary citizens’ demand for the recognition of local contextual knowledge is presented. Next, this paper provides the stakeholders’ perspectives on environmental justice and the citizens’ demand for more participation in the decision-making. The paper concludes with implications for environmental justice discourses and risk management. 2.
Background of the study Hsinchu County lies in the northwest of Taiwan. Hengshan town in Hsinchu occupies 71,926 square kilometers, has 11 villages, and a population of around 15,000. Most residents are Hakka, while there are small numbers of indigenous people. The ancestors of Hakka emigrated from Guangdong province, which contribute to about 15% of the
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___________________________________________________________ population in Taiwan. In the 18th and 19th century, there were numerous armed conflicts between the Hakka and Holos people for economic and political reasons. As the latecomer in places initially occupied by the locals, Hakkas usually had to struggle and survive on the less desirable lands. Hakka people are well-known for their perseverance even in the most adverse environments, and are also known to be very adamant in defending their cultural heritage and in keeping their traditions. The population is dominated by the older generation as most of the young people tend to seek greater material rewards available in the big city. Hengsan is rich in limestone and lumber. The plants of Asia Cement Corporation and Taiwan Cement Corporation had played an important role in local development. During the martial law period (1949~1987), residents near the plants suffered mostly in silence from dust and air pollution. Considering the job opportunities offered by the corporations and their employees’ livelihood, local residents did not oppose the operation of the plants. When martial law ended in 1987 and Taiwan transformed into a democratic form of government, the local residents started to air their complaints against the air pollution brought about by the corporations. Those who live near the plants complained that the roofs of their houses, crops, and plants were all covered by the dust from the cement plants. To remedy this, both corporations installed pollution-control equipment to minimize air pollution. A tourism farm has become a new industry of the county in the recent years. The local residents have exerted efforts in Hakka culture preservation and promotion, and hope that the operation of firefly culture by the communities can help strengthen its tourism resources. Considering that incinerator ash continues to pile up at incinerator sites across Taiwan, the ministry-level Environmental Protection Administration has introduced the BOO (Build-Operate-Own) program in 2001. This plan encourages local government and the private sector to cooperate in matters of hazardous waste disposal while the Environmental Protection Administration will provide grants to the private company that is successful in bidding for the development of waste disposal facility. Hsinchu County Government perceives the BOO scheme as a way to deal with the ashes from incinerator sites in the county and invite bids without consulting local residents. 3.
Local reasoning and citizen action in Hensang Hengsang has never been known in the past for its environmental activism. Most of the local residents did not know anything about the development project until it had passed the official environmental impact assessment (EIA) process in April 2003. The proposed site, which is about
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_________________________________________________ 25,000 hectares, is located at the land across the Yakan and Fusin villages. What concerns the residents the most is the potential negative impacts of hazardous waste facilities on their hometown. In the beginning, residents did not know exactly what incinerator ash meant and what impacts the facilities will have on their community. Several residents heard the news that people in a small town of Taipei County strongly protested against the project of siting hazardous waste in their town and claimed that it contains ‘toxic’ ash. They realized that incinerator ash may contain dioxin which is dangerous to human health. Local residents worry that the facilities will cause air and water pollution, specifically rancid smells, noise, dust, and so on. They are concerned that typhoons, landslides, and earthquakes might damage the facilities and could cause a leak and affect underwater. This will result in the water becoming undrinkable. For those who make a living out of farming, it will be an ecological disaster once the accident happens and the land becomes polluted. Local activists cited several environmental pollution episodes in the past as examples to express their doubt about the development of the project. There were mentions of other incidents which involved polluted fish farms that led to cancer. One local activist said: “We do not want to be the next (victims).” Another echoed, “Take the newly built chemical factory in the neighborhood for example; it seems to burn plastics and we can smell it everyday. …I do not think the government could do the monitoring well.” The Self-help Association was set up on 6 June 2003. Local activists sent leaflets and appealed to local residents and those who live in the nearby villages to join the meetings and activities organized by the Self-help Association. The leaflet states: “No toxic ash facilities on watershed, pure hometown only,” “The EIA review is illegal,” and “Guarding our homeland, everyone with one heart.” Moreover, the self-help Association organized a petition and a campaign of objection letters to express their sentiments. Letters of objection were written to the head of the county. Also, they appealed to the Environmental Protection Administration, and asked the Ministry of Interior to reject the plan submitted by the Hsien County Government because of the defects in the EIA process. 4.
Local politics and the demand for recognition The site selection process, which was dominated by the local government, was not transparent, and it rendered privileged access only for technocrats without consulting the public. In July 2003, the local
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___________________________________________________________ government recognized the Weimon Corporation as ‘top priority applicant’ among those who made a bid for the development of the project. In September, the local government signed a contract with Weimon Corporation. Local activists expressed their impression that the government may have conspired with the private company and the former head of Fusin village may have taken a bribe and acted as a broker. The demand for recognition of differences and identities are crucial components of the environmental justice movement. For Taylor, the need to “respect the cultures of all people, honoring cultural diversity, and appreciating a variety of belief systems that relate to the natural world.” 5 According to Schlosberg, misrecognition is experienced at both the individual and community level. For environmental justice activists, disrespect on the personal level is an everyday experience in terms of the demeaning body language. On the other hand, it involves a matter of cultural survival when activists see their identities and communities are devalued and recognition is denied. 6 The siting disputes made people reflective of their situation and involve the problem of recognition: F1 M1 F2
Why choose Hengsan town? Is it because it has a small population? Or is it because it is easy to get a site here? It is because we are considered worthless. And we do not have someone who is powerful.
Local activism reflects the demand for recognition of local knowledge. Current discussions on environmental controversies tend to affirm the ‘public ignorance’ or ‘public irrationality’ model, which assumes that greater scientific understanding among the lay public will bring greater public acceptance and support. 7 The diversity of understanding and lay knowledge within a local community are under-presented. Researchers have argued that various forms of citizen expertise that challenge scientific institutions are essential in addressing matters of environmental threat and sustainability. 8 In Taiwan, regulation and risk management are dominated by technocracy. Although the Environmental Impact Assessment Law had been approved in 1994 to regulate any development projects and to standardize the criteria, the lay public does not have much opportunity to participate in the process. The law was revised to include that the developmental organization hold a public meeting and consult the public before submitting the EIA report to local environmental agency. It also imposes that the development organization must hold a public meeting when its development project has passed the EIA process, and then the environmental agency needs to
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_________________________________________________ declare the project. But local environmental activists criticized the system and said that they were not aware of the project until the project has passed the EIA process. Likewise, the EIA report commissioned by the private development company faced criticism. The ecological survey was carried out by one scholar in mid-December 2002 and mid-January 2003. According to the EIA report, there was no fish in the river along the proposed site and no rare or endangered specie there. Although there are various kinds of birds, mammals, amphibians, insects near the proposed site, the expert who did the EIA report claimed that the project will not bring any significant negative impact on the fauna. On the other hand, local activists claim that there are many defective or untrue data in the EIA report, which makes them doubtful of the motive of its writers. They argued that there are rich creatures and plants in the nearby areas, but those were not mentioned in the EIA report. For them, the report was biased because the data were collected only during the winter and dry seasons, which are when the animals hibernate. They are also concerned that the rainy season (spring and summer) and typhoons might bring heavy rain and landslides which may cause a leak and affect underwater, soil, and land. The value of local knowledge and experiences has not been recognized. As one activist said, “The government tends to think that the experts are always right… The report was done hastily, which failed to consider the welfare of the local creatures and plants.” hazardous waste facilities site to evaluate the essential potential impact. Local activists argued that the role of Environmental Impact Assessment Review Committee was like a rubber stamp rather than a critical inspector. 5.
The stakeholders’ perspectives of environmental justice The regulators, developers, and local activists look at the siting disputes in different ways, which manifest different ideas of environmental justice. The officials of the Environmental Protection Administration provided criticisms of NIMBYism in siting hazardous facility. For a few government officials, local activists in Hengsan are just like other protestors who protest against landfill, chemical factory and so on. No one wants it to be in their backyard. The regulators tend to hold the utilitarian view and that it will bring the greatest good if the siting policy can be implemented effectively. For the regulators, the local residents did not quite understand that the siting facility is necessary for incinerators and industry waste management. They tend to think that compensation, negotiation, and authority in enforcement would be the solution to facility siting disputes. Also, the local officials tend to see those activists who
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___________________________________________________________ protest against the waste facility as irrational. The officials emphasize that the siting process follows the relevant regulations and that the precautionary measures to be undertaken are flawless, i.e., the monitoring mechanism will work. For the local government, local activists always have things to complain about, such as discarded soil from construction work and factories. The development company seems to think that they are qualified to address the common waste problem and the development scheme will be beneficial to the local community. The Weimon corporation handed out leaflets about the project and tried to communicate with local residents. First, it provided positive information about the company. For example, it claims that it has the ISO 9001 certificate and is recognized as an outstanding company. It also points out that the company has done a lot for the local community and county by paying huge amounts of tax, providing job opportunities, and funding activities held in the community. Second, the Weimon corporation assures the construction and operation meet the safety standard, and that the facility will NOT cause any negative impacts on drinking water and the living environment. Weimon’s communication with the local residents about the risk of the project has been treated with skepticism by the activists. They expressed their doubt whether or not the Weimon corporation has the capability to deal with hazardous waste since it has no experience in doing that. Although the supervision rules have been set up, local activists do not trust that the government will enforce the regulations strictly and effectively. Recent accidents previously mentioned in other places deepen their worries. Those residents who oppose against siting waste facilities on their home tend to be stigmatized as promoting self-interest and irrational in Taiwan. Instead of regarding the NIMBY (not in my back yard) syndrome as irrational or selfish local opposition to pollution, Norton maintained that local values are present in the NIMBY syndrome and suggested that environmental ethicists can seek ways to inform NIMBYism and integrate it into regional concerns. 9 Local activists felt excluded from the decision-making process of waste facility siting. The decision-making process was not transparent, which makes residents doubtful that the government could be trying to conceal the negative impacts from local community. Their opposition to the siting of hazardous waste is motivated by a range of environmental concerns and values and reflects residents’ concern for genuine negative impacts on the community that were ignored by the experts and decision-makers. Instead of saying ‘taking it somewhere else,’ local activists have tried to promote an acceptable procedure and cooperative search for a broader range of more suitable
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_________________________________________________ sites. The environmental justice movement shows that the grassroots groups confronting contamination in their communities perceive themselves as unjustly exposed to environmental risks, and their experiences are transmitted to those in similar circumstances by an emerging network of national or international organizations. The First National People of Color Environmental Leadership Summit held in Washington, D. C. in 1991 was the prime event of the environmental justice movement, consisting of diverse groups with many issues who aim to devise a plan to transform the society. 10 Local activists have the assistance from other activists who face a similar waste facility siting problem in Sindian, Taipei County. The Sindian anti-facility Siting Alliance provides information on the siting facility and shares their experiences of how to make an appeal, hold meetings, and run campaign. Local activists found that the regulators have required more tough safety standard in Sindian development scheme and felt that the government did not pay much attention to the safety of their hometown. They are demanding for improved precautions of the waste disposal facilities. Local activists tend to feel that they benefit a lot from being involved in the campaign and local activities. They are not just concerned about the affairs in their village or town, but are willing to be engaged in wider concerns. 6.
Conclusion This case study manifests the demands for democratic participation and recognition of local contextualized knowledge of ordinary citizens. Local activists felt excluded in the decision-making process of siting waste facilities and regarded it as black box like waste dealing system that involves self-interests. Instead of the recognition of the local rationality and citizen interpretation of risks from the perspective of sociocultural experiences, government officials gave more value to the EIA report written by the experts. Local activists expressed their distrust in the government for the improper records of waste management. The government claims that incinerator ashes are non-toxic and that the siting facility will have no negative impacts on the environment and local community. Local activism has forced the government to suspend the scheme and engage in the policy of reusing incinerator ash. It also has brought local transformation. The siting disputes made the local residents active in guarding their hometown and encouraged them to provide criticism of the top-down decision-making process. It has made the local resident reflective of their situation, cultures, and the kind of the town that they
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___________________________________________________________ want to have. Local activists have transformed the Self-help Association into a formal environmental non-governmental organization named Environment and Culture Sustainability Promotion Association. Members of local activists are engaged with long-term broader concerns and express their willingness to cooperate with other communities which are in need of help. It shows the sign of hope in the emergence of coalitions of grassroots organizations in order to confront environmental injustices.
Notes 1
Taylor, D. ‘The Rise of the Environmental Justice Paradigm: Injustice Framing and the Social Construction of Environmental Discourses.’ American Behavioral Scientist, 43 (4), 2000, pp. 508-80. 2 Middleton, J. ‘Health, Environmental and Social Justice.’ Local Environment, 8 (2), 2003, pp. 155-65. Arcioni, E. and Mitchell, G. ‘Environmental Justice in Australia: When the RATS Become IRATE.’ Environmental Politics, 14 (3), 2005, pp. 363-379. Fan, M. F. ‘Environmental Justice and Nuclear Waste Conflicts in Taiwan.’ Environmental Politics, 15 (3), 2006, pp. 417-34. 3 Schlosberg, D. Environmental Justice and the New Pluralism: The Challenge of Difference for Environmentalism. Oxford: Oxford University, 1999. Schlosberg, D. ‘The Justice of Environmental Justice: Reconciling Equity, Recognition, and Participation in a Political Movement.’ In Moral and Political Reasoning in Environmental Practice, edited by A. Light and A de-Shalit. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT, 2003. Schlosberg, D. ‘Reconceiving Environmental Justice: Global Movements And Political Theories.’ Environmental Politics, 13 (3), 2004: 517-40. 4 Zerner, C. (ed.) People, Plants, and Justice: The Politics of Nature Conservation. New York: Columbia University, 2000. 5 Taylor, D. ‘The Rise of the Environmental Justice Paradigm: Injustice Framing and the Social Construction of Environmental Discourses.’ American Behavioral Scientist, 43 (4), 2000, p. 542. 6 Schlosberg, D. ‘The Justice of Environmental Justice: Reconciling Equity, Recognition, and Participation in a Political Movement.’ In Moral and Political Reasoning in Environmental Practice, edited by A. Light and A de-Shalit. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT, 2003, pp. 89-92. 7 Irwin, A. Citizen Science. London: Routledge, 1995. 8 Ibid. Wynne, B. ‘Misunderstood misunderstandings: social identities and public uptake of science.’ In Misunderstanding Science? The public reconstruction of science and technology, edited by A. Irwin and B.
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_________________________________________________ Wynne. Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1996. Norton, B. ‘Applied Philosophy versus Practical Philosophy: Toward an Environmental Policy Integrated According to Scale.’ In Environmental Philosophy and Environmental Activism, edited by D. Marietta Jr. and L. Embree. London: Rowman & Littlefield, 1995, p. 142. 10 Hofrichter, R. (ed.) Toxic Struggles: The Theory and Practice of Environmental Justice. Philadelphia: New Society, 1993.
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Bibliography Arcioni, E. and Mitchell, G. ‘Environmental Justice in Australia: When the RATS Become IRATE.’ Environmental Politics, 14 (3), 2005, pp. 363-379. Fan, M. F. ‘Environmental Justice and Nuclear Waste Conflicts in Taiwan.’ Environmental Politics, 15 (3), 2006, pp. 417-34. Figueroa, R. and Mills, C. Environmental Justice. In A Companion to Environmental Philosophy, edited by D. Jamieson. Oxford: Blackwell, 2001. Hofrichter, R. (ed.) Toxic Struggles: The Theory and Practice of Environmental Justice. Philadelphia: New Society, 1993. Irwin, A. Citizen Science. London: Routledge, 1995. Middleton, J. ‘Health, Environmental and Social Justice.’ Local Environment, 8 (2), 2003, pp. 155-65. Norton, B. ‘Applied Philosophy versus Practical Philosophy: Toward an Environmental Policy Integrated According to Scale.’ In Environmental Philosophy and Environmental Activism, edited by D. Marietta Jr. and L. Embree. London: Rowman & Littlefield, 1995. Schlosberg, D. Environmental Justice and the New Pluralism: The Challenge of Difference for Environmentalism. Oxford: Oxford University, 1999. ― ― ― ‘The Justice of Environmental Justice: Reconciling Equity, Recognition, and Participation in a Political Movement.’ In Moral and Political Reasoning in Environmental Practice, edited by A. Light and A de-Shalit. Cambridge, Mass.: MIT, 2003. ― ― ― ‘Reconceiving Environmental Justice: Global Movements And Political Theories.’ Environmental Politics, 13 (3), 2004, pp. 517-40.
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___________________________________________________________ Taylor, D. ‘The Rise of the Environmental Justice Paradigm: Injustice Framing and the Social Construction of Environmental Discourses.’ American Behavioral Scientist, 43 (4), 2000, pp. 508-80. Wynne, B. ‘Misunderstood misunderstandings: social identities and public uptake of science.’ In Misunderstanding Science? The public reconstruction of science and technology, edited by A. Irwin and B. Wynne. Cambridge: Cambridge University, 1996. Zerner, C. (ed.) People, Plants, and Justice: The Politics of Nature Conservation. New York: Columbia University, 2000.
Reflections on Decisionmaking Process in Transition Society: The Case of Oil Shale Mining in North-Eastern Estonia Maie Kiisel Abstract The early post-Soviet time of Estonia can be characterized by the lack of its inner reflexivity, i.e. civil society, public participation and communication, argumented and research-based decisions. Albeit Estonian public consciousness feeds the image of knowledge and information society, the planning traditions of Estonia have not remarkably changed after joining EU. The opinion of experts (NGOs, scientists), local people and international treaties is rarely taken into account during environmental decision-making process. This case study focuses on the case of oil shale mining in North-Eastern part of Estonia and explores different aspects of social and environmental justice. Article is based on focus-group interviews with people in defense of their local community and reflects their visions of justice, sustainability of the mining district and decisionmaking processes in Estonia. Key words: reflexivity, argumented decisionmaking, transition society, focus-group interviews, oil shale mining 1.
Introduction The aim of this case study is to discuss on the discourse of environmental and social sustainability in post-Soviet transition countries and explore the issues of justice of oil shale mining in North-Eastern Estonia. Estonian energy is historically based on local fossil natural resources – oil shale (brown cole like), the proportion of renewable resources in energetics is marginal (less than 1%) 1 . Oil shale is energetically very ineffective due to its low energetic value and outdated technologies – only 30% of oil shales energetic value is turned into electricity. Mining of oil shale is related to enormous environmental impact, the main consequences of it are the loss of groundwater, which flows to the mines and is pumped out to rivers, contamination of groundwater by heavy metals, degradation of biological diversity in the rivers, landslide and changing landscapes. Oil shale based energy causes also high CO2 emissions and huge amounts of combustion waste. Important impacts are also health problems of the miners and local inhabitants, damages of buildings caused by explosion waves and landslide, lack of alternative futures for local development.
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___________________________________________________________ More than 80% of oil shale is burnt for electricity; rest of it is used in chemical and oil industry. If the consumption level of oil shale and technical-economical conditions of energy plants will remain the same, the active supplies of oil shale will end up in 40 years. From the active supplies of oil shale fields already in use there will be enough resources for Estonian energy sector till 2020. For the national energy needs there is objectively no need for new mines in fifteen years 2 . According to these facts Estonia is in need of alternative energy sources soon. Both strip and deep-level oil shale mines are situated in the North-Estonian district, as well as oil shale dependant energy plants and chemical industry. Most influenced Estonian county by the oil shale mining is Ida-Virumaa, which is the second biggest county in Estonia (178311 inhabitants (13,3% of total), 3364 km2 (7,4%)). Ida-Virumaa is the most urbanized county in Estonia – 88% of the people live in the cities 3 . City inhabitants are mainly occupied in energy, chemical and wood industry, people in the country are occupied in small enterprises and family firms, agriculture. City and country inhabitants differ also by their nationality – city people have emigrated from Russia during the Soviet period (forced industrialization period), country districts are populated mostly by native Estonians. As many of the city inhabitants are miners, the contact with oil shale derives from their profession (health issues). At the same time district people are influenced by direct effects of neighboring mines (loss of water, landslide, vibration, dust and noise). According to the rise of prices at the global fuel market the ineffective production and export of oil shale oil has become more profitable. The interest of energy and chemical industry towards bringing into play new mining fields has been enormous. Consequences of mining are partly compensated to local authorities, so environmental taxes are turned into local wellbeing projects (new schools, public buildings). However, the mining companies do not cover the whole damage, including social consequences – people are leaving from districts to towns, as their farmland and forests are turned into mining fields. Still, not only the sustainability of the district is jeopardized, but also the energy politics of Estonia, as extra use and export of oil shale products will shorten running out of it. The presentation introduces the main results of focus-group interviews with local people of one Ida-Virumaa district - Maidla. From Maidla districts 332 km2 10% is mineland; there are 900 inhabitants, 94% of them Estonians. 60% of the budget of the local authority comes from environmental taxes (oil shale and water use) 4 . The recovery of the district from the post-Soviet structural-institutional change and recent investments in the district were turned upside down in 2005, as energy companies applied for opening several new mining fields in the territory of the Maidla district. First applications arrived to Ministry of Environment on
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___________________________________________________________ 23rd, 24th and 30th of December 2004, which was obviously perfect timing to avoid public discussion during the compulsory two-week publicizing period in the beginning of proceedings. The mining applications were sent to local authorities a week later, although the procedural law demands automatically two copies of applications – one for ministry, one for local authority. The procedures of mining applications in Ministry of Environment were started also on insufficient documentation. First months of 2005 brought to Ministry of Environment altogether 8 mining applications for Maidla district. The territories applied in mining applications covered two-thirds of the area of Maidla district. The timing of applications was aiming to profit from Estonian legislation, as the higher demands on environmental impact assessment took effect on 22nd of February 2005 (new law of EIA), although most of EU environmental legislation (i.e. stricter demands) was supposed to be in force already July 1 2004. The overview of previous and following procedures is subject to another presentation, but this short introduction to the issue shows that democratic decisionmaking in the issues of sustainable development is ignored by executive powers and industries. Local authorities and local people in Maidla have formed a confrontation against Ministry of Environment (which was brought to justice by local authorities) and mining industries. Three focus-group interviews (altogether 15 interviewees, men and women, age from 22 to 82) in Maidla in May 2006 discuss upon local people visions of the sustainability of the region and democratic decisionmaking process of Estonia. 2.
Perceived side-effects of mining Although mines make up only 10% of the territory of Maidla district, the problems related to mining were familiar even to the interviewees living relatively far from the influenced area. The presence of mines in the neighborhood has become a natural part of the lifeworld of local inhabitants. Mines constantly remind of themselves as black artificial oil shale ash mountains reach high at the horizon (150 m above sea-level). Man in twenties: I’m used to it since childhood… well, it was not actually talked about, at the times we grew up. Now we know they made bad things to our environment. Maybe it was due to the [Soviet] time that people did not talk or they did not want to or were afraid to talk or they just accepted the fact, that this is the way it has to be. All interviewees could spontaneously describe different sideeffects of the mines. The most common effect has always been vibration. Explosion waves make dishes jingle, sometimes windows break to pieces,
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___________________________________________________________ building constructions crack. One of the interviewees compared local explosion waves to a six or seven degree earthquake. Loss of groundwater was considered the most serious problem. Simple 6-7 meter deep draw-wells turned into empty wells just in the beginning of mining activity (1960ies). Empty wells were replaced by 2035 meter artesian wells; those were soon replaced by 40-70, later even by 180 meter artesian wells, as the quality of the groundwater was falling quickly. One of the respondents had three different wells in her courtyard, but even in the deepest well water is contaminated by oil. Although water systems are changed every decade most of the inhabitants use local wellwater only for hand washing, they drink bottled water (Estonian country people are used to drink water of their own wells). Water for laundry is brought with cans from long distance, collecting of rainwater is also common. Changes of water regime have also affected arable land, as some parts of it suffer from flooding, some of lack of water. Pollution of local river Purtse is strongly tied to local identity issues, as people still remember the river as the richest one for its fishery (salmon, crawfish). Now the filthy and oily stream is no source for local self-pride. Although the biodiversity in the river has started to rise slowly, local people do not go fishing anymore. One of the interviewees had tasted local fish lately and claimed the taste to be unpleasant and specific. Local identity is tied to historic agricultural prosperity of the region; according to the memories of interviewees Maidla district was full of vitality until WWII, when Soviet regime deported many inhabitants to Siberia. As land was nationalized, many people left voluntarily to towns. As the population of Maidla district has decreased three times since, local inhabitants reflect on themselves as the last Mohikans. Man in fourties: “All the best have left. We are the poor and miserable, who have remained faithful to the district.“ Hopelessness of the future of local life has strengthened local identity among „stayers“. Still, interviewees avoid big investments in the area. Health problems were mentioned several times, but this issue found no consensus among the interviewees. Some of the respondents associated health problems (like allergies, cancer) strongly with mining and chemical industry; they also claimed that existing health inquiries have never been made public. Some of the respondents did not agree on a direct connection between health problems and mining issues, although they admitted, that the smell of air is unpleasant (contamination by the chemical industry in the neighborhood). 3.
Reflections on interests groups The interviewees were asked to describe different interests in decisionmaking processes in Maidla district.
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___________________________________________________________ Government and executive institutions. Interviewees found that the management of the dilemmas related to potential oil shale mines by the government has been one-sided, has decelerated public discussion and critical reflexion, and emanated from the logic of short-term economic profit of the mining companies. The interests of state apparatus in local district were reflected through the interests of Ministry of Environment and Economics, and ministers. The interests of Ministry of Environment and its minister were described as mining companies and money oriented, according to local people opinion they have not stood up for the people of Maidla district. For example the interviewees reminded of public statement of the minister of environment, which suggested people not comfortable with the new mines just move away from the district. The Ministry of the Environment was never reflected as a representative of environmental interests – the ministry was called as Ministry of Economics II or Ministry of Industry several times. The state apparatus was described as very corrupted institution. Interviewees seemed to be well informed about corruption schemes – they called several concrete names and institutions that are connected by mutual benefits – f.e shares, bribes. Man in fourties: I personally get along with a man named […] from the headquarters of the […] mining company. The man admitted that he has strong difficulties in dealing with the politics as he has to pay so much money to the politicians that he has no money left to buy new lands to expand the mine. The state institutions and politicians were described as the ephemeras or little boys who do not look into the future and want to exploit everything right now. Energy politics in general was reflected as a mashine without head – the decisionmakers are not able to come to agreements or certain perspective – should Estonia prefer oil shale, renewable resources, oil or nuclear power… European Union. EU was mentioned few times as a hope for local future, because the laws of EU are known stricter (f.e democratic decisionmaking and protected environment) than Estonian ones. So the interests of EU were reflected through positive narratives. Energy companies. According to interviewees opinion the mining and energy companies are only interested in money, and the only ones who benefit from mining are the owners of the companies. In respondents view companies jeopardize local unity, as they approach local landowners one by one trying to buy their property. Each landowner is treated (threatened) separately, offers depend on concrete negotiations. This kind of secrecy and private approach endangers local public front against the
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___________________________________________________________ mines – the more land the companies buy the easier it is to introduce new mines. As the representatives of energy companies have not appeared to the public meetings to discuss the possible futures of the district it is obvious that discussion, interests of local people and the future of the country district is not an issue for the companies. According to the respondents opinion mining companies see their social responsibility miners oriented, i.e russian speaking city inhabitants (pensions, social services). Local authorities. According to the interviews local authorities are strongly oriented to preserve life in the district, they inform local public and activate public, local media, carry through discursively complicated correspondence with Ministry of Environment and other target groups. They also strongly proscribe local inhabitants not to sell their property as this makes Maidla district more vulnerable to the mines (f.e local newspaper published the names of the people who sold their land). This kind of mental pressure is considered justified by the interviewees, but the issue of free will still remains. Local inhabitants. According to the interviewees opinion more than 90% of inhabitants would prohibit potential mines if they could. Still, the activism among local people is minimal; interviewees admitted that they haven‘t supported their authorities enough nor showed their gratefulness. Irrespective of strong opposition against the mines, the survival strategies of the interviewees were different. Some of the interviewees had intention to fight against the mines till the last minute, but some had also thought about leaving the district. Major influence on the strategies is the price and ownership of the land nearby, because the changes in the ownership of the land affect the survival of the area. The prizes of the land with oil shale beneath had grown rapidly. One interviewee, farmer, who had lost many rental farming land to mining companies, had even thought of buying the land from the same owners instead of mining companies (in the help of the bank loans). He thought that fighting alone against the mining companies will keep his coinhabitants away from temptation of selling their land to wrong party. But the turnout of the farming is so slow that he would have gone bankrupt soon. At the same time the prizes of the property fall rapidly, because nobody wants to buy a house in the area which is threatened by mining. This means that local people will not get enough money for their property to start over in some other place at the same quality. The interviewees understood and accepted the reasons the land sellers might have had, although the act of selling was condemned. There were different reasons named why people sold their property – sellers had no hope in local future, they had already left from the district, they were under pressure of the companies, they needed money to fix the damage
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___________________________________________________________ made [ironically!] by explosion waves or for personal needs (f.e for children’s needs). Sellers were mostly elderly and people who were not interested in staying in the district. One of the sellers who refused of the focus-group interview, told that the she was tired of constant threatening. As she put it (woman in sixties): In 1941 my father was imprisoned for the first time, our wealth was taken away. In 1945 my father was imprisoned for the second time, again everything we owned was taken away [father died a year later in Novaja Zemlja]. In 1949 we were deported to Siberia – mother and two kids, two bundles with personal belongings. In 1960ies [she came back from Siberia in the end of the fifties] our house was expropriated for the mines, so we got this place here. [She also mentioned the monetary reform in 1992, which lost peoples savings.] This way… you can not trust anybody. And when you hear that there is a threat again [the mining company claimed that in case she will not sell her land it will be expropriated by the state], that threat follows you all the time… That‘s why [I sold the property]… At least now I know that I have nothing to do with it anymore. 4.
Justice issues of oil shale mining Compensation to the local inhabitants. The first oil shale mines in Maidla district were established in 1960ies. People were told already in the beginning of the decade not to renovate their buildings anymore, as it will not be compensated. Local inhabitants were not asked about their opinion. The property of local people was expropriated (as land was already nationalized in 1940ies), only buildings and apple trees were compensated at fixed rate. People moved away, partly to the nowadays center of Maidla (threatened by present mining applications), partly to cities. In the beginning of 1990ies when privatization started, people got their historical properties back or it was compensated by the state. During the Soviet time as well as fifteen years of independence the negative effects of the mines have never been compensated to the individuals. New windows and wells, renovation of buildings, cleaning up for the contamination have always been their extra individual expenses. The compensation of constant insecurity has also never been an issue. Man in fourties: „Everybody is stressed out here, you can not do anything, nobody will establish home here anymore – we are like waiting for the deportation.“
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___________________________________________________________ Future of the region. Although the life has gone better during previous years, already many people have left Maidla district as there are no jobs for them. Interviewees argued that a state without agriculture and farmers, without small and medium farms is not a state, state where there are no people in the country, is a dead state. Man in twenties: When we talk about advancement of this district and what we should do about it, then according to my opinion the biggest problem is that there are no jobs here. We have said in our development plan that we will have a clean and peculiar natural environment which should invite people move here – but we can not tell them work somewhere else. This doesn’t work in reality. There must be enterprises here, there must be jobs. I can not imagine we can bring here any other enterprises than energy, oil shale or oil industry, there will be no small or medium size enterprises. What would you do among these mountains? Interviewees also raised questions about the sustainability of the income of the district – as big part of it comes from the taxes of environmental resources, Maidla district gets no financial support from the state as the other districts do. According to one interviewee Maidla district acts like a kidney donor to get its profits – but how many kidneys can you sell? Environmental taxes are used for major public wellbeing projects such as renovation of schools, buildings, water systems. But respondents argued that there will soon be no people, who can benefit from those projects. The system of environmental taxes was also questioned as the taxes are paid only on the amount of water that is pumped into rivers, water polluted by the mines will remain without compensation. Natural resources and future generations. The idea of future regret of peoples present lifestyle and politics was reflected in all focusgroup interviews. The interviewees felt that it is unfair to run oil shale (which was formed by nature in millions of years) out in a century. Some respondents brought up the issue of fair price of natural resources, f.e they argued that water is for them soon more expensive than oil shale. In 40-50 years there will be no land, no water, no forest and future generations are have to pay high price for it. Respondents were aware of the efforts to restore nature on previous mining fields, f.e arable land, which are publicly communicated by the mining companies as positive examples of social responsibility. Still, the farmers told that the recultivated soil is practically dead, water regime is ruined and there is also constant threat of landslide, because recultivation projects have been carried through without
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___________________________________________________________ sufficient respect to land and knowledge of biological and geological processes. National interests. Interviewees asked about the sustainability of Estonian energy politics – from their viewpoint Estonia acts as some oil state which has enough oil to export (most of it is exported). They also wondered, what is the national benefit from oil production, as they could not remind of any. Man in fourties: They [owners of the industries] say, it is our national wealth, our gold. But as the price of oil started to go up, they started to sell oil shale oil. They put the money into their pockets like shahs in Iran, there is none of them among the people of course. Estonian Energy with millions of profit comes here to put some posts and wire for local farmers for electricity, and the price for it is so huge that people are on their knees. People are poor. It is the same system as in some oil state. The interviewees felt that other Estonians will care more for oil shale mining than of the interests of Ida-Virumaa people. The contacts with Estonians in other counties were described as cold and distant. The respondents blamed the overall unpleasant image of Ida-Viru county for it, as different media are used to represent this area through mining and chemical industry issues, Russians, black combustion waste mountains etc, which is part of Estonian energy discourse nobody wants to acknowledge. There had been cases where people of Ida-Viru county were turned down by potential investors because of the image of the region. Woman in fourties: I came here from Tallinn, I knew nothing about these problems here. And as I had my secondary school reunion and I mentioned that I live in Ida-Viru county now, I was stared like a ghost. Since then I have never joined this reunion, because for them I live in the nest of Russians, they know practically nothing about IdaVirumaa. Cultural issues. Several times the majority-minority issues were brought up, relations of Estonians and Russians were reflected in unfriendly manner (by men). The reason for it is probably Estonian historical and cultural background, also lack of understanding and communication between two competing cultures. Low-skilled Russian workers were deported to Estonia in the 1960ies and 1970ies, in the period of russification and industrialization, they work in the mines and chemical
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___________________________________________________________ industry. The mines in Ida-Viru county are run by Russians, the working community of the mines has no relations or connections to local Estonians. If any of local Estonians would like to claim for his broken window, he has no access to the closed territory of the mine. As Russians have little contact to their Estonian neighbors in the countryside, i.e no motivation to study Estonian, they do not speak it (important sign of identity for local Estonians). According to interviewed Estonians they are mostly annoyed by Russian culture, which does not care about living and natural environment. F.e Estonian land owners (interviewees) whose property is in contact with mine area, spend a lot of time and money to collect the waste that Russian miners produce at their workplace. Respondents of Maidla saw themselves as the last stakeout of Estonian culture before Russia where people can actually hear Estonian. This is also a reason why the feeling of abandonness by other Estonians was reflected so many times. Rights of consumers and citizens. Interviewees expressed the difficulty of being citizens, because the right of consumers to choose is so notorious that nobody questions that right. At the same time the choices of the citizens have to be carefully motivated and scientifically argumented. Man in twenties: Take local people and environmental impact assessment process for example. These documents consist of all kind of technical data, scientific data. People who attend those publicising meetings are told about things they do not actually understand anything. So the system in Estonia is like double-faced, on the one hand everything must be motivated and argumented, you can’t do without it. On the other hand the demand for argumentation is just illustrative and ordinary people are not actually given any chance. This means essentially, that people who go to the public meetings must have the skills and arguments in respect of those scientific inquiries - what is wrong, misleading… and give their own facts. Everybody knows, that this is impossible. Where should ordinary people take the concurrent scientific facts out of?“ Respondents showed their mistrust argumentation, because the commas in the text important than the idea the document stands for. power can change the meaning of the paper or find Who pays orders the music.
towards scientific are nowadays more Those who have the the ways to ignore it.
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___________________________________________________________ Several examples of inquiries were described which were made according to the needs of mining companies, f.e local people could not prove that explosion waves had broken their windows. The vibrations of the explosion waves are measured during the days mines do not work, the contamination of the air is measured at the times wind is from opposite direction. Man in fourties: Well, I was there when they measured the strength of the explosion waves, the inquiry was made at my workplace, the detectors were placed in my office. The inquirerers were warned about the waves via radio transmitters… and when the wave came, it was so week that you couldn’t almost here anything. It was fixed, that there was something [a shot] but that’s it. But as soon as the inquiry was finished, big shots started again. So it is difficult to prove anything. As the commissions haven’t found anything, local people are often accused of lying. Interviewees described several situations were the negative outcomes of the mines were described as positive to the district. F.e when the forest of one landowner was fallen askew due to the landslide above the mines, the owner was told that he has nothing to complain as according to the official inquiry the productivity of the soil had even gone better. This argument from that single situational inquiry was repeated again and again in public communication to show how positive effect the mines have on the local community. As the right in decisionmaking process has never been given to local people and no mining application has ever been refused, the lack of rationality in decisionmaking processes where sustainability and justice issues are concerned was reflected again and again. Man in twenties: Local authorities stand for the justice. People here understand that law and justice are two different things and this appears especially in this kind of double-faced societies. They make the laws and prepare all kind of orders to fill the formal standards, but these have no essential content. They say they have the right, everything is based on law, on order. But this order is not based on justice, things are not balanced, not all of the interests are represented. 5.
Conclusion The analysis of focus-group interviews revealed several issues of justice and sustainability that deserve closer examination. The reflections
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___________________________________________________________ on decisionmaking process of mining politics reveal that post-Soviet time in Estonia can be characterized by the lack of its inner reflexivity. The power discourse of the transition society is hold up by import of Western lifestyle and illusion of the flawlessness of the economic rationality. It can be postulated that the joining of the technological-economic culture of EU was rationalized for Estonia mostly through translation (top-down strategy) not through inner reflexion, which has caused difficulties in reflecting down-top arguments on the level of state apparatus. Although different target groups wish to participate in decisionmaking process and broaden the scope of definitions of sustainability and justice, the strongly entrenched ideology of fast economic profit (peculiar to transition country) impedes the implementation of sustainability principle in the politics of economy.
Notes 1
Estonian Government. Development Plan of Estonian Economics of Electricity from 2005 to 2015, 2005, 3. 2 Estonian Government. Development Plan of Estonian Economics of Electricity from 2005 to 2015, 2005, 4. 3 Website of Ida-Viru county, http://www.idavirumaa.ee/content.php?section=topMenu/maakond/uldinfo&lang=est, (8 June 2006). 4 Enno Vinni, „Budget – purse of the district“, Maidla Sõnumitooja: Newspaper of Maidla District, January 2005, p. 1.
Part III
Whose Knowledge Counts Anyway? Understanding Environmental Issues
The Public Debate on Genetic Modification (GM): Varieties of Understanding Linda Hadfield Abstract The genetic modification of crops and foodstuffs (GM) is one of the most contentious issues of public science policy. In 2002, the UK Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) organised a public debate on GM, which included the creation of a website to which members of the public could post comments between August 2002 and May 2003. The research described in this paper entails analysis of the responses to this consultation, using qualitative social science techniques, aimed at identifying both the range of views which exist on the substantive issue of GM technology, and the ways in which they are understood by the participants. An earlier stage of the research found that differences of perspective may embody differing assumptions concerning degrees of belief, time, and the types of criteria on which truth claims may be made. The present paper extends the understanding of these dimensions by using them to classify and interrogate the contributions further. The research has implications for other issues characterised by controversy and polarisation of views; for the effectiveness of public policy on such issues; and for the relationship between science, the public and government. Key words: Public understanding of science; GM; environmental perceptions. 1
Introduction The last quarter of the twentieth century, and the early years of the twenty first, have witnessed widespread controversy over the impacts of technological development. In the Western developed nations, universal education and the mass communication media, including the Internet, have led to a wide (if sometimes rather shallow) awareness of the negative impacts of past technologies, and scepticism towards future developments. One of the most contentious new technologies which came to public attention in the 1990s is the genetic modification of crops and foodstuffs (GM). In September 2001 the Agriculture and Environment Biotechnology Commission published a report, “Crops on Trial”, which called for a major debate on the future use of GM, involving the lay public 1 .
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_______________________________________________________________ In response to this report, the Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) organised a public debate on GM, which began in November 2002 with a series of nine workshops, leading to a programme of public meetings and discussion from May to July 2003, and the creation of a website to which members of the public could post comments. The responses to the debate, which are in the public domain and available on the Internet, constitute a valuable resource containing a cross section of opinions 2 . The on-going research described in this paper uses transcripts of these responses to construct a database of issues, arguments and perceptions. The transcripts are analysed using qualitative social science techniques to identify both the range of views which exist on the substantive issue of GM technology, and also the ways in which those views are understood, justified and contested by the participants to the debate. 2
Public Understanding of Science Historically, the relationship between “Science” and “the Public” has been conceptualised as one in which knowledge is a commodity to be transferred between the two (the “deficit model”). In its most extreme forms, this may lead to a perception of the problem as “public ignorance” which must be addressed by education, or, at the other extreme, as a situation where “scientists” are dangerously unaware of the needs and priorities of “the public”, and must be held to account. This simplified approach is both a poor description of the true underlying relationships between science and the public, and unhelpful for the development of policy. In particular, it disregards two facts: that often dispute exists between experts; and that there may be legitimate reasons for lack of trust. The public’s perceptions cannot be dismissed in the development of policy, because they affect individual behaviour, whether or not they are “objectively” justified. A more nuanced understanding of the complexities of the public’s perceptions of scientific issues is therefore needed both to help improve communication and understand why policies may fail 3 . 3.
Discourse and Appreciation Issues of science policy are often portrayed by concerned individuals and groups as clear cut and self-evident, leading to polarisation and a tendency for those with strong views to vilify the holders of different perspectives. While opposing views are often sincerely held, the terms of debate become starkly polarised, the ‘story’ is often portrayed in simplistic and emotive ways, and an understanding of the true underlying complexity is lost.
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_______________________________________________________________ Discourse analysis has developed since the 1980s as a way of recognising, defining and understanding multiple perceptions of an issue. It is based on a ‘social constructionist’ approach, which understands the external world as being partly determined by our beliefs and perceptions. 4 Knowledge on a particular issue may be described by a number of different ‘discourses’, defined as the relatively coherent and consistent systems of knowledge and belief which exist externally to, and interact with, our individual personal knowledge systems. Multiple discourses may exist and compete for dominance within a broader terrain of meaning which can be referred to as ‘the order of discourse’. 5 The concepts of ‘discourse’ and ‘order of discourse’ describe relatively fixed, coherent and shared patterns or sets of beliefs, and the relationships between them. However, we also need an equivalent terminology to describe the ways in which these discourses affect individuals. The behaviour of individuals is a function of their beliefs, perceptions, needs and desires within constraints imposed by their environment. 6 Vickers defines the process by which individuals understand their context, set priorities, make choices and act on them as the process of ‘appreciation’, and the factors contributing to that process as an ‘appreciative system’. 7 Discourses and appreciative systems may be seen as complementary phenomena, which exist in a constant state of interaction with one another. The existence of multiple discourses within a given order of discourse contributes both to the appreciative systems and hence behaviour of individuals within a society, and also to the political and cultural processes within the society, and the construction of the social world itself. 4
Methodology The methodology of the research, which has been described in more detail elsewhere, entails the application of qualitative social science techniques, based on discourse analysis and grounded theory approaches, to the analysis of responses made by members of the public to the GM debate. 8 The responses cannot be considered as a ‘representative sample’ of public opinion, because the respondents constitute a self-selected sample, of individuals who are both familiar with the Internet, and also sufficiently concerned about the issue of GM to make such a contribution. On the other hand, they can be seen as ‘naturally occurring material’, free from the prior influences of question framing and survey design which may be imposed by the researcher in more conventional research contexts. 9
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_______________________________________________________________ The analysis of the transcripts is based on the principles of ‘open coding’ (an initial stage in which the data are scrutinised to identify as many potential meanings as possible) 10 and ‘constant comparison’ (the exploration of similarities and differences across the data) 11 . The method is iterative, and at each stage of analysis, comments are coded in terms of categories determined by the researcher. Content analysis is carried out to count the numbers of comments falling into these categories, and to identify the most frequently occurring. The categories are then reviewed in turn, by referring back to the original comments and the context in which they occur. This generates a new linked set of comments, which are once again coded and classified. In this way an overall picture of issues arising from the transcripts is gradually built up. A previous paper has described the early phases of the research, using a sample of 14 transcripts and focussing on the conflicting views generated around the issue of ‘Using GM to end world hunger’ 12 . Detailed analysis of the sample identified a set of dimensions for classifying statements in terms of: the basis of their claim to ‘truth’ (e.g., personal experience, externally verifiable evidence); degrees of belief, and the time at which they apply, i.e. whether they refer to historical events which have already occurred, present events, or forecasts about the future. The present paper describes a further stage, in which the analysis was extended to a larger sample of 25 transcripts. The focus has been shifted to a wider area of interest: the understanding of the potential impacts of GM. The usefulness of the previously identified dimensions has been challenged in consideration of this different sample. 5 Perceptions of impacts of GM All comments identified as relating to potential impacts of GM were re-visited and re-evaluated within the context of each response. These 284 comments were then re-classified according to content. Table 1 shows all categories which occurred in more than one response. The two most frequently occurring categories relating to ‘impacts’ were ‘Control’ and ‘Environment’. The remainder of this paper will focus on these two categories, analysing comments using the three dimensions of ‘degrees of belief’, ‘time’ and ‘basis of truth claim’.
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_______________________________________________________________ A Degrees of belief The first dimension, ‘degrees of belief’, refers to uncertainty, as indicated by the use of qualifiers such as ‘potential’, ‘possible’ and ‘likely’. These comments can be regarded as ‘judgments of credibility’, expressing varying degrees of belief, of which ‘certainty’ may be seen as a special case. 13 Most of the comments were straightforward assertions of belief, rather than assessments of possibilities, particularly in the area of “control”. The “control” category concerned both the physical control which can be exerted over GM crops, and issues of political, legislative and economic control. Comments relating to political and economic control were stated in terms of certainty, with little scope for variation in belief: My grounds for objecting to GM technology is… the fact that it is dominated by a few multinational companies (mainly US-owned) which will mean that the farmers will be caught in a vicious cycle, increasingly dependent on a small number of giant multinationals. Table 1 Frequencies of categories relating to ‘impacts’. Category Responses Comments Control 8 19 Environment 7 20 Uncertainty 7 9 Health 6 6 Food chain 5 8 Organic 5 6 Progress 5 8 Choice 5 6 World hunger 4 7 Economic 4 4 Agriculture 4 8 Long term 3 3 Trials 3 4 Need 3 3 Overproduction 3 3
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_______________________________________________________________ Category Consumers Industry Other uses Particularity
Responses
Comments 2 2 2 2
3 5 7 2
Uncertainty occurred where the focus was on the control of the physical crops themselves: “In marginal and wild situations, genes do not seem to get out easily”; “Animals are highly mobile and would provide possibly the most efficient means of dispersing GM materials.” (emphasis added). While most of the comments on ‘environmental impact’ were also asserted, some included degrees of belief: “…the Government did not give sufficient weight to the potential impacts of GMOs on biodiversity.” “Is there a risk of significant damage to the world ecosystem?” These comments suggest that respondents may be more sure of their ground with respect to political and institutional arrangements, and less so with respect to the physical world. This is a hypothesis which could be explored further. B Time Considering the sample comments in terms of the ‘time’ dimension showed a range of perceptions of past and present experience, and future projections. Many took the form of statements about past experience, which were then used to project future outcomes. Once out of the bottle, the genie will not be able to be caught when things wrong, as they will do, going by past human efforts of tinkering with the environment. Crops and their wild relatives have grown side by side for thousands of years, yet are still distinct, so clearly they don't contribute much to each other. These comments depend on an implicit assumption: that the past is a good predictor of the future. This is an understandable assumption, given that past experience is all we have to make sense of the world. Certain trends can be projected forward with a reasonable degree of certainty. However, the complexity of interactions may lead to emergent effects and unintended consequences.
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_______________________________________________________________ C Basis of truth claims The most frequently occurring type of “truth claim” in the sample is the straightforward assertion, or statement of personal belief. Other types of truth claim identified previously, i.e. “personal experience’, ‘external authority’ and ‘externally verifiable statement’ were also identified in this sample. In addition, the analysis of this extended sample also suggested ways of extending this classification, as shown in Table 2. “Syllogism”, “Analogy” and “Question” each embody a further assumption about causality. A syllogism is a logical argument consisting of two premises and a conclusion. The comment “GM technology… is dominated by a few multinational companies… which will mean that farmers will be increasingly dependent on a small number of giant multinationals” is more properly described as an enthymeme, “an informally-stated syllogism which omits either one of the premises or the conclusion” 14 . In the example, the implicit premise is that “Market dominance causes dependence among farmers”, and the reader is expected to take this as given. Both “analogy” and “question” can also be seen as enthymemes, the omitted premises being, respectively, that the analogy is valid, and that the grounds on which the question is asked are correct, e.g. in the example, that genes have in fact been discovered to be moving across crop boundaries. The use of such statements to justify truth claims may deflect attention from the premises on which the statements are made. Table 2: Types of criteria for justifying truth claims. Basis of Example truth claim Assertion “Neither the Government nor the GM industry has the ability to adequately control the release of GM products to the environment and their subsequent dispersal.” Statement of “I believe that genetically modified crops will adversely belief affect the delicate balance of nature in innumerable ways.” Personal “Since the trials started I have suffered from severe experience hayfever during the flowering of these crops.” Appeal to “Linda Hall… quoted a saving of 6,000 tons of herbicide external and 32 million litres of fossil fuel that would have been authority used for conventional spraying.” Verifiable “Studies of 'organic crops' and wild maize in South claim America now show contamination by GM.” Syllogism “GM technology … is dominated by a few multinational
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Analogy Question
companies … which will mean that the farmers will be … increasingly dependent on a small number of giant multinationals.” “We have seen … the consequences of meddling with nature's way of growing food. “What is being done about the discovery that genes are moving into the environment outside the crop boundaries?”
Such implicit premises may be used to justify different conclusions, as for example in the following pair of comments: “I want to retain for the future the ability to choose an entirely GM-free organic honey” and “Personally, I would like free choice. Please, Tesco’s, bring back my GM marshmallows and FlavrSavr tomato puree”. Both respondents are making the implicit assumption that “Consumer choice is good”, yet they use this same premise to justify diametrically opposed arguments. 6
Conclusions and further work This paper has described the further application of a qualitative methodology to responses to the online debate on GM. The application of the dimensions of ‘degrees of belief’, ‘time’ and ‘basis of truth claims’ has proven robust, and generated new insights when extended to a larger sample of responses. From the analysis, it has emerged that many of the comments embody implicit assumptions, including the specific assumption that the past is a good basis on which to predict the future. These assumptions may be used to justify contradictory conclusions. The data also suggests that greater uncertainty exists over physical relationships than institutional relationships, and this hypothesis can be tested in further analysis. The analysis suggests that, behind the surface comments and explanations put forward by participants in the GM debate, there lies a level of ‘second order’ explanation, which warrants further investigation.
Notes 1
Agriculture and Environment Biotechnology Commission, Crops on Trial: A Report by the AEBC, (http://www.aebc.gov.uk/aebc/pdf/crops.pdf, 2001). 2 http://www.gmnation.org.uk/ 3 Alan Irwin and Mike Michael, Science, Social Theory and Public Knowledge, (Open University Press, Maidenhead, 2003).
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Peter Berger and Thomas Luckman, The Social Construction of Reality: A Treatise in the Sociology of Knowledge, (Penguin, London, 1971). 5 Louise Phillips and Marianne W Jorgensen, Discourse Analysis as Theory and Method, (Sage Publications Ltd, London, 2002). 6 RAF Seaton, “Policy and Decision Relevant Science Research: Multidisciplinary and Integrative Approaches”, In Environmental Perception and Policy Making: Cultural and Natural Heritage and the Preservation of Degradation-Sensitive Environments in Southern Europe; 2nd Interim Report on EU DGXII Contract EV5V-CT94-0486, S.E. van der Leeuw (ed), (Université de Paris (Panthéon-Sorbonne), Paris, 1996). 7 Sir Geoffrey Vickers, The Art of Judgement, (Harper & Row, London 1965). 8 Linda Hadfield, 2005, “Modifying Perceptions: The UK Public Debate on Genetic Modification (GM)”, Interdisciplinary Environmental Review, Vol VII(1), June 2005, pp56-66 9 Phillips and Jorgensen. 10 Anselm Strauss and Juliet Corbin, Basics of Qualitative Research, (Sage Publications, London, 1990). 11 Christina Goulding, Grounded Theory: A Practical Guide for Management, Business and Market Researchers, (Sage Publications, London, 2002). 12 Hadfield 13 AJ Ayer, “Chance”, In Risk & Chance: Selected Readings, Jack Dowie and Paul Lefrere (eds), (Open University Press, Milton Keynes, England, 1980), pp33-51 14 Robert A Harris, A Handbook of Rhetorical Devices, (http://www.virtualsalt.com/rhetoric.htm, 2005).
Discursive Strategies in GM Policy: A Theoretical Assessment
Eszter Kollár - Attila Fonyó - Miklós Sükösd Abstract New multi-disciplinary policy themes, such as biotechnology, genetic engineering or food safety pose exemplary challenges for contemporary politics and political science. While these are traditionally perceived as technical matters requiring scientific expertise for public policy making, today’s publics, new political actors and movements, who have an increased sensibility to risk and endorse a rich plurality of values and interests, ask a say in such matters. Besides challenging the borderline between facts and norms, they question the exclusive legitimacy of existing political processes and outcomes. This complexity gives the floor for a large number of perspectives in interpreting the policy problem and its alternative solutions. In this paper we discuss the theoretical and methodological considerations for a discursive analysis of GM policy-making. We chose the theory and method of argumentative discourse analysis in order to anchor discourses in their social contexts, argumentative practices and power relations, which shape the different discourses present in GM policy debates. In the following paper we present six normative assumptions and ten agendas that are characteristically present in GM discourses, along with their corresponding rhetorical devices. The breakdown of GM discourses along the three dimensions will make their reconstruction and comparative analysis possible. The theoretical conclusions will serve as the foundation for our ongoing Italian-Hungarian comparative empirical research project. Key Words: argumentative discourse analysis, discourse, genetically modified food, GMO, methodology, policy, policy field, policy making 1. Introduction New multi-disciplinary policy themes, such as biotechnology, genetic engineering or food safety pose exemplary challenges for contemporary politics and political science. While these are traditionally perceived as technical matters requiring scientific expertise for public policy making, today’s publics, new political actors and movements, who have an increased sensibility to risk and endorse a rich plurality of values and interests, ask a say in such matters. Besides challenging the fact/value divide, they question the borderline between public (state) and private (market) as well as the exclusive legitimacy of existing political processes and outcomes. This complexity gives
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_______________________________________________________________ the floor for a large number of perspectives in interpreting the policy problem and its alternative solutions. In this paper we discuss the theoretical and methodological considerations for a discursive analysis of GM policy-making. We have developed a three-dimensional analytical tool in order to assess the different discourses present in the field of GM policy making. The conclusions provide the conceptual framework that we use in our ongoing Italian-Hungarian comparative empirical research project, which focuses on discourses in GM policy-making. The paper examines the following question: How can we break down and analyze discourses in a systematic empirical and comparative framework, given their complexity and diversity? We chose the theory and method of argumentative discourse analysis in order to anchor the socially constructed discourses in their social and institutional contexts, argumentative practices and power relations, which shape the different discourses present in GM policy debates. This attempt to analyze discourses systematically may have two practical outcomes. First, our analysis of discursive struggles over GM food and crops in Hungary and Italy can help to understand the formation of national policies and country positions on GM policy in the context of the European Union. Second, such discourses also directly shape transnational governance processes, so this exercise might help us clarify some of the controversies that characterize the conflicts and obstacles around GM policy making at the EU level. 2. Argumentative Discourse Analysis The changing context of politics in recent decades requires the reconsideration of political research, both in its theoretical foundations and practical tools. Under contemporary circumstances, characterized by increased complexity, radical uncertainty and plurality of meanings and understandings, discursive and deliberative approaches have become increasingly relevant. 1 As an epistemological starting point, these new approaches assume that facts can be found out there in the world, but we do not have direct access to them. We reach out to the world and attach meaning to the phenomena out there through discursive processes. In these meaning-giving processes, language is not a “neutral medium, which simply mirrors the facts, but by language-use we constantly create, express, and interpret meanings, we carry out social action, and reproduce power relations in society”. 2 Social meaning is “relationally constructed.” 3 Discourse analysis, both with its theoretical
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_______________________________________________________________ foundations and practical tools, has made its way to the realm of political science, and represents a novel way of approaching politics and policy making. According to one of the most prominent definitions, “discourse is a shared way of apprehending the world,” 4 more precisely, a discourse can be understood as “an ensemble of ideas, concepts, and categories through which meaning is given to phenomena.” 5 It is a pattern, which can be discovered through careful analysis of the discussion, written or spoken, taking place at an interpersonal or societal level. In discourse analysis, the narrative structure, framing, agendas and their linkages, the choice of specific words and metaphors, and the underlying value patterns become the subject matter of analysis. Argumentative discourse analysts go one step further, by attributing a significant role to a further factor: the social practices in which discourse is embedded. As Hajer put it, the challenge is to combine “analysis of the discursive production of reality with analysis of the social practices, from which social constructs emerge.” 6 Thus actors, their institutional positions, and their relative positions to other actors become important in the study of policy making. This way, advocates of the argumentative turn distinguish themselves from post-structuralist approaches which conceptualize discourses as ‘free-floating’ in the social and political space, and they also reject pure text analysis as a sufficient instrument for political research. They tie discourses to specific actors and institutions and emphasize that discursive positioning is always expressed in relation to other positions and their discursive strategies. Challenging the traditional conception of policy making, advocates of the argumentative turn argue that policy processes can no longer be mapped exclusively within classical political institutions. In addition to traditional political arenas (parliament, local/regional/national administrative levels, lobby groups, mass media etc.), new political spaces have emerged where new political practices are under way. Examples of the latter include policy regimes, transnational advocacy coalitions, and interactive policy platforms, such as deliberative forums and citizens’ juries. 7 Policy making takes place in a complex web of old and new political spaces, labelled with different terms, such as governance networks, 8 sub-politics, 9 or to use a term coined by Pierre Bourdieu 10 , the policy field. Instead of being constituted by fixed rules and membership, with clear authority and hierarchy patterns, they “are embedded in a normative and cognitive framework that empowers the actors, gives
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_______________________________________________________________ direction to their joint and separate actions, and defines the principles of inclusion and exclusion from the network.” 11 3. Research questions Our conception of the GM policy field is rooted in Pierre Bourdieu’s field conception, in which policy struggle and actors’ positioning takes place through the use of discourses. We argue that political institutions operate as a framework that determines the rules and norms of the policy field, i.e., the criteria of what constitutes a legitimate discourse. However, the borderlines of legitimacy are constantly contested by newcomers, including diverse social movements and civil society groups. They try to modify the criteria of what constitutes a legitimate claim through new thematic framing strategies and unexplored normative assumptions. Taking this dynamics seriously, we extend the analysis of the GM policy debate from the strict political institutional context to a wider social environment, including civil society groups and movements, the research and development sector, and the key actors of the private sector. We identify the GM discourses in a) the policy process (including public consultations and policy documents), b) documents of professional fora and public events, and c) our interviews with the relevant policy actors. Our major focus is on how different discourses and actors are involved in the formation of country positions that are represented in the European Union debates on GM policy. Our minor focus is on national (Hungarian and Italian) policy formation within the limits of effective EU policies. Our analysis of discursive strategies will help to answer the following questions: First, it will allow us to understand how discourses are tied to group strategies, institutional practices and policy outcomes in Hungary and Italy. According to our preliminary studies, expert as well as public dialogues in the two countries encompass very different discourses. Both countries occupy a strong anti-GM position in the EU, however these country positions originate in very different political cultures - in our terminology, these positions are the outcome of very different discursive struggles. In Hungary, anti-GM discourses have an expert edge and work with a predominantly environmental agenda. In Italy they focus on the risk aspect and work with a strong food safety and consumer rights agenda. However, in terms of policy outcomes,
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_______________________________________________________________ both countries represent similar anti-GM positions in the EU, and also show a strong overlap in national policy approaches. Second, we can assess which arguments are considered valid in a policy debate, which are the legitimate discourses in the policy field, and further, which of them succeed in being institutionalized. Why and how can some social discourses become legitimate policy discourses while others remain excluded? Which type of actor strategies and institutional mechanisms support the legitimization of a GM discourse? How does the institutional framework set the field for policy dialogue, and how do actors strategically position themselves through the use of discourse in order to be successful in determining the policy outcome? Third, we aim to understand how one actor may use different discourses, i.e., to explore the fact that some actors are 'multi-lingual' in their use of discourses. According to our hypothesis, various actors in the GM policy field use more than one discourse. In other words, such actors are able to strategically change their ‘language’ depending on the contexts, including the policy space in which they have to articulate their positions.Anti-GM NGOs, in their arguments warning the public against certain risks, often challenge the monopoly of scientific truth production, and the validity of scientific claims, by questioning their epistemological starting points and foundations. However, when participating in official policy consultations, the same NGO representatives might shift their discursive focus, bracketing the epistemological challenges and accepting the validity of scientific truth production processes, in order to challenge pro-GM positions on scientific grounds (while also using ethical and political arguments). 4. Analytical Dimensions for Assessing GM Policy Discourses How could one explore and compare GM discourses? In this paper, we identify three relevant levels that could be separated for the identification and systematic analysis of different discourses. On the basis of our preliminary interviews and media analyses, we argue that discourses may be explored and systematically analyzed by separating their cognitive frames, agendas and rhetorics. 1. Cognitive frames include systematic references to basic values, cognitive frameworks, epistemological beliefs that underlie discursive argumentation and the normative assumptions of policies.
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_______________________________________________________________ 2. Agendas include themes and problem definitions that are presented as the central GM themes, problems, and related policy areas. 3. Rhetorics involve diverse textual elements such as linguistic presentation, style, the use of jargon, metaphors, analogies, idioms and visual expressions. 4.1. Cognitive Frames: Epistemological Claims and Normative Assumptions At the heart of political argumentation there are basic beliefs and normative assumptions, which serve as elements of cognitive frameworks for making sense of the world. These underlying conceptions of science and knowledge, and of society and political organization, deeply influence “what is considered a legitimate political argument in political discourse, which rules of interpersonal political conduct are preferred over others, and … what kind of society we envision ourselves living in.” 12 Epistemological claims and beliefs are definitions of ‘what there exists’ and how we can come to know about it. There are wide and deep chasms in these epistemological foundations of our discourses. For example, a division is evident around the question of whether, according to the given discourse, the knowledge that can be obtained about GM and its effects is considered the monopoly of science (or, in an extreme situation, the monopoly of a single branch of science) or not; and similarly, whether the given discourse only considers laboratory experiments as legitimate methods for obtaining knowledge, or whether it accepts other procedures as well. (In Hungary, for example, we have encountered arguments claiming that only biotechnologists were entitled to offer their views about GM, and not even ecologists, i.e., scholars from another discipline of the natural sciences, were entitled to do so!) The question whether a given discourse is based on acknowledging or rejecting the view that knowledge is socially constructed is one of the cornerstones of the GM debate. Another important question in this epistemological debate is whether genetic modification should be considered a special technology or whether it should be seen as no different from other procedures used in plant breeding and livestock breeding. Finally, there is deep disagreement concerning the dimensions and indicators of the risks involved, and the assessment of these risks in the growing and consumption of GM crops and food. In the case of GM, and similarly in the case of all other technologies with inherent risks,
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_______________________________________________________________ perhaps the most important anti-GM argument is about demystifying science and toppling the monopolistic position it enjoys in making sense of the world. As Beck has put it, “what becomes clear in risk discussions are the fissures and gaps between scientific and social rationality in dealing with the hazardous potential of civilization.” 13 A very important cognitive frame is the definition of politics, i.e., whether one accepts or rejects the claim that the GM issue is a political issue. As Wales and Mythen have pointed out, one of the methods used for regulating the various discourses and limiting their number is the attribution of unquestionable powers to science and the negation of the political aspects of GM utilization. 14 The question is fundamentally that of the axioms whereby we can determine who should be entitled to decide about the utilization of scientific achievements: whether that decision should be in the hands of science, and the representatives of science; or the experts or the institutions of a policy; or politics in its widest sense, meaning “every party that can possibly be concerned”, as suggested by the deliberative conception. The normative assumptions are at the core of social and political choices and manifest themselves in all policy areas. These long-term goals and principles appear in international regulations, strategies, policy objectives and procedures. Such basic normative assumptions cannot be circumvented in the policy process, and they also provide a basis of reference within the policies themselves. We identify six dominant normative assumptions that are frequently made in GM policy discourses along the following three binary oppositions. 1. Expert rationality vs. 2. Pluralist participation 3. Innovation and progress vs. 4. Risk and precaution 5. Market efficiency vs. 6. Social and ecological sustainability Of course these categories are not clear-cut, as there are many intermediary situations and norms that can be reconstructed. Still, with each binary opposition, we may also find several real-life instances for both extremities and their fundamentalist interpretations. The paradigm of ecomodernization, for example, which proposes the reconciliation of economic thinking and sustainability, typically occupies an intermediary position, and its underlying approach is cited as a reference by both pro-GM and anti-GM arguments. 1. Expert rationality vs. 2. Pluralist participation
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_______________________________________________________________ Modern political systems have two basic complementary requirements, efficiency and legitimacy. They are both necessary elements of a ‘common good’ conception of political decisions in complex modern societies. On the one hand, evidence and information behind policy decisions are often highly complex, mediated, and inaccessible for ordinary citizens. Therefore, technical expertise is required to determine the cost-benefit ratio of a decision in light of the foreseeable consequences. 3. Innovation and progress vs. 4. Risk and precaution The second binary opposition represents another fact/value divide in policy making. Policy choices regulating the processes of genetic modification are made on a value-scale between innovation and precaution, and many GM discourses use these normative assumptions. Risk vs. innovation are the concepts central to these assumptions, through which “ethics … is resurrected inside the centres of modernization.” 15 The selection of relevant dimensions and indicators of risk itself is the outcome of discursive conflicts. 16 All regulatory processes of technological risk assessment of GM innovations, per se, express value judgements about the relevance of some risks as opposed to others. Value judgement does not only express the limitations of calculable effects, but it is already at work in the inherent procedures of ‘truth-making’, thus it expresses the limits of what counts as evidence for truth - or in the case of GMOs, evidence for safety. Consequently “values guide fact-finding, not simply vice versa.” 17 5. Market efficiency vs. 6. Social and ecological sustainability The final pair of basic normative assumptions refers to two master narratives of late modernity, the market vs. sustainability. In the form of abstract ideologies, both neo-liberal economics and political ecology have presented normative assumptions with hegemonistic claims that are often viewed as mutually exclusive. On the one hand, the values of market efficiency and competitiveness, economic productivity, free trade and investment are seen as unquestionable foundations of any public policy. Transnational organizations such as the WTO back the hegemonistic market norm using their institutional power. On the other hand, since the Bruntland Report, 18 socially and environmentally sustainable development has emerged as a challenging normative assumption. The concept has explored and linked diverse challenges such as population growth, massive poverty, human and energy resources, food security, ecosystems and species, in a unified perspective. International
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_______________________________________________________________ agreements and major UN documents including the Montreal and Kyoto Protocols, and the Agenda 21, have been based on the concept of environmentally sustainable development. Normative assumptions about the market and sustainability are not necessarily mutually exclusive, as attested by the concepts of ecological modernization and green capitalism. Market competitiveness and environmental sustainability are also jointly mentioned as key values in the Lisbon Strategy of the EU (2000). There exists a dynamic relationship between the two concepts with patterns of conflict and reconfiguration. 4.2. The Agendas On the second level of our analysis we identify the major agendas along which actors discuss GM policy. These agendas may represent specific policy sectors, scientific disciplines, or thematic niches frequented by social movements or their coalitions. Within the GM policy field, the greatest struggles for definition have been seen to develop around the emergence and acceptance of these agenda-based identifications. Even within certain topic identifications or sub-issues, a wide range of arguments and counterarguments can be reconstructed, and the clashes between such arguments also constitute a part of the struggles in the policy field. Topic identifications change with time. As Buttel 19 has pointed out, while GM had been represented primarily as a problem of global justice in the 1980s, it has definitely transformed into an environmental issue by the 1990s. We identify 10 dominant agendas that we believe cover the thematic vocabulary of actors involved in the GM policy debate: 1. environment, 2. food safety, 3. agriculture, 4. consumer rights, 5. ethics of scientific research, 6. information rights, 7. global justice, 8. economic growth and research and development, 9. democratic (self-)government, 10. theology. 1. The central environmental theme in the GM debate is genetic pollution, usually discussed by the environmental social movement, backed up by anti-GM research groups, vs. the biotech research industry. GM adversaries refer to the Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, by way of which they emphasize the relevance of pollution and the risks involved in the long-term consequences, such as the loss of biological and genetic diversity. 2. The most common concern regarding the negative effects of GM food and feed is that of food safety. Given the great amount of consumer interest, this is the most widely discussed GM topic in the public sphere,
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_______________________________________________________________ picked up frequently by the media. Adverse discourses are expressed predominantly by various health and consumer protection NGOs. They insist on a moratorium for the market release of GM foodstuffs until producers provide ‘full’ evidence that human health is not at risk. 3. The GM debate on agricultural grounds includes several subthemes: genetic pollution of indigenous crops, farmers’ dependency on giant corporations, crop yield and its sustainability over time, and pesticide use with regard to sustainable soil conditions. The current European regulatory debate focuses on the co-existence of biological, traditional and GM-based forms of agricultural production. 4. The consumer rights theme involves consumer NGOs and anti-GM production chains (COOP, TESCO, Barilla etc.) that have been able to react to their customers’ preferences. Their main concern is to protect the autonomous choices of consumers, and to provide them with all the information they need to make such choices, which they achieve through diverse labelling strategies. Pro-GM groups make ambivalent claims. Some argue that labelling is an implicit non-tariff barrier that jeopardizes their products’ optimal allocation on a free market, while others favour labelling, that leads to informed consumer choices. 5. The topic of the ethics of scientific research is raised both in antiGM and pro-GM groups. Adversaries raise their voice against the dependency of biotech research activities on the research funds provided by giant biotech firms, which leads to biased scientific results. They ask for increased government control over the processes through which evidence is produced. Conversely, biotech researchers cite their right to the freedom of research, which they say is violated by government regulations, such as GM research bans in Italy. Government bans on field and laboratory experiments have generated widespread dissent and led to the emergence of a whole movement for the protection of free research activities. 6. Information rights also constitute a major policy theme that is frequently used in GM policy discourses. Freedom of information (FOI, i.e. citizens’ access to information relevant for the public) vs. exclusiveness surfaces in terms of access to research results (data obtained by tests, laboratory and open field experiments, etc.) or information concerning research support. Anti-GM stakeholders often claim that genetic information of crops, animals and humans in general belong to the public domain and cannot be privatized by commercial corporations. Pro-GM actors, typically
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_______________________________________________________________ biotech companies, argue that their inventions and innovations deserve legal protection just like any other trademark. 7. The global justice agenda can be summarized as follows. Anti-GM groups question the justice of having intellectual property rights prevail over life forms, and claim that corporate patents increase the vulnerability of the poor, who rely on land and agriculture as their basic livelihood. They argue that the seed monopoly of Monsanto or Novartis deprives local farmers of their customs and their traditional survival strategies of saving the seeds and sharing them with neighbors freely, on a reciprocal basis. As a consequence local breeding processes can be discouraged by high prices if breeders have to pay royalties for the seeds, and this can result in a decrease of new adaptive crop varieties. 20 8. Economic growth and research and development is an agenda typically advanced by governments, scientific research institutes and pro-GM companies. They argue that GM research and development could present key industry opportunities that would serve economic growth and development at the national level, as well as scientific achievements in terms of academic excellence and scientific contributions to the nation’s economic development. 9. The democratic self-government agenda is concerned with the competences attributed to the different levels of governance in GM policy in the EU. The key point is whether a local/regional democratic decision rejecting the introduction of GM crops for agricultural use can overrule a national or EU level policy. Many European regions and local advocacy groups are struggling to be recognized as GM-free regions, challenging the Commission with arguments founded on an ideal notion of democratic selfgovernment. Elements of the nationalistic rhetoric sometimes appear in this agenda. 10. Theology: Several actors argue on religious grounds that genetic engineering involves key human attempts to modify the natural order of the world which is God’s creation. Some churches and religious groups suggest that messing with Creation should be considered taboo, and many of them occupy an anti-GM position. Other churches are more permissive, arguing that God has empowered humans to engage in the pursuit of scientific knowledge, and that GM crops could be used for good causes, e.g. resolving food crises in poverty-ridden regions.
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_______________________________________________________________ 4.3. Rhetorics On the third level of our analysis of GM discourses, we shift our focus to the rhetorical elements in the language use of GM actors, which elements, we argue, play an important role in determining their discursive positions in the policy field. Analogies, metaphors, idioms, elements of scientific and other jargons, popular expressions, the use of epithets and examples, as well as visual representations, all point to different ideological backgrounds, normative positions and ontological starting points. A simple example might be the systematic use of the terms ‘genetic modification’ vs. ‘genetic manipulation’ vs. ‘genetic tinkering’, as if they had a purely scientific and value-neutral connotation. One of the variables in the language of a discourse is its radically fundamentalist nature. But it is equally important how much the discourse ‘speaks the language of the people’, and, conversely, to what extent it is based on the ‘language of expertise’ which is so customary within the policy process. For example, the anti-GM arguments that appear before the public in Hungary and are identified as environmental themes are usually expressed in a language identified mostly with ‘scientific education’ activities, as opposed to the discourses that are characteristic mainly of Great Britain which appeal to people’s emotions, depict opponents as ‘enemies’, and use expressions like ‘Frankenstein crops. ’ 5. Conclusions In this paper, we have presented six normative assumptions and ten agendas that are characteristically present in GM discourses, along with their corresponding rhetorical devices. The breakdown of GM discourses along the three levels above sets the grounds for their reconstruction and comparative analysis. First, using this analytical framework, we can identify, explore and systematically analyze any GM discourse that we may encounter in any policy making context. Second, a systematic reconstruction of discursive strategies, discursive coalitions and conflicts, framing wars and frame alignments, can enable us to carry out international comparative research about policy processes and outcomes. Discursive trends and temporal shifts may also be explored. Third, using this framework, we may explore some policy actors’ multi-lingual strategies in which they address different policy contexts and audiences using different discourses. Finally, comparing the normative assumptions, agenda themes and rhetorical devices of discursive actors with
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_______________________________________________________________ approved policy documents (effective policies), we may expose otherwise invisible boundaries of legitimacy and understand why certain actors are successful and legitimate while others remain more or less excluded from the policyprocess.
Bibliography Ágh, Attila. “Közpolitika” [Public Policy]. In: Mi a politika [The Nature of Politics]. Budapest: Osiris, 1998: 81-122. Beck, Ulrich. Risk Society, Towards a New Modernity. London: Sage Publications, 1992. Bhat, Mahadev G. “Trade-related Intellectual Property Rights to Biological Resources: Socioeconomic Implications for Developing Countries.” In: Ecological Economics 19 (1996): 205-217. Bourdieu, Pierre. Distinction: a Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984. Bruntland Report, “Our Common Future.” The World Commission on Environment and Development. Edited by Gro Harlem Bruntland. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987. Buttel, Frederik H. “The Environmental and Post-Environmental Politics of Genetically Modified Crops and Foods.” In: Environmental Politics 14 No. 3 (2005): 309-323. Carver, Terrell. “Discourse Analysis and the Linguistic Turn.” In: European Political Science 2 (2002): 50-53. Cartagena Protocol on Biosafety, The Secretariat of the Convention on Biological Diversity, Montreal, 2000 (3 June 2006): Dryzek, John. The Politics of the Earth. Environmental Discourses. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996. Fischoff, Baruch, C. Hope and S. R. Watson. “Defining Risk.” In: Readings in Risk. Eds. Glickman, Th. S. and M. Gough. Washington, D.C.: Resources for the Future, 1990: 30-41. Hajer, Maarten. “Discourse Coalitions and the Institutionalisation of Practice: the Case of Acid Rain in Great Britain.” In: The Argumentative Turn in Policy Analysis and Planning. Edited by Fischer and Forester. Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1993.
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_______________________________________________________________ Hajer, Maarten. “Discourse Analysis and the Study of Policy Making.” In: European Political Science 2 (2002): 61-65. Hajer, Maarten. “Policy Without Polity? Policy Analysis and the Institutional Void.” In: Policy Science 36 (2003): 175-195. Hajer, Maarten and Hendrik Wagenaar. “Introduction.” In: Deliberative Policy Analysis: Understanding Governance in the Network Society. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003. Levidow, Les and Susan Carr. “How Biotechnology Regulation Sets a Risk/Ethics Boundary.” In: Agriculture and Human Values 14 (1997): 29-43. Torfing, Jacob. “Discourse Analysis and the Post-structuralism of Laclau and Mouffe.” In: European Political Science 2 (2002): 54-57. Shiva, Vandana. “From Commons to Corporate Patents on Life Forms.” In: Alternatives to Economic Globalization. A Better World is Possible. A Report of the International Forum on Globalization. Ed. John Cavanagh et al. San Francisco: Berett-Koehler Publishers, 2002: Chapter 3. Szabó, Márton. A diszkurzív politikatudomány alapjai [The Fundamentals of a Discursive Political Science] Budapest: L’Harmattan, 2003. Wales, Corinne and Gabe Mythen. “Risky Discourses: The Politics of GM Foods.” In: Environmental Politics, Summer 2002, Vol. 11 Issue 2: 121-124
Notes 1 Maarten Hajer and Hendrik Wagenaar, “Introduction,” in Deliberative Policy Analysis: Understanding Governance in the Network Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2003) p. 16 2 Terrell Carver, “Discourse Analysis and the Linguistic Turn,” n European Political Science 2, (2002) p. 51 3 Jacob Torfing, “Discourse Analysis and the Post-structuralism of Laclau and Mouffe,” in European Political Science 2, (2002) p. 54-57 4 John Dryzek, The Politics of the Earth. Environmental Discourses (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1996) p. 8 5 Maarten Hajer, “Discourse Coalitions and the Institutionalisation of Practice: the Case of Acid Rain in Great Britain,” in The Argumentative Turn in Policy Analysis and Planning, eds. Fischer and Forester (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1993) p. 45 6 Ibid. 7 Maarten Hajer, “Policy Without Polity? Policy Analysis and the Institutional Void,” in Policy Science 36 (2003) pp. 175-195; Hajer and Wagenaar, “Introduction,” pp. 8-9 8 Torfing, p. 55 9 Ulrich Beck, Risk Society, Towards a New Modernity (London: Sage Publications, 1992)
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_______________________________________________________________ 10 Pierre Bourdieu, Distinction: a Social Critique of the Judgment of Taste (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1984) 11 Torfing, p. 56 12 Hajer and Wagenaar, p. 13 13 Beck, p. 30 14 Corinne Wales and Gabe Mythen, “Risky Discourses: The Politics of GM Foods,” in Environmental Politics, Summer 2002, Vol. 11 Issue 2, pp. 121-124 15 Les Levidow and Susan Carr, “How Biotechnology Regulation Sets a Risk/Ethics Boundary,” in Agriculture and Human Values 14 (1997) pp. 29-43 16 Baruch Fischoff, C. Hope and S. R. Watson, “Defining Risk,” in Readings in Risk, eds. Glickman, Th. S. and M. Gough (Washington, D.C.: Resources for the Future, 1990) pp. 30-41 17 Levidow and Carr, p. 38 18 Bruntland Report, “Our Common Future,” The World Commission on Environment and Development, ed. Bruntland, Gro Harlem (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1987) 19 Buttel, pp. 313-314 20 Mahadev G. Bhat, “Trade-related Intellectual Property Rights to Biological Resources: Socioeconomic Implications for Developing Countries,” in Ecological Economics 19 (1996) pp. 205-217. Vandana Shiva, “From Commons to Corporate Patents on Life Forms,” in Alternatives to Economic Globalization. A Better World is Possible. A Report of the International Forum on Globalization, ed. John Cavanagh et al. (San Francisco: Berett-Koehler Publishers, 2002) Chapter 3, p. 87
Getting the Message: Audience Resonance with Australian Climate Change Campaigns Nina L. Hall and Cassandra Star Abstract To date, the Australian Government admits climate change is a concern that needs to be addressed, but has yet to implement policy domestically and internationally that non-government organisations (NGOs) consider to be adequate. Through in-depth interviews, the effectiveness of climate change campaigns by seven environmental NGOs was contrast with the perceptions of these NGOs' campaigns held by 'external observers' of the climate change debate: community, media, politicians, industry and policy-makers. The findings suggest the general community has received messages about climate change, but there is insignificant agitation or action at this level to be felt by politicians. The NGOs have formed new ‘alliances’ with other interest groups and professionals that have increased their credibility in the eyes of the media, industry and policy-makers. The media are wary of the NGOs’ ‘sensationalism’ of the issue and, with policy-makers, are seeking a stronger scientific basis to give the campaign messages greater objectivity and legitimacy. Politicians consider NGOs present policy demands ‘unrealistic’, and policy-makers feel that NGOs could gain more ‘mileage’ from their policy submissions. This research suggests NGOs are effective at raising general awareness and ‘agenda creation’, but appear less politically effective at the ‘policy creation’ part of the policy cycle, and this is a campaign area requiring further consideration. Keywords: Australia, climate change, non-government organisations, environment movement, strategies 1.
Introduction This paper examines the climate change campaigns being conducted by seven environmental non-government organisations (NGOs) in Australia to determine how campaign messages are perceived by the intended audiences. The research examines whom the NGOs are targeting, and whether the messages resonate with these audiences. This paper compares the impressions of campaign effectiveness of the NGO campaigners against those of their identified audience groups. This comparison is presented in recognition that, as Giugni identifies, “[social movement success] is in large part subjectively assessed.
Getting the Message 186 ____________________________________________________________ Movement participants and external observers may have different perceptions of the success of a given action.” 1 2.
NGO activities and intended audiences This paper is based on the findings from twenty-five semistructured interviews conducted between November 2004 and January 2006 with both campaign staff working in environmental NGOs as well as the audiences the NGOs sought to influence. The NGOs discussed in the paper include the Climate Action Network Australia (CANA), the Minerals Policy Institute (MPI), Rising Tide, Friends of the Earth (FoE), the Australian Conservation Foundation (ACF), WWF Australia, and Greenpeace. The Australian NGOs included in this paper consider government actions to address the projected impacts of human-induced climate change are inadequate. The term ‘NGOs’ describes not-for-profit advocacy organisations focused primarily on environmental issues. These organisations undertake research, campaigns and advocacy to influence decisions of the ‘institutional elite’ for social and political outcomes with benefits beyond the organisation’s own membership. 2 The NGO interview participants identified a variety of target audiences, to be discussed in an extended version of this paper, and which reflects the variety of activities and strategies they are undertaking. For the purposes of this paper, these target audiences have been termed ‘community’, ‘media’, ‘politicians’, ‘industry’ and ‘policy-makers’. 3.
NGO and audience perspectives on campaigns In the following sections, the perspectives of the NGOs regarding their campaigns’ effectiveness are contrast with those of their audiences. A. Community Many of the NGOs were optimistic about the reception of their campaigns by the ‘community’. CANA felt it had moderate success, stating that people are concerned, but not concerned enough to take action, as they are also “overwhelmed and confused” by the complexity and size of the climate change issue. 3 MPI identified the community as the best recipient of their messages, but identified that they “are still marginalised voices in government policy outcomes. 4 Rising Tide was more optimistic, having seen “good turnouts” to its events and responsiveness to their street stalls. 5 FoE believed that their messages have resonated easily with civil society, and stated “most people would say yes, it’s [climate change] happening.” 6 WWF considered that community awareness has significantly increased, saying “the level of knowledge and discussion about climate change is double what it was … [and] has certainly helped … ‘prime’ Australian society for change.” 7 However, ACF saw the NGO campaign at a “crossroads,” where the focus of community campaigns
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____________________________________________________________ until now has been on the “elite,” educated and professional part of the community. ACF’s Erwin Jackson argued that NGOs must now build “tomorrow’s movement [that] seeks significant societal and economic change through strong mainstream support.” 8 It is difficult to ascertain general community perceptions through interviews, so this analysis is based on several major surveys. These found climate change is not an environmental issue that is at the “top of mind” for many Australians. A NSW government survey in 2003 found that only three percent of people in NSW named ‘greenhouse effect/ global warming/ climate’ as the most important environmental issue in NSW. 9 One of the reasons that may lie behind the low level of concern is poor understanding of climate change. The Australian Greenhouse Office’s 2003 national survey found that only 12 percent correctly identified the burning of fossil fuels as the major contributor to climate change. 10 The 2003 NSW survey argued that education and information have increased people’s level of knowledge about climate change between 1994 and 2003. 11 This may have been achieved in part by the mass media, as the 2003 national survey found it to be the main source of information about climate change issues. 12 These findings support the NGOs’ decisions to build community awareness and calls for action, and to reach people through the media. B. Media The NGOs recognise that the media plays an important role in broadcasting their messages. However, as Maddison and Scalmer describe, “in an increasingly media-saturated present, social movements have had to find often spectacular means of generating media and community interest in their action.” 13 Climate change is a particularly difficult issue to portray. An anonymous NGO campaigner reflected that “popularising” climate change for uptake in the media is a difficult task. This campaigner also observed that media attention can be a “double-edged sword,” where groups with significant coverage risk losing media currency. 14 The journalists interviewed had a number of criticisms and suggestions for NGOs’ interaction with the media. A newspaper Opinions editor stated “climate change is not a specific issue of interest,” and is only included in his section if the particular angle of a story or action is “novel, challenges thinking or advances discussion.” 15 For his paper, climate change presents a very polarised and radical issue that is “demonstrative of scientists and NGOs up against the federal government and industry lobby.” 16 A former environment reporter explained that newspaper journalism is about newness and conflict, and that since the Federal government’s action on policy is minimal at this moment, climate change is currently a story of “nothing happening, so it’s no news.” 17
Getting the Message 188 ____________________________________________________________ These journalists urged NGOs to use an approach and language in their advocacy on climate change in a credible and balanced way. One journalist stressed “environmental groups are good lobbyists but cannot differentiate between proselytising [and providing informed comment].” 18 Another journalist criticised the emphasis he felt is placed on “scaremongering” and fear-based messages. For him, this approach reduced the NGOs’ credibility. 19 C. Politicians WWF’s Reynolds acknowledged that “the political environment is quite a tough one.” 20 In support of this, CANA’s Richards said, “we can’t have [influenced politicians], otherwise we would have better climate policy.” 21 Rising Tide’s Phillips reflected that “NGOs got the debate happening but [this] hasn’t translated into political gains.” 22 A former NSW Minister for Resources, Kim Yeadon, believed that the NGO focus on renewable energy and demand management positively contributed to the Mandatory Renewable Energy Target scheme. 23 He implored NGOs to “better understand the political system” and the process by which an NGO’s “politically unattainable” demands may be modified for acceptance into government policy. Furthermore, according to Yeadon, politicians are seeking positive public feedback from NGOs on the policies and actions. Yet, this feedback rarely arrived because “you can never satisfy the environment movement – you’ve never done enough.” 24 A political advisor identified the real obstacle for NGO effectiveness was in building broader community support at the electorate level, rather than relying on the ‘elite’, educated community’s support and action on the issue. 25 D. Energy-intensive and Electricity Industry The response by industry to pressure and campaigns from environmental NGOs was mixed, according to CANA’s Julie-Anne Richards. She considered the Greenpeace-led campaign that halted shale oil extraction in Queensland a “stand out success,” while the contested Hazelwood power plant in Victoria has proceeded despite a collaborative NGO campaign. 26 MPI was positive about certain companies’ willingness to consider alternatives to coal-generated electricity, but Geoff Evans said “the commitments of the major generators remains minimal, though hopefully will grow.” 27 Erwin Jackson felt that ACF built good relationships with both business and government officers, one that is both pragmatic and open to discussion. 28 An ACF campaigner observed, “I was surprised to find how advanced these companies all are in … their commitment to [action on] climate change.” 29 Another campaigner also commended engaging industry to, “get the corporate sector feeling good and get debate happening.” 30
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____________________________________________________________ Industries that have high greenhouse emissions, either through manufacturing or electricity production, held a variety of views on the effectiveness of the approaches that NGOs are using. Many interview participants considered that aspects of the NGO campaigns had been effective. The Australian Industry Greenhouse Network’s John Daley appreciated ‘business-aware’ NGO approaches. 31 A Rio Tinto manager commended some NGO actions, such as ACF’s policy position on carbon dioxide storage underground (‘geosequestration’), as a positive example of productive NGO engagement on climate change. 32 However, a particularly strong critique came from a participant in the renewable energy industry. He felt that the NGOs could have played their politics “smarter,” with more behind-the-scenes emphasis on negotiation and discussion, rather than creating a polarised public political debate. 33 Despite varying perspectives, some interview participants from industry felt there were significant areas where their industries shared the same agenda as NGOs focused on climate change concerns. The CIF’s Ritchie described the common agenda broadly, acknowledging “climate change is occurring and needs more action.” 34 Similarly, Rio Tinto’s official position is that “in order to avoid human caused changes to the climate the world must reduce emissions of greenhouse gases.” 35 An energy supplier found that his company joined with many NGOs in calling for a national economic instrument (such as a carbon tax) as an alternative to the current “hodge-podge of policies.” 36 E. Policy-Makers The campaigns’ effects on political decision-making are mixed, according to the NGOs. CANA’s Richards believed their efforts have been unsuccessful at a federal level, but she was encouraged by Western Australia’s decision to move towards gas-generated electricity. 37 MPI was despondent that state governments such as NSW still support new coal mines but pleased that they now acknowledge the process to establish new mines is now more difficult “as community awareness and resistance grows.” 38 Anna Reynolds was pleased with the attention that WWF’s campaigns on coal-fired power stations was being given by policy-makers, although this was not at the highest decision-making level. 39 The policy-makers interviewed both commended and criticised environmental NGO activities that had come to their attention. One policy officer considered that the new and “unnnatural” lobbying alliances, such as the Australian Business Roundtable on Climate Change, created a strong voice that engaged well with the private sector. 40 Another policy officer commended the contributions the NGOs are making to advisory groups. 41 An economist praised WWF as “attuned to being part of the policy debate [and] considering the economic impacts,” but he criticised other NGOs as “aiming for media headlines.” 42 A policy officer
Getting the Message 190 ____________________________________________________________ highlighted the impact that specific individuals can make, and mentioned several long-term NGO campaigners who had “provided excellent intellectual contributions to the debate on both national and international [climate] policy-making.” 43 Strong critique came from a former policy-maker who lamented the lack of “follow-through” by environmental NGOs in the efforts to engage with the policy-making process. He considered that personal interactions needed to go beyond ad hoc meetings with the Premier and other “friendly” power-holders. He encouraged NGOs to “leverage” off their submissions: circulate them to relevant ministers and bureaucrats, seek follow-up meetings, pursue consistent contact, and brief the media. An economist warned against the tendency he observes in environmental NGOs towards “sensationalism” of weather events not scientifically linked to climate change, and to “impractical” policy prescriptions. 44 This was supported by a former government climate scientist who felt NGOs placed “too much emphasis on doom and gloom without sufficient recognition of the uncertainties.” This scientist lamented that NGOs have not provided the potential bridge between policy-makers and the “real coal-face climate scientists” who may “feel unable to speak publicly because it makes them look biased and reduces their credibility with policy-makers and could affect their funding.” 45 6.
Conclusions Two main observations can be drawn from this research. Firstly, NGOs are communicating their concerns to a range of specific audiences. The new alliances with business, the medical profession, scientists, academics and others appear to have been well-received and strengthened the credibility of the climate change issue. However, the findings from the community and media reinforce the challenge of making climate change messages resonate with audiences. Furthermore, the message is acted upon often in an unexpected manner that is beyond the NGOs’ control. This loss of control may be due to the lack of obvious solutions advocated in the campaign messages, which place greater emphasis on scientific projections and potential impacts. Indeed, some NGO campaigners interviewed for this research sought to provide more community solutions to counteract the perception that projected climate change is a ‘scientific’ issue that can only be ‘solved’ by governments and scientists. While this first observation suggests that NGOs are effective at raising general awareness and ‘agenda creation’, the second observation is that social and policy change appears to not be happening, or happening very slowly. NGOs working on climate change appear less politically effective at the ‘policy creation’ part of the policy cycle. While policy creation is a campaign area requiring further consideration, this raises the question of whether this role is too much to expect of Australian NGOs, given that unsecured legitimacy and poor resources were two common
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____________________________________________________________ themes in the interviews with NGO campaigners. NGOs are seeking legitimacy with a wide range of audiences, described as the five general groups in this research. However, as described here, not all of these audiences accept this legitimacy, and to challenge this notion in one group may alienate another. Low resources can impact the breadth of campaign focus and prioritisation within an NGO, which in turn has implications on the ability to tailor messages to reach their target audiences. These two findings lead to the important question of the overall effectiveness of climate change campaigns in Australia. However, it must be noted that these observations and questions have been drawn from a series of perspectives of interview participants. Political effectiveness is difficult to adequately assess from the perspectives provided here, especially given the breadth of definitions and criteria employed by various researchers who are active on these questions. Further research on the question of effectiveness in relation to these campaigns would be fruitful, and would provide the basis for specific campaign and strategic recommendations.
Notes 1 M Giugni, “Introduction,” in How Social Movements Matter, ed.s M Giugni, D McAdam, and C Tilly (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1999), xxi. 2 D Worth, “The WA forest conflict: the construction of the political effectiveness of advocacy organisations,” Grit: Journal of Australian Studies, 78 (2003): 83-103. 3 Julie-Anne Richards, Climate Action Network Australia, pers. comm., 17 October 2005. 4 Geoff Evans, Mineral Policy Institute, pers. comm., 20 October 2005. 5 Steve Phillips, Rising Tide, pers comm., 17 October 2005. 6 Stephanie Long, Friends of the Earth, pers comm., 20 October 2005; Cam Walker, Friends of the Earth Australia, pers. comm., 19 November 2004. 7 Anna Reynolds, WWF Australia, pers. comm., 2 December 2004. 8 E Jackson, “The environment movement on climate change,” Proceedings of the Climate Action Network Australia Annual Conference: Dangerous Climate Change- Together We Can Stop It, (Melbourne: 29-30 September, 2005). 9 DEC, Who Cares about the Environment in 2003? A Survey of NSW People’s Environmental Knowledge, Attitudes and Behaviours (Sydney: NSW Department of Environment and Conservation, 2003), 22.
Getting the Message 192 ____________________________________________________________ 10 Colmar Brunton Social Research and Redsuit Advertising, Community Perceptions of Climate Change: A Report on Benchmark Research (Canberra: Australian Greenhouse Office, 2003), 6-7. 11 DEC, 49. 12 Colmar Brunton Social Research and Redsuit Advertising, 9. 13 S Maddison and S Scalmer, Activist Wisdom: Practical Knowledge and Creative Tension in the Life of Social Movements, (Sydney: UNSW Press, 2005), 46. 14 NGO campaigner ‘Anon. 1,’ pers. comm., 8 December 2004. 15 Media journalist ‘Anon. 1,’ pers. comm., 18 October 2005. 16 Media journalist ‘Anon. 2,’ pers. comm., 7 November 2005. 17 Stephanie Peatling, Sydney Morning Herald, pers. comm., 18 October 2005. 18 Media journalist ‘Anon. 1’. 19 Media journalist ‘Anon. 2’. 20 Reynolds, 2004. 21 Richards, 2005. 22 Phillips. 23 Kim Yeadon, NSW Member of Parliament, pers. comm., 24 October 2005. 24 Ibid. 25 Political staffer ‘Anon. 1,’ pers. comm., 16 November 2005. 26 Richards, 2005. 27 Evans. 28 Erwin Jackson, Australian Conservation Foundation, pers. comm., 10 November 2005. 29 Mishael J, Australian Conservation Foundation, pers. comm., 3 November 2005. 30 NGO campaigner ‘Anon. 1,’ pers. comm., 8 December 2004. 31 John Daley, Australian Industry Greenhouse Network, pers. comm., 7 November 2005. 32 Fiona Nicholls, Rio Tinto, pers. comm., 13 December 2005. 33 Industry staffer ‘Anon. 1.’, pers. comm., 10 November 2005. 34 Stuart Ritchie, Cement Industry Federation, pers. comm., 25 October 2005. 35 Nicholls. 36 Industry staffer ‘Anon. 2,’ pers. comm., 15 December 2005. 37 Richards, 2005. 38 Evans. 39 Anna Reynolds, Worldwide Fund for Nature, pers. comm., 8 November 2005. 40 Policy officer ‘Anon. 1,’ pers. comm., 15 October 2005. 41 Policy officer ‘Anon. 4,’ pers. comm. 12 December 2005.
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____________________________________________________________ 42 Michael Hitchens, Economist, pers. comm., 24 October 2005. 43 Policy officer ‘Anon. 4’. 44 Hitchens. 45 Barrie Pittock, climate scientist, pers. comm., 24 December 2005.
How many Koalas are there on Kangaroo Island? Sarah Wilks Abstract This study demonstrated how an apparently clear-cut wildlife management issue was hijacked by a minority group. Koala populations on Kangaroo Island (where 18 Koalas were introduced in 1920), have been the topic of heated, vitriolic and public debate. As the debate continues, 30 000 herbivores are steadily chewing trees to death, spreading silently along riparian zones and remnant vegetation, leaving dead and dying trees and Koalas behind them. Using an elastic Actant Network Theory approach, different actors’ understandings of Koalas, each other, and the Island’s ecology were explored. Of particular interest were the means by which different constructions became devices to influence management outcomes. Several groups/alliances of actors were discerned, each with its own sense of identity, expertise and concept of conservation; defined not solely in terms of what a group was, but also in terms of what it was not. In particular, ascribed motivations provided definition. Four separate images of a Koala were constructed and promulgated by various groups. It is shown that one image (soft, cuddly and harmless) had been effectively constructed for sufficient constituencies to influence the outcome of the management debate. The current management solution serves no group well, especially the animals themselves. Keywords: Actant Network Theory, charismatic introduced species, human dimensions of conservation, Koalas 1.
Introduction This study aimed to dissect the heated and complex public debate about the management of Koalas on Kangaroo Island. The study explored different actors’ different understandings of Koalas, each other, and the situation on the island. Of particular interest were the ways in which knowledge and information- about koalas, the environment, other groupsbecame transformed in order to better suit the purposes of the main players. These different constructions were then used as devices to influence the management outcomes.
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_______________________________________________________________ Mainly as a result of media coverage and the activities of the Australian Koala Foundation (AKF) the issue of Koalas on the island has become a topic of debate nationally and internationally. Public statements and opinion pieces by “experts” abound; “farmers” are periodically reported in the media as illegally killing koalas; the AKF deploys a large support base (many overseas) of letter writers; and the present (State) Government, having made political capital of the issue whilst in opposition, is mindful of the political consequences of any eventual course of action. Meanwhile, the opportunity to propose expensive high-tech fixes was not lost on some scientists, to the dismay of the local populace who have only two sealed roads. As the debate plays out, a population of over 30 000 introduced herbivores are quietly and steadily chewing the trees to death, spreading silently along riparian zones and remnant vegetation, leaving dead and dying trees behind them. A.Kangaroo Island: an ecological treasure. Kangaroo Island (KI) lies 12 km south west of the Fleurieu peninsula, South Australia. The island was occupied by Aborigines until about 2 250 years ago when it was apparently abandoned. 1 KI covers an area of approximately 4 500 square kilometers, almost half still covered by native vegetation, nearly 30% as National Park. 2 The island’s flora and fauna is diverse; 1179 plant species occur on the island, 45 endemic. Eighteen endemic terrestrial mammals and three introduced native species are present (platypus, koala, ring-tail possum). The island is home to approximately 4 000 people who are mainly engaged in primary production and tourism related activities. Kangaroo Island is a significant destination for overseas visitors and ecotourism activities, reflective of its undeveloped state and considerable ecological capital. B.Koalas on Kangaroo Island. As a response to concerns about the survival of Koalas on the mainland, 18 Koalas were introduced to the Flinders Chase National Park, on the western corner of the island, in the 1920s. The introducees subsequently multiplied rapidly. Koalas were reportedly ‘present in hundreds’ by 1948; the population doubling time indicates that the numbers could have been very large by that time. Eyewitness accounts concur; that Koalas increased in numbers very rapidly but virtually un-noticed except by some Parks Officers and a few landholders on properties adjoining the National Park. Older islanders reported Koalas and concomitant defoliation spreading along riparian zones from one property to the next in considerable detail. The island population is Chlamydia free and there are no dingoes on the island 3 .
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_______________________________________________________________ The natural history of the Koala has been described by Martin and Handasyde. 4 Medium sized arboreal marsupials, Koalas feed exclusively on only four or five species of Eucalyptus tree. Koalas are ‘messy’ feeders, damaging more foliage than they consume, and cause tree damage when present at high densities. If subject to continuous long term browsing, a food tree will eventually die. The Eucalypt species on KI succumb more readily than mainland species; they have not been selected for resistance to heavy browsing, (eg by incorporating unpalatable substances in their leaves), having existed in an environment free of Koalas until comparatively recently. A complicating factor is the presence of other tree stressors such as edge effects and fertiliser run-off from farming, salinity, Phytopthera infections and heavy insect infestations, the susceptibility to which varies between species; therefore assigning blame for tree deaths to Koala browsing is contestable, and is contested. By 1965 severe tree damage in areas containing high densities of Koalas had been reported. 5 Small scale translocations from Flinders Chase commenced in the 1950s and continued until official management was suspended in the 1970s. By the early 1990s, overabundant Koala populations and the environmental consequences of over browsing, including widespread tree deaths in some areas, attracted the attention of authorities, scientist and conservationists. Ball estimated that by 2002 the Koalas had entirely eliminated many localised food tree populations and that half the island’s total population of the most favoured (endemic) Eucalypt species had been destroyed by Koala browsing. 6 Besides the environmental problems caused by widespread deaths among trees in riparian environments, another threat is posed by uncontrolled Koala browsing. Eucalyptus baxterii is the second or third most common tree species on Kangaroo Island and is the predominant species along roadsides. There is potential for very widespread adverse environmental consequences if Koala populations are allowed to cause significant deaths among this species. In addition, substantial Koala populations using the baxteriis as corridors will inevitably spread further eastwards, eventually reaching the currently unaffected Dudley Peninsula. Koalas are protected by legislation in all jurisdictions, primary responsibility resting with State and Territory Governments. In South Australia, Koalas are protected under the National Parks and Wildlife Act 1972, which provides for heavy penalties. The Koala is currently listed as a “rare species” and the maximum penalty is a fine of $ 5 000 or 12 months imprisonment. While provisions exist under this Act for destructive management of Koalas, no such permission has ever been given. All other
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_______________________________________________________________ overabundant native and feral animal populations are managed destructively on Kangaroo Island. Annual destruction permits are issued for tens of thousands of Brush-tailed Possums, Tammar Wallabies and (endemic) Kangaroo Island Kangaroos. Feral cats and pigs can be shot without permits. Permits for the destruction of Corellas and Galahs (parrots) are granted on a case by case basis. In 1996, the Koala Management Task Force was commissioned by the State Minister for the Environment in South Australia, comprising representatives from the scientific, conservation, animal welfare communities, State and local Government and Departmental officers. 7 The 1994-96 survey estimates of Koala numbers of 3-5 000 8 were vigorously contested by the AKF, which stated at that time that a more accurate count would be in the region of 1 500. 9 The Task Force recommended an immediate reduction in numbers via culling, followed by translocations off island and maintenance of low densities. Culling of Koalas had previously been precluded by the SA Government and by the Australian and New Zealand Environment and Conservation Council, 10 and the recommendation of the Task Force, when reported, led to very negative national and international responses. The Task Force was told by the State and Federal Governments that the recommendations were unacceptable and was sent back to do the work again. The second time around, with terms of reference that forbade culling, the Task Force was unable to recommend a management strategy that would be both feasible and economic. In 1997, the Koala Rescue Strategy was launched. Aiming to “relieve habitat damage and avoid suffering and starvation of Koalas,” 11 large scale surgical sterilizations, translocations to the mainland, habitat restoration and protection, follow up monitoring and further research were to be funded. Initial funding in 1997/98 of over $ 600 000 dwindled in subsequent years to $ 200 000 per annum. By 2000, only 4 000 sterilizations and 1 100 translocations of sterilized animals had occurred, representing less than the natural increase during the period 12 . By 2001, Masters et al had estimated Koala numbers on KI to be in the region of 27 000, a substantially larger population, and more widely distributed, than had been previously accepted.12 This estimate was also immediately challenged by the AKF, which had in the interim period revised its population estimate upwards to about 5 000. This prompted a local veterinarian to crack; “…I must have sterilised some animals twice!”
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Theoretical perspective: Actant Network Theory. Actant Network Theory (ANT) is a loosely-defined approach derived from the work of Latour, 13, 14 Callon, 15 and Law 16 in the sociology of science and knowledge. ANT-based approaches have been used to study various aspects of environmentalism, sustainability and land use conflicts. Murdoch and Marsden studied political conflicts over land-use proposals where environmentalists had enrolled scientific results to fight against proposed development. 17 Woods studied the conflicts associated with recreational stag hunting and attempts to ban the activity. 18 Sustainable agriculture and food supply chains were examined by McManus, 19 Marsden et al, 20 and Van der Ploeg & Frouws, 21 while Burgess et al 22 examined different attitudes to the value of wetlands and Bowler 23 scrutinised urban waste disposal. ANT is not a theory of anything, despite the name (which is a translation of a French term), but a way to approach an understanding of how things work without adopting a particular paradigm: “It was never a theory of what the social is made of… actors know what they do and we have to learn from them not only what they do, but how and why they do it. It is us, the social scientists, who lack knowledge of what they do, and not they who are missing the explanation of why they are unwittingly manipulated by forces exterior to themselves and known to the Social Scientist’s powerful gaze and methods” Latour. 24 This approach requires an honest and rigorous attempt to objectively construct a narrative from all perspectives, without privileging one viewpoint or source of authority over another, recognising that processes, actions and beliefs drive results rather than inherent properties. No judgement is made as to the ‘truth’ or paradigmatic view of the actors. ANT demands impartiality on the part of the analyst; humans, non-humans, and institutions may all be implicated as actors with power to act. Natural and social entities are explained together, and the power and influence of physical and natural entities are recognised, in contrast to being hidden, dismissed or treated as artificial or subjective constructs. ANT also allows for the formation of ‘hybrid’ associations which may cross conceptual divisions, rather than entrenching the notion that there are purely social or purely natural entities. This approach was critiqued by Woods, who found that ANT could be a useful descriptive approach but could fail to provide full explanations in
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_______________________________________________________________ some circumstances;18 the reader is referred to this source for a fuller explanation. In this study an elastic ANT approach has been taken to the generation of a narrative; in essence, this means a concerted effort to include all entities and pathways through the network in order to generate an account of the different knowledges held by different groups (actors) and the manners in which these groups’ knowledges, efforts and expertise flow and interact. In contrast to writing a purely scientific account, the existence of other sources of information and knowledge is acknowledged and these entities included in the analysis. This study was developed after qualitative analysis of media and internet articles, policy and position statements, letters between stakeholders and to newspapers and politicians, and interview transcripts of semi structured interviews with participants from all stakeholder groups. 3.
Results and Discussion The existence of several distinct groups of actors was discerned. Membership of a group was defined in two ways; self definition and attribution by others. Members recognised themselves and others as part of a group where common beliefs, aims and attitudes were expressed. Members of a group defined other actors as outside their group by expressing their perceptions that other actors were different in some fundamental belief, attitude or aim. Groups included landholders/farmers, scientists, conservationists, tourism operators, land managers/politicians, and greenies 25 . Space precludes a full description of the groups and alliances of the actors. By examining the prevailing situation, it is instructive to consider whose chosen solution has prevailed and how this has eventuated. One key to understanding the situation rests with different ideas of what a Koala actually is. These different ideas are discussed below. A.The Conservationists’ Koala: respected, wild animals that deserve to be conserved. Conservationists simultaneously wished to preserve all Koalas while conceding if they were overabundant then the population should be controlled, in the interests of all species present in the assemblage. Individual animals could be foregrounded, allowing the species to become a known quantity while preserving the ‘wildness’ of the animals. One ecotourism operator explained: “I think when people come through here, they appreciate the animals more, they respect it more as a species, take a wider
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_______________________________________________________________ view, because they’ve met an individual …they find that pretty special.” B.The Farmers’ Koala: no different from any other animal. Farmers’ attitudes to Koalas were founded upon observations of the consequences of overabundance with respect to farm management. Farmers were less likely to see the animal just as cute and cuddly, but as something that certainly appeared cute but had further dimensions. Farmers explained: “…appears to be nice and soft and furry and cuddly, but he’s a bony little critter. Got sharp claws! And their revolting habits, they smell, they stink...if one piddled on the roof of your car, it’d lift the paint off. Oh yes, they’re stinking things and they bite and scratch.” To farmers, Koalas should be subject to control like any other animal, and it was the responsibility of a land holder to manage the consequences of their land use practices: “…we should control the animals grazing, whether it be on pasture in the form of sheep and cattle or whether it be kangaroos, wallabies, possums or koalas or parrots or anything like that, if we wish to keep our environment reasonably intact, it’s up to us to do our bit…” C. The Scientists’ Koala: introduced, inbred and overabundant. A body of peer-reviewed scientific literature describes the Koalas on KI as overabundant, prolific breeders. Studies examining genetic variability, and the knowledge that the Koalas on Kangaroo Island were established from a small number of individuals, leads to the scientific definition of the Koalas as “inbred.” Scientists tended to view the Koalas as one part of an ecological whole and had a wider view of the consequences of overabundance than most of the farmers, scientists tending to emphasise the repercussions to the whole island’s ecology. From a scientific standpoint, there is no dissent: Koalas on KI are overabundant, inbred, outside their natural range and problematic. Most scientists did not grant the Koala special status among animals: “If they need to be culled, that doesn’t worry me at all…” However, it is possible to discern additional dimensions in some circumstances. In some grant applications, the animals were portrayed as a regrettably overabundant species that unfortunately must be controlled via
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_______________________________________________________________ high tech (=high price) means because lower cost alternatives are unacceptable, for example: “Although many scientists believe these species need to be controlled quickly through lethal means, this approach has become increasingly unacceptable in socio-political terms….When it is clear that overabundance leads to environmental damage there is demand for immediate action. The means to do this without culling currently do not exist…” These dissident scientists had successfully enrolled the perceptions, promulgated by greenies, that the Koala may not be culled, and by doing so had garnered very large sums of funding in order to pursue certain lines of research. Such endeavours were criticized by all the other actors, for different reasons. Other scientists regretted the diversion of funds away from more ‘deserving’ causes: “...there’s only so many dollars within the wildlife management field…to see so much money wasted on ineffective management is a very depressing thing…any money that’s spent on koalas is money that’s taken away from other species…” Farmers questioned why large amounts of money were to be spent when a bullet was so much cheaper and there were more pressing needs “...our local council has to pay interest to borrow money to fix up our roads! …that money would be better spent in a nursing home or a hospital or on the disabled…” Greenies found the resulting headlines (“Koalas put on the pill!” etc) to be counterproductive to their fundraising, which was predicated on perceptions of rarity and ‘specialness;’ “…anywhere in the world I can hear; you’ve got so many koalas you have to put them on the pill or you have to shoot them. That doesn’t help anyone, those media reports, and its very clever and very devious…” The Greenies’ Koala: Cute and cuddly, harmless and loveable: According to the AKF, the Koala is “absolutely unique… one of the most
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_______________________________________________________________ beautiful marsupials on the planet… Even the hardest human heart melts when it comes into close contact with them.” Sentiments expressed by AKF members defined the Koala as “innocent …amazing…cuddly, harmless, loveable.” Other correspondents underlined the anthropomorphic nature of their view of the Koala, referring to comments advocating culling: “This is murder. Nothing more or less…” The notion that Koalas are cuddly and harmless is powerful, often attributed by farmers and scientists to “ignorant” people overseas but conceded by a senior politician to also have currency within Australia: “…there’s a kind of deep romantic association from childhood. With bears, and childrens’ stories, Blinky Bill, people grow up with an emotional attachment to them….” This iconic status as cute and cuddly is actively exploited by the AKF: “…we understand the power of the Koala and we understand its power politically and from a fundraising perspective.” 4.
Building the battlefield The ANT based approach adopted during this study has allowed for an account of the differences between the ways in which farmers, scientists, greenies and others view the issue and their accounts of the best way to proceed, without privileging any viewpoint over another. These accounts illustrate that what is ‘right’ from a particular point of view is complex, involving the construction of not only one’s own group identity but also the identity of other groups. To do this, actors draw upon their own formal or informal knowledge of their situation and their beliefs about the nature of other actors’/groups’ knowledge. It might be considered that landholders would know more about these notoriously cryptic creatures than anyone else. However, the greenies’ portrayal of farmers as “…unqualified, ignorant…money grubbing hoons, running mad with a rifle…..only interested in mining their land, who do not care about biodiversity…” is a powerful incentive for others to discount what they have to say. Similarly, scientists, who while enjoying a general legitimacy in society of having the ‘right’ answer, were generally out of favour with greenies; “…secretive, cabbalistic…doing research in an ethical and moral vacuum…” and therefore not to be trusted with anything so precious and important as a Koala. These and other portrayals of other groups (for example of greenies as “...ill-informed…crackpots”), have been employed to great effect as a device to influence the outcome of the debate, sometimes accompanied by unintended consequences. 26 While several other studies have found that farmers’ understandings of conservation are at variance with that of scientists, 27 in this case farmers
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_______________________________________________________________ and scientists are in agreement, at least to the extent of agreeing that the Koalas are overabundant, that tree damage and adverse environmental consequences result, and therefore it would be desirable to control the Koalas. However, this farmer/scientist alliance and mutual acknowledgement of expertise did not eventually contribute positively to either farmers’ or scientists’ aims. Scientists were given a hearing and granted credibility in the public arena of the debate, whereas farmers were portrayed in a far less flattering light. In the media, scientists were listened to but farmers were the subject of inflammatory reporting. Scientists were looked to by other groups to come up with an answer, but farmers were not; they were to wait and accept the solutions imposed upon them. Although most scientists were acknowledging the farmers’ expertise, other groups, especially the greenies, were not. That some scientists understood them and agreed with them was a validation to the farmers; they had Science on their side. Farmers were then angry, frustrated and bewildered that, having enrolled/been enrolled by Science and scientists, other groups still acted against them: farmers viewed Science as a problem-solver and politicians as gutless toadies to the “…general public…,” “...other people in other places” and the “…ill-informed crackpots.” Greenies have effectively constructed the soft, fluffy, harmless image of the Koala prominently in the media (domestic and international) and by activist group and internet activities; reaching voters, letter writers, emailers, activists, and potential overseas and domestic visitors. Politicians are very conscious of this. While the current political and managerial leadership are aware of the other images of the Koala, in the media (excepting the very local paper, supported by the advertising and patronage of Kangaroo Islanders) and in many people’s eyes, domestically and internationally, the knowledge of the Greenie groups that the Koala is soft, fluffy, harmless and loveable has been enrolled as the prevailing image. In this way the activities of the AKF have created not only the image of the Koala but also the ground within which any debate over management must be confined, assisted in this by the demonisation of Chlamydia. The pieces on the board have been constructed to exist and move in particular ways only; the stupid farmer who mines his property and cares for nothing that will not bring in money; the unethical scientists doing research in a moral and ethical vacuum; the politicians with chronically short (electoral) term outlooks; incompetent National Parks staff, and so on. Within this arena, there is no latitude for any other existence for the actors; a farmer will not suddenly start caring about native wildlife and a scientist will not suddenly develop a conscience. They are as they have been described and will act as they have
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_______________________________________________________________ been described (by the AKF) and it will always be that way. The AKF has effectively, for the time being at least, frozen the network and the result is a stalemate. Dissent by other actors; usually expressions of utter disbelief and frustration, periodically given prominence in media and other reports, is dealt with swiftly and effectively in ways that permit no meaningful discussion of alternative management solutions. On every occasion that pro-culling sentiments have been expressed publicly, by for example a politician, or a prominent scientist, business or farmer, there has been a ripple effect. Such public statements tend to have great support in the immediate vicinity, but this support decreases with extending geographic range. As the distance increases, extending through the ‘chardonnay sippers’ of the east coast cities of Australia, towards international places such as Japan and the US, support for culling is replaced by condemnation and outrage that the actors, who are as described in the preceding paragraph, could even think about threatening the (soft, cuddly, harmless) Koalas. By promulgating its images of the actors, and its framing of the debate as outlined above and by taking the debate to other places, the AKF has lengthened and broadened the network. As is known from other ANT explorations, networks can be very robust indeed. The current State Minister has many times stated his personal belief that excess Koalas should be culled, quickly adding that it is not politically acceptable to his Government to do so, and neither was it to the previous administration. This conclusion- that Kolas cannot be culled because it would be unacceptable in a range of places domestic and internationally- has been reached throughout Australia on several occasions dating at least from the early 1990s, and is reflected in the Task Force Report. This political consensus- from both Labor and Coalition Governments- has further enhanced the robustness and stability of the network; affected constituents cannot even vote them out. The trite explanation in such circumstances; that politicians are gutless and too busy looking after their own seat(s), is both partly true and unsatisfying. . 5. Conclusions To answer to the question posed by the title; there are four Koalas on Kangaroo Island. It doesn’t matter how many individuals are present; the soft fluffy, harmless Koala must be preserved at all costs. The AKF is to be variously credited or blamed (depending on outlook) for this outcome, where decision making was wrested from the control of statutory authorities and rested instead with an NGO.
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_______________________________________________________________ That one effect of a well-intentioned campaign by a group representing the interests of the Koala (which is indeed threatened in many areas of Australia by land clearing, urbanization and disease) is to consign many Koalas to literally drop dead from denuded trees is surely an unintended by-blow. Great damage is in progress, to the environment of Kangaroo Island, its (human and non human) inhabitants and many observers of the situation.
Notes 1
Richard Lampert, “Aborigines” in Natural History of Kangaroo Island, ed. Margaret Davies, Rowl Twidale & Mike Tyler (Richmond, South Australia, Royal Society of South Australia, 2002), 66-74. 2 David Ball & Steve Carruthers, “Kangaroo Island Vegetation Mapping,” (Adelaide, Department for Transport, Urban Planning and the Arts, 1998). 3 Chlamydia is a sexually transmitted disease that, amongst other effects, reduces population fertility. Dingoes predate koalas on the mainland. KI Koalas thus are free from predation except by domestic dogs. 4 Roger Martin & Kathryn Handasyde, “The Koala. Natural History, Conservation and Management,” (Sydney: UNSW Press, 1999). 5 C.M. Philpott, “The ecology of the Koala Phascolarctos cinereus (Goldfuss) on Flinders Chase, Kangaroo Island,” (Adelaide: B.Sc.(Honours) Thesis, University of Adelaide, 1965). 6 David Ball, “Vegetation” in Natural History of Kangaroo Island, ed. Margaret Davies, Rowl Twidale & Mike Tyler (Richmond, South Australia, Royal Society of South Australia, 2002), 54-66. 7 Hugh Possingham et al., “Koala Management Task Force Final Report.” (Adelaide: University of Adelaide, 1996). 8 Barbara St John, “Risk assessment and Koala management in South Australia,” Australian Biologist 10(1997): 47-56. 9 Australian Koala Foundation, “Kangaroo Island- the Koala problem can be solved,” Issues (March 1997): 20-26. 10 Australian and New Zealand Environment and Conservation Council, “National Koala Conservation Strategy,” (Canberra: Australian Government Printing Service, 1998). 11 Department of Environment and Natural Resources South Australia, “Koala Rescue Update,” (Kensington SA: Department of Environment and Natural Resources, 1997).
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Pip Masters, Toni Duka, Steve Berris & Graeme Moss, “Koalas on Kangaroo Island: from introduction to pest status in less than a century,” Wildlife Research 31( 2004): 267-272. 13 Bruno Latour, Science in Action: how to follow Scientists and Engineers through Society (Milton Keynes: Open University Press, 1987). 14 Bruno Latour, We have never been Modern. (Hemel Hampstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1993). 15 Michel Callon, “Some elements of a sociology of translation: domestication of the scallops and fishermen of St Brieuc Bay,” in Power, Action and Belief. A New Sociology of Knowledge, ed. John Law (London,: Routledge, 1986). 16 John Law, “Notes on the theory of the actor-network: ordering, strategy and heterogeneity.” Systems Practice 5(1992): 379-393. 17 Jon Murdoch & Terry Marsden, “The spatialisation of politics: local and national actor-spaces in environmental conflict,” Transactions of the Institute of British Geographers 20(1995): 368-380. 18 Michael Woods, “Researching rural conflicts: hunting, local politics and Actor-networks,” Journal of Rural Studies 14(1998): 321-340. 19 Phil McManus, “Sustaining Unsustainability: Sausages, Actant Networks and the Australian Beef Industry,” in Consuming Foods, Sustaining Environments, ed. Stewart Lockie & Bill Pritchard (Bowen Hills, Australian Academic Press, 2001). 20 Terry Marsden, Jon Murdoch & Kevin Morgan, “Sustainable agriculture, food supply chains and regional development: editorial introduction,” International Planning Studies 4(1999): 295-301. 21 Jan Douwe Van der Ploeg & Jaap Frouws, “On power and weakness, capacity and impotence: rigidity and flexibility in food chains,” International Planning Studies 4 (1999): 333-347. 22 Jacquelin Burgess, Judy Clark, & Carolyn Harrison, “Knowledges in action: an actor network analysis of a wetland agri-environment scheme,” Ecological Economics 35(2000): 119-132. 23 Ian Bowler, “Recycling urban waste on farmland an actor-network interpretation,” Applied Geography 19(1999): 29-43. 24 Bruno Latour, “On recalling ANT,” in Actor Network Theory and after, ed. John Law & John Hassard (Blackwell, Oxford, 1999), 15-25. 25 Intended neither pejoratively nor as a political affiliation. This group contained sub-groups; people referred to by some farmers and scientists as “the general public,” “people in the city,” and “foreigners.” These groups, where involved, appeared to overwhelmingly include only people expressing support for greenie sentiments.
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For example, the AKF had suggested at least a discussion of the introduction of Chlamydia as a population management measure. The subsequent portrayals of the AKF, by many scientists, farmers, politicians and managers, as “foolish,” “inhumane” and “inconsistent” on the issue of Koala welfare was accompanied by the demonisation of Chlamydia, which also effectively stifled any prospect of an open discussion of the possible effects of its introduction as a population management tool. While some scientists and managers believe the deliberate introduction of Chlamydia would be unacceptable, many other scientists and members of other groups would like an open, informed debate on the subject. Chlamydia is now discussed by scientists, conservationists and managers mainly in private for fear of negative reactions; not least the fear of being labelled as an “…ill-informed crackpot” too. This has an additional potential consequence because while the present ineffective management regime persists, there is a risk that deliberate unauthorised and uncontrolled introductions could take place. 27 Burgess et al
Environmental Grief® Kriss A. Kevorkian Abstract Scientists working among dwindling populations, devastated habitats and recovery efforts from natural disasters experience an array of emotions not often acknowledged or discussed. Many in science maintain the method of observation without becoming emotionally attached to the subject. Regardless of whether one is interacting or observing, a bond develops. Observing a subject or population for a long period of time, only to see its decline, has a profound effect on a researcher. When a new term was suggested to scientists working with particular declining ecosystems, an overwhelming sense of relief welled up that offered a validation and understanding that prior to this was unrecognized. Probing the emotions of these scientists led to the conclusion that each person was reacting to environmental grief®: the grief reaction stemming from the environmental loss of ecosystems caused by natural or man-made events. This term builds upon disenfranchised grief, a form of grief not openly acknowledged or accepted in society. Considering the fact that scientists are trained observers, they will react on some level to the losses in nature that they observe, whether consciously or unconsciously. Despite what some theorists believe about the plight of our environment, whether we are in some sort of natural cycle, or whether humans are the threat to the planet, grief issues should and can be acknowledged. Once a name is put to any type of symptom or feeling, people are generally able to move forward and begin the healing process. In the case of environmental grief, we can openly acknowledge our grief while educating ourselves and others about the grieving process. In so doing, we can begin the healing process. We only need to learn the skills to cope with grief in order to heal. Key words: Environmental grief, grief, disenfranchised grief, killer whale, orca 1.
Introduction Scientists, as well as medical professionals, have been taught to maintain an emotional distance from those they observe in order to remain objective and note only facts. When the facts reveal that the animal or habitat in question is dying, the scientist is then able to continue this emotional distancing by calling the situation an act of nature. Are we really able to ignore the death being observed and therefore ignore our own grief reaction?
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Grief Grief is a reaction to loss. When we speak of grief, it is usually in regard to the death of a loved one. Grief can also be a reaction to many other losses that occur in life. The losses of a job, a house, or even the experience of having a friend move away are also associated with grief; however, these kinds of losses are not often considered in discussions of grief. Grief is very individual: How one person reacts could be very different from how another might react. Grief manifests itself in many ways: feelings such as sadness, anger, guilt, anxiety, fatigue, and shock; physical sensations, such as tightness in the throat or chest, dry mouth, lack of energy, and shortness of breath; cognitive responses, such as disbelief, confusion, and sometimes a sense of the presence of the deceased; and behaviors such as disruptions in sleep or appetite, crying, dreaming of the deceased, loss of interest, and social withdrawal. Grief can also express itself in social and spiritual manifestations: problems functioning in an organization or family and difficulties with interpersonal relationships, searching for meaning, or feeling anger or hostility toward a religious figure. There are various forms of grief, including anticipatory grief - the reaction to losses associated with an impending death, which may include past, present, or future losses during the dying process; complicated grief “A significant minority of bereaved persons will experience substantial impairment in their social and occupational functioning for many months following the loss, accompanied by marked symptoms of emotional numbness, disbelief, purposelessness, futility, insecurity, and a sense that a part of the self has died;”1 uncomplicated grief - a healthy, normal response to loss; and disenfranchised grief - grief that a person experiences for a loss that is not acknowledged by society. Medical professionals were once taught to distance themselves from their patients in order to “survive” all the many losses they would see in their career lifetimes. Logic determined that if professionals attached themselves to the people (or environments) they worked within, that when a loss occurred, they would find themselves devastated and unable to perform properly. Medical professionals realize that the patient is a whole, complex being and that loss of an extremity or ability is a substantial loss. Fortunately, many in medicine have reviewed this thinking and discovered that in order to care for a patient well one must become attached on some level while understanding that a loss may occur. Some scientists hold a similar view.
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Environmental Grief Environmental grief is the grief reaction stemming from the environmental loss of ecosystems caused by natural or man-made events. Whether or not scientists in general acknowledge the losses they encounter, those who do so find validation in having a name that describes their particular grief reaction. People reacting to the loss of their environment and to the ecosystems around them experience disenfranchised grief because society does not openly acknowledge these losses. The term disenfranchised grief has brought great validation to people who felt as though they were ostracized by society for having abnormal grieving processes. For some scientists researching the decline of the southern resident killer whale population in Puget Sound, environmental grief validated the feeling they had had for years. In gathering information on this subject, I interviewed a number of people active in the environmental sciences. Excerpts from several of these follow. Stefanie Hawks-Johnson studied orca behavior at the University of Washington, particularly their eating habits. She had years of experience working with the southern resident killer whales as a naturalist on whale-watching vessels. She had become interested in whales after seeing the effects of the Exxon-Valdez spill in 1989. She refers to it as an epiphany, stating she “realized how much the environment was being affected by all our actions.” After spending four to five months working with whales and other marine mammals in Australia and Alaska, Stefanie decided that she wanted to become involved in environmental education. Around 1994, she began learning about the southern resident killer whales while she was a naturalist on a whale-watching boat. A few years later, she applied for graduate school and was accepted at the University of Washington in Seattle. Her research has been on the southern residents and the decline of salmon. She was studying the main reasons for the southern resident decline. As she explained, “They are loaded with PCBs,” and there is a shortage of their food supply, mainly salmon. The third issue for the southern residents is still being studied, and that is the possibility that noise from whale-watching boats and private boats as well as other manmade sounds in the ocean are causing problems for the whales. “There are three huge issues up here in Washington for a distinct population of orcas. We’ve seen a 20% decline in the last five years.” She is researching what the whales are eating now, wanting to compare that to what they perhaps were eating in the past. The southern residents are
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____________________________________________________________ feeding on bottom-dwelling fish, which are not as nutritious as the salmon. Given the information she was expressing about the decline of the southern residents, I asked if she believed they would survive. Stefanie responded, I truly hope so, but my research will not be the end-all answer for saving these whales, nor will anybody else’s research. The way that we’re going to save these whales is a concentrated effort to change the way people fundamentally look at the environment and the way they interact with the environment. And what changes our lives - changing the little things that we do in our lives, from buying nontoxic chemicals to going to the store with canvas bags to looking at every single thing we buy as consumers. Quite frankly, the bottom line is that we as consumers are affecting the whales. Whatever we buy has something to do, some connection with the environment, and we have to realize that. I think that’s the only way that we’re going to actually be able to save the whales - if we start changing the way that we buy things in America. I asked Stefanie if she had a favorite killer whale. She stated that she feels closest to a male named Ruffles, as most people do. She believes that the reason everyone feels close to Ruffles is probably because Ruffles is one of those whales that you can identify so easily because he has a wavy dorsal fin. When you’re first out there, first doing your research, first doing whale watches, you see this huge dorsal fin that’s wavy and it’s Ruffles, this 50-plus-year-old male that you automatically just become very attached to. Ruffles is still alive, thank goodness. He is one of the only four surviving males, four adult surviving males in the southern resident community out of 80-some whales. Scientists are hoping that Ruffles will continue to reproduce. Another male that Stefanie mentioned is named Faith. “Because of the southern resident community’s problems, we always say that we still have Faith.” She is very attached to both Ruffles and Faith. She says she does grow attached to certain whales but that she loves them all. I asked how she would react when Ruffles dies.
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____________________________________________________________ [Tears] I would mourn and be very sad for him and be very sad for his family. He’s…it’s hard to describe when you’re talking about grief and sadness. I’d feel very sad. I’d feel that I’ve lost something. Do we need Ruffles? Do we need the Southern resident community? Do my kids need the southern resident community? Does everybody? Yeah. To talk about it as a parallel to losing one of your family members, I think that we all know that when you’re close to somebody, and you’re living with them day in and day out, there is a stronger connection that you create. And with being a mom, it’s an incredible maternal instinct to have this overwhelming desire to protect. I take those feelings seriously and I imagine and I don’t know if this is my imagination, I actually don’t think it is. I imagine those feelings that these animals, that these orcas, actually feel for their young. I know that some of the orcas have carried around their dead babies for up to a month, mourning their loss, and I think of that. I know they feel the same way as we do, I know it in my heart. I don’t know it as a scientist, and I don’t think we ever will as scientists, but I would feel very sad and very sad for their families. [More tears.] Stefanie discussed whales that had died, explaining that it was difficult to lose some of the younger whales, such as Everett, J-18, who was at the prime of his life. He was a young whale that was washed up on the shore in 2000. He died of a massive bacterial infection that his immune system should have been able to fight off and that he couldn’t, probably due to PCBs and the lack of food in combination. That made me angry. It made me really angry to see what we’re doing to our whales and to see that people don’t get it yet, we just don’t get it yet, and we don’t see our connection. I think I give people credit that they honestly care, but they don’t make the connection that they’re affecting the whales. This is a hard one to address. This touches on people’s personal rights and personal issues, but they don’t get the connection that if you have three or four kids, that
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____________________________________________________________ you’re creating more population on this planet, you’re creating more stress to this planet. She continued to discuss consumerism in the United States. Americans glamorize the overabundance in consumerism, such as large houses and large sport utility vehicles. In this fast-paced world, how can people stop to think and to use products that are environmentally friendly rather than use chemicals that will eat away at the dirt and grime - and our environment? Our society has become too fast; everything has to be easy. We have a throw-away society in which everything has to be disposable. We’ve become a lazy society. Not only is it being lazy. It’s worse than just being lazy, and it’s becoming a horrible problem in society. We are becoming lazy about caring for our neighbors and everything around us. We’re teaching our children not to care about the environment. People all around here are lazy [even Stefanie admits to it for herself, which makes her feel angry and sad, particularly for the world in which her children are being raised]. What is encouraging is that some companies are promoting sustainable resources, but the products are incredibly expensive, causing those of us who want to preserve our environment a lot of stress because many of us cannot afford to pay high prices for environmentally friendly products. And many of the people who have the money to buy these products simply don’t. The discussion soon grew into her expression of anger toward the auto manufacturers. She commented that while people are wanting to find better, healthier, organic foods, looking for health internally, it is ironic that the parking lots of some of these health food stores are filled with large SUVs. People need to balance their own health with a healthy environment. Sometimes Stefanie could not describe how she was feeling. She explained that she often feels “so frustrated and so angry and so sad sometimes and even more so now that I’m a mom of two little wonderful beings that I know we’re handing this planet down to.” We also discussed hope that people can reconnect to the environment and that there has to be a human-environment connection. We need our environment in order to survive.
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____________________________________________________________ Stefanie agreed that the southern resident killer whales might be a warning to us, like “canaries in the mine,” that if we don’t clean up our world, humankind might follow suit, creating our own extinction. After the interview, Stefanie and I spent time sharing our personal views on the plight of our environment. Since she had experienced tears during the interview, it was important to see that she would be all right. I shared with her the purpose of the study, discussing the idea of environmental grief. When I mentioned the term, Stefanie began to cry again, stating that there was finally a name to put to her feelings. She explained that for 11 years she had been feeling an ambiguous sadness, anger, and frustration but was not quite sure of what it was. She believed that the term environmental grief fit the way she was feeling for so many years. Just putting a name to those feelings made her feel validated.2 Dr. Rich Osborne is the Director of the Whale Museum in Friday Harbor, Washington. He is the lead author of A Guide to Marine Mammals of Greater Puget Sound3 and several scientific publications primarily focusing on orca behavior, acoustics, and ecology. Dr. Osborne has been in the Puget Sound area since 1969. He attended Evergreen State College in Olympia, Washington. When he was a freshman studying filmmaking, he read Lilly’s The Mind of the Dolphin, published in 1967. He found whales to be such incredibly intelligent animals that no one knew about and an exciting field to [explore]. He shifted his studies to whales, learning linguistics and a lot of biology, trying to get an education that wasn’t mainstream marine biology, but had all the other courses that would be relevant to whales. His senior internship was at the old Seattle Aquarium working with Don Goldsberry who captured most of the killer whales during that era. They closed that aquarium in 1976, and then the city of Seattle opened the present one. That same year, Ken Balcomb began a photo identification study in Friday Harbor. Dr. Osborne called Ken and asked him if he needed any help. Ken said “sure,” and Dr. Osborne has been on the island since then. He went on to get an anthropology degree from Western Washington University and studied captive gorillas at the Woodland Park Zoo in Seattle. In the 1990s, he received his PhD from the University of Victoria in physical geography and resource management. He researched historical ecology of the southern resident population. He tried to look at the last 200 years of the environment here from the whales’ perspective and do a trend analysis of things such as shipping traffic and toxins, looking at how the environment might have changed in that time. He said, “Odontocetes have culture, and killer whales are the best evolutionary model for human beings out there.”
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____________________________________________________________ Since Dr. Osborne has been on Friday Harbor, he has seen a great deal of change in the environment. When he first arrived, there were mostly commercial fishing boats. “They were everywhere. The whales were swimming through 80 to 100 gill netters; the noise was just deafening in the water.” Everybody likes orcas. I can’t say that there is anyone out there trying not to do the right thing. They wouldn’t do anything knowingly to hurt them. Most of the shooting of the whales by fishermen happened in the ‘50s and ‘60s. By the time the ‘70s began rolling around, they just didn’t care anymore. Dr. Osborne sees the growth on the island as terrible: I think that the number one environmental issue for the whole planet is overpopulation. It is truly the problem as far as I’m concerned. There are not enough resources on the planet, and every time we have another human being added to the system, that’s half a dozen wildlife and environmental areas that have to give up in order to supply that human being with the resources they need. It’s very straightforward, but I don’t see it culturally anywhere in the world that we are dealing with it. The only thing that seems to be going in the right direction is educating women, which brings birth levels down. That’s the only level of hope I see in the whole process. I’m very pessimistic about the future. Since Dr. Osborne has been working with the southern resident population for so long, we discussed his reactions to their decline, how he feels when one of them dies: I feel pretty bad, particularly with the ones I knew the best. The animals I knew in the ‘70s and ‘80s, I knew them personally a lot better because I did a lot more field work in those days. Those were the first individuals I got to know, so I got to watch them for 20 years and really get to know them. It was like losing a good friend or a really good pet anytime any of those individuals died. I just recently lost a bunch of pets, and there is that personal blow whenever you lose a loved one like that.
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____________________________________________________________ It’s usually stronger with another human being obviously, but it’s the same effect on people. In this last number of declines, there were older ones I expected to move on but not the younger ones. I might be getting jaded. I’m not very hopeful for their future because they are so toxic. I’m fairly convinced that that’s what’s killing them and that’s the thing we’re not doing anything about. You could begin the process of banning any persistent bioactive toxic chemicals that are being released into the environment because they are killing all of us. For the health and well-being of everyone on the planet, that’s what we should be doing. But the economic slump would be tremendous, but you have to set your priorities. He continued to discuss chemicals in other animals, such as the beluga whales, as well as the movement of these chemicals through the atmosphere: I’m more concerned with the entire planet than I am the southern residents. Orcas are such resourceful organisms that who knows what they may come up with as solutions. I can see them continuing on for quite a while. If we could get their food resources up, it would help a lot. They are most vulnerable when they aren’t getting enough food. As time goes on, second- and third-born calves are a lot cleaner than the first-born siblings because the mother will have a lifetime load of toxins and she’ll dump them mostly into her first calves; then subsequent calves have much lower levels. The loads in the environment still need to be lowered. I’m very sad. I’ve been particularly sad since the last election. He discussed the frustration that he, his wife, and his friends are all experiencing with the politics at this time.4 4.
Conclusion The prevailing themes from the interviews are consistent with reactions of environmental grief. The co-researchers shared reactions of anger, sadness, and frustration, all consistent with environmental grief. One of the greatest concerns a grieving person has is, “Is what I
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____________________________________________________________ am feeling normal?” People do not want to believe that they are crazy and therefore may not share their reactions, their feelings of grief over a loss. Once they are validated, these reactions and feelings are considered normal, and people may feel a sense of relief. When I first considered the idea of environmental grief, my concern was whether or not I was crazy. Was I the only person in the world who was grieving over the plight of our environment? I coined the term after reacting to the loss of marine mammals, especially whales. I also realized that when I read the news online about the increased logging in the Amazon or snowmobiles polluting Yellowstone National Park, I was reacting to environmental grief. Everything that we as humans are doing to the environment, the sheer destruction without any thought about the consequences of our actions, caused me to react this way. My concerns were validated by the responses and reactions of co-researchers, particularly when writer/scientist Leigh Calvez mentioned that she felt she was alone in her thinking. “I think it’s incredibly helpful to give this grief a name. It helps me to hear a term like that. It helps me feel that I’m not crazy, that I’m not alone.”5
Notes 1. Neimeyer, Robert and Louis. Gamino, “The Experience of Grief and Bereavement,” In Handbook of Death and Dying Volume 2, ed. Clifton D. Bryant (Thousand Oaks, California: Sage, 2003) 849. 2. Stefanie Hawks-Johnson in interview with author October 2002. 3. Rich Osborne, John Calambokidis, and Eleanor M. Dorsey, A Guide to Marine Mammals of Greater Puget Sound (Anacortes, Washington: Island Publishers, 1988). 4. Dr. Rich Osborne in interview with author October 2002. 5. Leigh Calvez, in interview with author, October 2002.
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Bibliography Kevorkian, Kriss. “Environmental Grief: Hope and Healing.” PhD diss., Union Institute and University, Cincinnati, Ohio, 2004. Neimeyer, Robert and L. Gamino. “The Experience of Grief and Bereavement.” In Handbook of Death and Dying Volume 2, edited by Clifton D. Bryant, 847-854. Thousand Oaks, California: Sage, 2003. Osborne, Rich, John Calambokidis, and Eleanor M. Dorsey. A Guide to Marine Mammals of Greater Puget Sound. Anacortes, Washington: Island Publishers, 1988.
Examining the Technological Approach to Environmentally Sustainable Architecture in India Deepika Mathur Abstract Sustainable architecture is a major issue in light of the environmental degradation that the world faces today. This paper argues that there is a need in India to extend the technological understanding of sustainable architecture to incorporate the socio-cultural aspects in its production. The need emerges from the fact that Indian architects have failed to recognize the significance of the social dimension in facilitating the development of sustainable agendas. On one end solutions have been developed to improve the energy efficiency of a building that need high initial investment and are based on technology. On the other end low cost technologies like mud architecture are being developed which do not fit in with the aspirations of the upwardly mobile urban population. Technology is thus seen as the only means of addressing environmental degradation. This issue is of particular relevance for developing countries such as India that are in the process of industrializing but are yet to confront the high costs of development. Key words: sustainable architecture, energy efficient buildings, and social sustainability 1.
Introduction Sustainable architecture in India is polarized into two approaches – the technology intensive ‘green’ architecture and low cost ‘alternative’ architecture. Both stress on development that is essentially technology based. This paper argues that there is a need to extend the technological understanding of sustainable architecture in India to incorporate the sociocultural aspects in its production. The dialectic in sustainable architecture is a legacy from the time of India’s independence, generated through the diverging visions of the India’s father of the nation, Mahatma Gandhi and India’s first Prime Minister Jawaharlal Nehru. Although Gandhi’s vision embraced ideas of modernity and nationhood, he believed that India’s future lay in developing a network of villages. He wanted the villages to have all amenities, a democratic administrative structure and most importantly be self-reliant. 1 In contrast, Nehru visualized India as a modern nation state where industrialization and urbanization were key indicators of progress. 2 He believed that technology had the ability to advance the cause of democracy. 3
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___________________________________________________________ Following Gandhi’s assassination, Nehru’s accession to power led to science and technology being adopted as the backbone of development. Nehru initiated the project of modernizing India by constructing dams establishing institutes of technology and introducing industries, factories and mines. 4 The State’s endorsement of modern architecture and urban models was reflected in the building of new capitals such as Chandigarh, and Bhubaneshwar. To Nehru, Chandigarh symbolized India’s progress towards a technocratic future with a clean break from the past. 5 The government was looking at constructing a secular national identity, unlike Pakistan that was bound by a common religion. 6 In fact, Nehru being a staunch rationalist saw religion as a private affair and kept it separate from politics. At the time of Independence, Nehru along with other western educated Indian elites adopted science as the way of progress. They saw universal reason as the only meeting ground with the west. And this formed the basis of a new structure of knowledge. 7 The authority of science was established in the newly independent country and became a part of its identity. Science symbolised ‘rationality and progress’ in India 8 . Not only was universal reason hailed as a way of reform, it was also the path to reorganize Indian culture and highlight Indian scientific traditions. Parallels of western science were sought in revived indigenous scientific traditions. 9 2.
Approach to sustainable architecture in India Sustainable architecture posed a new challenge for Indian architecture. With the oil crisis of 1973, the Indian scientific community quickly responded to the issues of sustainable development heralded by the developed world. The emerging green architecture turned towards science and technology to provide solutions for environmental degradation. The western technology dependent solutions were adopted to solve India’s environmental problems. In this approach energy efficiency was prioritized over all other concerns. 10 It tended to be excessively quantitative in nature with the success of the building being measured by its energy consumption, material embodied energy, waste and resource consumption. 11 This form of green architecture fitted easily into the existing power structures. Other approaches towards sustainability such as alternate modes of production, a decentralized approach to planning, emphasis on appropriate technology and need for contemporary regionalism were marginalized. 12 The government and Universities set up new research centers, for exploring non-conventional and renewable energy resources and simultaneously institutions researching adobe as low cost alternatives
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___________________________________________________________ emerged. 13 Government institutions promoted energy efficiency as a solution for achieving sustainable architecture. The salient features in this approach were increasing energy efficiency, reducing water consumption, using renewable energy and recycled products. Conversely, the activists following Gandhi drew inspiration from his at rustic ideal. 14 In spite of its obvious ecological benefits, it did not appeal to the popular modernity of a Adobe symbolized the kuchha rapidly urbanizing population. 15 (temporary) dwellings that the migrants and lower income group were trying to leave behind. 16 Their aspirations were for the pucca (permanent) house made from bricks and steel, which signified progress and upward mobility. The production of sustainable architecture reiterated the old Gandhi/ Nehru dialectic without finding less extreme or hybrid solutions. 3.
Sustainable architecture after liberalisation Following liberalization in 1990, there was rapid economic reform, greater privatization and globalization. 17 Nehru’s socialist ideals of selfreliance and economic equality gave way to India’s participation in the world economy. 18 The rapidly expanding middle class that represented a large consumer market was responsible for projecting a new identity of India as a global superpower with a strong economic base. The booming IT industry created a new image of India in the technological field and a visible sector of urban India was ready to take advantage of its advancement in science. Multinationals returned to India with airconditioned curtain glazed high-rise office blocks. Liberalization affected sustainable architecture too and it underwent considerable transformation with the adoption of global ‘green rating systems’ and its relevance to earlier frameworks was severed. In order to understand the creation of a new Indian sustainable architecture through these green rated buildings, CII Green Building Centre (CII GBC) in Hyderabad is an interesting case. It made headlines in India when it was awarded the LEED (Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design) ‘platinum’ rating by the US Green Building Council. Platinum rating is considered the highest rating and it was the first time it was given to a building outside the US. With CIIGBC being declared the ‘greenest’ building in the world by an internationally accredited organization, India gained a new global identity as one of the leaders in sustainable architecture movement much like the attention Malaysia received when the Petronas Towers were unveiled. Reliance on science and technology had finally paid off. While CII GBC is ostensibly a green building that also promotes green construction in India, it has also institutionalized green architecture in India. New markets are now being explored and created for green
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___________________________________________________________ building materials through this institute. Several other buildings are being designed on principles laid out by US Green Building council, all vying for the LEED awards. At present three buildings have already been awarded LEED gold/platinum ratings and seven more are waiting completion so that they can apply. All these buildings are corporate offices or IT parks. Being ‘green’ adds value to corporations who are competing globally for projects. The belief that science can fix the world’s problems is further reinforced by the President’s endorsement. The President of India, who also happens to be a top scientist responsible for India’s nuclear blasts in 2000, was present at the opening of CII GBC and Grundfos thus signifying govt. patronage for green buildings. 4.
Limitations of green buildings However these stand-alone green buildings are overshadowing critical issues of sustainability. The current, award-based production of sustainable architecture, while constructing an Indian identity as one addressing environmental concerns, skews the Indian sustainable debate by ignoring important social aspects in the production of sustainable architecture. In short the version of sustainability adopted by India exists outside familiar systems of social & cultural production Although the technology dependent green buildings have contributed in raising awareness and stimulating debate about sustainable architecture, they have several limitations. These buildings have 10-25 percent higher initial investment than traditional constructions. 19 High initial costs and therefore dependence on corporate or government patronage has also restricted the adoption of this type of architecture to institutional building types with a few isolated exceptions of suburban residences. Almost 50% of all construction activity in India is in private housing. Efforts to make this large sector sustainable have been virtually negligible. Isolated buildings are judged, as ‘sustainable’ while their context is not considered at all. Ignorance of the social process, underlying the built object has isolated the building from its context. Maximizing natural lighting and ventilation to achieve energy efficiency is often achieved at the cost of using large quantities of materials with high-embodied energy like glass, aluminum, etc. 20 The large amount of energy that goes into extracting, processing and transporting materials used in these buildings (embodied energy) needs to be considered when while calculating the building’s energy efficiency. The claimed reduced energy usage is sometimes not an accurate picture of actual energy consumed.
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___________________________________________________________ The intent of technology-oriented sustainable architecture in India has been to produce spectacular buildings. Building like CII GBC and Groundfos are an example of that. As “conspicuous technology” has also been the goal of science in India since independence, these buildings are an extension of that. 21 Indian middle classes depend upon ‘spectacular technology’ to deliver them from social problems. With CII GBC winning accolades internationally, it has come to symbolize all that sustainable architecture stands for in India. Sustainable architecture now means green rating systems and green technology such as solar heater and photovoltaic. Environmental agendas in India, and green buildings are often based on the precedents from developed countries. 22 The 2004 draft National Environmental Policy of India came under heavy criticism for this reason. It laid down environmental challenges for India in general terms as lifted from Agenda 21 without making them relevant to India or her concerns. 23 Similarly, the issue of energy efficiency is more relevant for developed countries where one-third of the total energy is utilized for heating or cooling of buildings. In adopting energy efficiency as the main criteria for green buildings in India, several more critical issues have been ignored. In India the issues of water and sanitation are more critical than energy efficiency. Studies indicate that at current rates of population growth and per capita consumption of water, there will be a shortage of drinking water in urban centers within the next decade. 24 The 60’s environmental movement grew out of concern for the environment and as a critique of modernization and capitalism. 25 The current form of green architecture in India embodies all that that the earlier movement critiqued. It had emerged as a social movement essentially seeking structural changes in the society. Its imported form in India slowly moved away from the social aspects of the movement and restricted itself to the technological aspects. In a country where population, urbanization and poverty constitute its most pressing problems, a technology that glosses over these fundamental issues is untenable. 5.
Need for social sustainability The debate on sustainable architecture cannot be restricted to quantitative environmental sustainability and it is essential that relationship between social, economic and environmental sustainability should become a critical consideration for the design of India’s built environment. The ‘green building’ as an isolated object does not integrate with India’s socio-cultural fabric any more than say an adobe house does. There has been too much emphasis on individual problems and their technical solutions. Sustainable architecture in India needs to address the larger issues and account for the changing social and environmental
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___________________________________________________________ conditions because rapid population growth and urbanization have directly impacted the environment. Nearly 30% of India’s population lives in urban areas that percentage is estimated to increase to 50% in the next fifteen years. 26 Between 1947 and 2000, the total population of India increased two and a half times while the urban population increased five fold. On one hand the present form of urban development in India is comparable to worldwide urban development and clearly unsustainable. On the other hand it is impossible to envisage a future not rooted in urban living. This means that it is impossible to solve the problem of sustainable architecture without addressing the issue of urban living. The affluent lifestyle of city suburbs impacts the environment as much as the inner city slums. The post industrialist, capitalist nature of society that India is fast acquiring is one of the main sources of environmental degradation. 27 The growing urban middle class with its changing lifestyle is straining the supply of natural resources. 28 The consumption patterns of the elite resemble those of developed countries and impact the environment with their high resource use and waste. On the other hand the low-income classes in urban centres with low resource consumption, and waste generation also adversely affect the environment. The lack of infrastructure like adequate water supply, sanitation and low quality housing impacts the environment of the whole city. 29 Therefore there needs to be a sustainable relationship between consumers and the resources, waste sink and ecosystems they draw from. For architecture to be sustainable the process of its production, consumption and its context is important. In the technology based sustainable architecture, only the process of production is emphasized. As the technological reliance has gained singular importance, the social role of people as consumers of and decision makers about sustainable architecture has been reduced in the face of elite hegemony of technology and technological processes. 6.
Conclusion By limiting itself to sustainability that is dependent on technology for solutions, sustainable architecture in India fails to incorporate the critical dimension of social and cultural sustainability without which it may not work in the Indian context. 30 To be environmentally sustainable, architecture would need to also register the social, political, economical and cultural context of India and offer solutions that are sensitive to its particularities. This precludes universal technological solutions in the form of models of environmental sustainability derived from the West.
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___________________________________________________________ This issue is of particular relevance for developing countries such as India that are in the process of industrializing but are yet to confront the high costs of development. Both urbanization and suburban growth take a heavy toll on the environment and the lack of sustainable framework suggests that the architectural profession has failed to recognize the critical need for developing socially appropriate sustainable architectural practices for India.
Notes 1
Gyan Prakash, The Urban Turn (accessed 5 june 2005); available from http://www.sarai.net/journal/02PDF/03morphologies/02urban_turn.pdf. 2 Sunil Khilnani, The Idea of India (New York: Farrar Straus Giroux, 1997), 167 and Prakash, The Urban Turn. 3 Ravi Kalia, Chandigarh:The Making of an Indian City (New Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1999). 4 Kazi Khaleed Ashraf and James Belluardo, eds., An Architecture of Independence: The Making of Modern South Asia (New York: The Architectural League of New York, 1998), 13 5 Prakash, The Urban Turn. 6 Ashraf and Belluardo, eds., An Architecture of Independence: The Making of Modern South Asia. 7 Gyan Prakash, Another Reason: Science and Imagination of Modern India (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), 4 8 Prakash, Another Reason: Science and Imagination of Modern India, 7 9 Prakash, Another Reason: Science and Imagination of Modern India, 6-7 10 Simon Guy and Graham Farmer, "Reinterpreting Sustainable Architecture: The Place of Technology," Journal of Architectural Education 54, (2001): 140-147 11 Guy and Farmer, "Reinterpreting Sustainable Architecture: The Place of Technology." 12 Chris Abel, Architecture & Identity (Oxford: Architectural Press, 1997). 13 Vinod Gupta, "Energy Conservation: Indian Myths and Realities," Architecture + Design, May-June (1992): 19 14 Vikram Bhatt and Peter Scriver, Contemporary Indian Architecture: After the Masters (Ahmedabad: Mapin, 1990), 94 15 Bhatt and Scriver, Contemporary Indian Architecture: After the Masters, 94 16 Gautam Bhatia, Laurie Baker, Life, Work, Writings (New Delhi: Viking, 1991).
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Kirtee Shah, "Agenda 21 for Sustainable Construction in Developing Countries - the Indian Case." 18 Ashraf and Belluardo, eds., An Architecture of Independence: The Making of Modern South Asia, 19 19 M. Majumdar, "Going Green," Times News Network (2004). 20 David Lloyd Jones, Architecture and the Environment: Bioclimatic Building Design (London: Laurence King, 1998), 228-229 21 Ashis Nandy, ed., Science, Hegemony and Violence: A Requiem for Modernity (Delhi: Oxford University Press, 1988), 7 22 J.E. Hardoy, D. Mitlin, and D. Satterthwaite, Environmental Problems in an Urbanizing World: Finding Solutions for Cities in Africa, Asia and Latin America (London: Earthscan, 2001). 23 C P Geevan, "National Environmental Policy: Ascendance of Economic Factors," Economic and Political Weekly (2004). 24 K.C.Pant, "Setting the Agenda for India," in Sustainability through Building, ed. N.K.Bansal and Jeffrey Cook (New Delhi: Omega Scientific Publishers, 2001). 25 Arthur P.J Mol, "The Environmental Transformation of the Modern Order," in Modernity and Technology, ed. Thomas J. Misa, Philip Brey, and Andrew Feenberg (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 2003). 26 Cities/Urban: Statistics http://urbanindia.nic.in/scene.htm on 10/03/04. 27 Wang, "Sustainability Is a Cultural Problem." 28 Wilfried Wang, "Sustainability Is a Cultural Problem," Harvard Design Magazine 18, no. Spring/Summer (2003). 29 J.E. Hardoy, D. Mitlin, and D. Satterthwaite, Environmental Problems in an Urbanizing World: Finding Solutions for Cities in Africa, Asia and Latin America (London: Earthscan, 2001), 7 30 It is generally agreed there are four key strands of sustainability – environmental, social, cultural and economic.
Search for a Theory Linking Environment and Society Doriana Daroit Luis Felipe Nascimento Abstract The link between environment and society configures a field where nature, society and economics should be studied together. This relationship opens possibilities for different approaches and interpretations about environmental themes and its management inside organizations. More than descriptions, for the comprehension of the field, are necessary studies that promote questions, which can lead to transformations in the management and production regime. The present study brings to environmental theme different approaches coming from management, economics and sociology to discuss environmental management. Data were collected in companies with certificate ISO9000, in Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. Theory section stands out the criteria of efficiency from Scientific Management and from Simon, the Transation Cost Economics with Coase, Williamson and North works, and discusses the importance of conflicts and power for environmental decisions and actions. The data analysis showed that all theories can contribute to understanding the relations between environment and society. Key words: Environment, organizational theory, efficiency, transaction costs, environmental discourse, power. 1.
Introduction The use of nature is at the base of human economic and social organization. To human developed techniques the scientific method was added, generating knowledge that was further transformed into technologies, thus resulting in further “discoveries”. The exploitation of natural resources leads to the existence of food, clothing, computers, and spaceships. Nature is subordinated to our economic interests. However, how are such relationships established? Can such a complex set of relationships be solely driven by economics? Some approaches to organizational management seem to enhance the economic view, without discussing its implications on the set of nature-society relationships. Denying questioning the subject, and which relationships are desirable, studies become a description of what already exists, immune to the thinking that could transform production management and generate positive consequences to the environment and to society. This work aims at discussing the contribution of organizational and economic theories to environmental management. In 2000, a survey was conducted in ISO9000 companies in the Rio Grande do Sul State, Brazil. The study’s objective was to identify the main negative environmental impacts generated by companies and the respective
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_________________________________________________ counter-measures responses adopted. The population was composed of 188 companies, out of which 33 collaborated in the survey. The 33 companies were part of the following sectors: metal-mechanic, plastics and rubber, chemical and petrochemical, and electro-electronic. Five were selected for in-depth interviews according to environment harm reduction criteria, scope of environmental measures and financial quantification of such measures. Data analysis was conducted using different and wellestablished theories in the management and economics fields: scientific management, Simon’s research on decision making and efficiency, and the studies on transaction costs performed by Coase, Williamson and North. Also works by Foucault were considered as inspirations for the power analysis used in the definition of environmental practices. 2.
Efficiency in Scientific Management According to Taylor, efficiency referred to the relationship between real performance in a given task and the standard set for its accomplishment. Efficiency was achieved through the standardization of movements and tools 1 . The initial trend in management was to consider administrative questions as engineering problems 2 . According to March and Simon 3 , this is explained by the Taylor’s background and by the situation experienced by him and his collaborators. The Taylor-method substantially increased labor performance, i.e., its efficiency 4 . According to Taylor 5 , maximum company performance, and, consequently maximum employee success, is achieved through the maximum productivity of those responsible for company functions, in its turn obtainable via training. Therefore, efficiency and productivity are interwoven concepts. A. Taylor, Ford, the Environment… Through interviews, it became evident that preoccupation moved from end-of-pipe solutions to process modifications that minimize wastes and costs. This is specially noticed in the Cleaner Production program, whose main appeal is cost reduction through modifications in the procedures and in the production technology. ISO14000 privileges the standardization of productive and administrative practices so that they become correctly executed, i.e. efficient. This is achieved through workers’ training on new practices that are less environmentally aggressive. Concerns related to measuring environmental management system results, particularly through waste generation and energy consumption indicators, reflect the concern with achieving the established performance standard. The presentation of indicators to the board of directors has demonstrated the importance of production efficiency as a factor in the maintenance or expansion of environmental investments.
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_________________________________________________ Since efficiency and productivity concepts are strongly related, greater production efficiency may lead to greater productivity. On the one hand, attention to the method employed in task execution leads to resource savings, be them labor, energy, raw materials or equipment usage; on the other hand, such greater efficiency when allied to greater productivity may result in greater resource consumption due to the increase in the company’s productivity. Although the company activities might be considered less environmentally aggressive from a process-based standpoint, they might not result in a reduction of the company’s environmental impacts from a global perspective. 3.
Simon and the Efficiency Criterion According to Simon 6 , social sciences do not have as precise mechanisms as those owned by natural sciences. Efficiency in administrative decisions is a concept “almost identical to the concept of utility maximization in the economic theory” 7 . Efficiency is related to the existence of scarce resources, and the activities involve the comparability of reference values. Therefore, “the efficiency criterion determines the choice of alternatives that lead to the maximization of results when scarce resources are applied” 8 . However, alternatives cannot be exhausted because the decision maker does not have the necessary computational power and only owns incomplete information; besides many alternatives do not represent and adequate solution. The decision is made when one of the alternatives presents a satisfactory item, achieving an expectation level formed on the basis of past experiences and one that allows a judgment on decision quality. However, the expectation level must be adjusted as a function of the parameters found in the domain and during the unfolding of the situation, parameters that do not refer to utility only 9 . Since the administrative activity is groupal in nature, its identification with the values of an organized group, an organization, orients it according to the organizational objectives, not according to myriad human values. Ethical premises of the organization constitute the organization’s objectives 10 . When the organization provides the decision maker with fundamental values, it restricts his or her choices. Therefore, for commercial organizations and used an expression used by Simon 11 , the fundamental premise corresponds to profit and decisions are oriented to maximize income or minimize cost. Money corresponds to the common denominator that allows the choice of one alternative among the many available. As described by Simon 12 , rationality is limited. According to this view, the administrative man operates in a complex world, but his perception is simple. Therefore, he compromises, since he cannot maximize. Decisions seek a satisfactory action course.
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_________________________________________________ A. Simon and the Environmental Management? The environmental management activities present in a company are directed by the values and policies established by the company. Alternatives are further restricted when one deals with profit-oriented commercial organizations. Organizational objectives are established via authority and communication channels. In general, quality programs require as a fundamental step, the commitment from the top management, not only for the liberation of investments, but also for the establishment of an environmental policy, the latter based on a set of values, i.e., organizational objectives. This was verified in the studied companies. Since they were profit-seeking organizations, it is natural to have profit as the decision-guiding factor. This partly explains why environmental activities in the studied companies are directed to costs minimization or to the discovery of business opportunities, practices that not necessarily transform polluting programs. The decisions do not question whether the goals are ethical or not, for this was established while discussing organizational values and the environmental policy defined by the top management. However, decisions are made on the basis of limited rationality. Choices are satisfactory. Therefore, decisions are also guided by intrinsic values learned by each one of the decision makers. In the case studies, it was observed that all companies went through an initial phase, in which employee culture change is attempted. Trainings are used not only as a means of teaching new procedures but also to highlight the importance of the environment, health, safety and the well-being of the employees, the company and the community itself. The preoccupation described as productive efficiency places economic gains derived from new practices and opportunities at the center of environmental management. The emphasis on competitiveness is evident; as quoted in more than one interview: national and international markets may require a proof that the company is seeking impact reduction. This means that the profit dimension governs environmental management. The question that cannot be answered by this study is whether organizations would maintain their environmental practices in detriment of profit reduction, thus revealing an influence of environmental values that are not linked to profitability. 4.
Transaction Costs Economics From the 70’s, institutionalism has undergone a set of transformations in its economic, sociological and political facets 13 . Although the interests on sociological and political aspects are invaluable to the analysis of environmental questions, this work opted for a discussion of the economic aspect of neo-institutionalism, based on the
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_________________________________________________ economy of transaction costs, because, during the research, it was clear the importance placed by the interviewees on the profitability associated to environmental practices. Cost transaction economy represents one of the most recent developments in theory of the firm, inaugurated by the classical theory but reconfigured by the work of Ronald Coase, in 1937: The nature of the firm 14 . In order to answer why firms exist and what determines their actions, Coase introduced the concept of transaction costs. They correspond to research and information costs, bargaining and decision costs and control costs, present in a transaction. According to Coase, economy traditionally considered the price mechanism as responsible for the coordination of the economic system. The only reason for the establishment of a firm is the existence of costs of use of price mechanisms: price identification costs, negotiation costs and contracting costs. The contracts for the conduction of firm activities via process mechanisms are replace by a smaller number of contracts inside the firm, e.g. contracts among the employer and his employees. In a different work entitled The problem of social cost 15 , in 1960, Coase deals with firm actions that harm others, such as pollution. These negative effects of one firm on another are called externalities. Within the neo-classic economic theory, externalities are solved according to the work of Pigou 16 : through the responsabilization of the producer via taxes and fines in proportion to the harm caused. For Coase 17 , the pollution problem is reciprocal in nature. If A provokes a nocive effect on B, avoiding B’s problem may harm A. The solution should consider the total cost of pollution minimization. Following Coase’s work on transaction costs and property rights, Oliver Williamson developed the Transaction Cost Economy (TCE) maintaining the emphasis on the importance of firm coordination activities, the market and property rights. For Williamson 18 , the firm is a governance structure. In the TCE, firms and markets represent alternative forms of governance and the distribution of activities among them stems from the institutional environment. What is governance, however? According to Williamson 19 : “Governance is the means by which to infuse order, thereby to mitigate conflict and to realize “the most fundamental of all understandings in economics”, mutual gain from voluntary exchange”. Williamson follows North’s definition of institutions: “institutions are the rules of the game in a society or, more formally, are the humanly devised constrains that shape human interaction” 20 . Institutions reduce uncertainty, because they provide support for daily activities. Therefore, the institutional environment and governance institutions play a very important role in the industrial organization 21 . In order to succeed, as organization needs to adapt itself to the
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_________________________________________________ environment 22 . This also influences vertical integration. Since transactions differ in their attributes and governance structures differ in costs and competences, transactions must be aligned with appropriate governance structures 23 . Besides Coase’s influence, TCE resorts to Simon’s notion of limited rationality The latter directly influences the elaboration of contracts, which are considered intrinsically incomplete 24 . Apart from the problems associated to the impossibility of foreseeing all situations associated to a transaction during contract closure, one must consider the opportunistic behavior of the agents. Ex ante governance is essential to avoid ex post opportunism problems. Instead of the satisfying, derived from limited rationality, TCE seeks the economizing. Economizing refers to reducing waste, burocracy and other types of adaptation losses; it aims at better contractual alignment, organization, incentives and controls 25 . TCE presents three levels that transact and are responsible for the firm’s governance structure. The institutional environment, which influences the form and its governance structures and which, in its turn, affects the individual. The reverse path is also valid for the TCE. Transaction costs, according to North 26 , derive not only from the inefficiency of property rights stemming from the institutional environment,, but also from the imperfect mind models of the agents when they try to understand the complexity of routine problems. A. Transaction Costs and the Environment? Something not so Strange… Regarding environmental management the question is: what are the game rules in regard to the environment? There are two main components here: making money, the objective of any capitalist enterprise, and being concerned with the environment. However, according to the practices described by the studied companies, both are intrinsically connected. The presence of environmental inspection bodies, like FEPAM, and the consequent possibility of fines for bad environmental behavior prod companies towards the adoption of environmental management processes. However, following Coase's reasoning on social cost, taxes and fines are not enough to curb negative externalities such as pollution. Even governmental administration has its costs and the system efficiency can be affected. Therefore, market mechanisms aimed at the inclusion of environmental norms have been increasingly preferred. The reasoning privileges the economic view both from the active and from the passive subjects, avoiding fines, reducing costs or improving the company's image. The value that guides environmental preoccupation is income maximization, from which the need of clear property rights regarding the environment stems. This generates a conflict with the views regarding the environment as a public good 27 .
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_________________________________________________ The profit component seems to have a greater importance as a “game rule”, since the adoption of practices that stretch beyond what is required by law suffices to the objective of saving resources and attending present and future market demands. The market assumes a capital importance for it considers the existence of consumers who value products and services that are less environmentally aggressive. This involves not only purchase relations but also the company's image as environmentally non-aggressive, a fact that may avoid transaction costs. Partnerships developed with universities, and with the National Center of Clean Technologies, may represent a step towards a more effective insertion of environmental values in organizations. Various governance structures were found in the researched companies. One of the companies, for example, sought long-term contracts, actively participating in suppliers environmental audits, whereas others simply controlled their suppliers through a set of pre-established requirements, like operations licenses issued and renewed by FEPAM, as a means of avoiding control costs. The common denominator to all companies where in-depth interviews occurred is the existence of an engineering staff, which is responsible for the environmental area, in hierarchically distinct levels. The engineers work with human resource and product development professionals, indicating an adaptation to the complex institutional environment represented by ecological requirements. Regarding customers, one notices sometimes an opportunistic behavior. For example, a PVC producer states that its product is recyclable, but does not reveal that PVC has carcinogenic substances, the reason for the ban on PVC toys and medical products in Europe (a ban that can be extended to other consumption goods). 5.
Discourse, Power and Environment Discourse promotes and reflects power relations. It is simultaneously a text, a discursive practice and a social practice. The discursive practice focuses on the concepts of ideology and hegemony that are produced, reproduced and transformed in the discourse 28 . For Foucault 29 , power is not found in a single aspect, but in power correlations that generate different ever-unstable states of power. These relations of power are expressed and constituted in the discourse. Therefore, discourse is the power that is to be seized. For Hardy e Phillips 30 , discourse produces concepts that are ideas that represent our view of the world. Concepts can be transformed in time and with respect too the situation producing them, disseminated and interpreted by different social agents. These concepts do not live in harmony. Much to the contrary, they are source of disputes among the
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_________________________________________________ agents seeking their legitimacy and hegemony. Different concepts evoke different objects and involve different practices to deal with this object. According to Olivo and Misoczky 31 , in the environmental discourse presented in the Brundtland Report, there is a predominance of economic logic to determine the concept of sustainable development and strategic actions of sustainability. The logic of life preservation was left in second place. Springett 32 points that the term sustainable development is confused with other concepts and with the very notion of sustainable development. Government members, NGO and companies use concepts such as triple bottom line, sustainability, sustainable management, sustainable grow, and ecoefficience as synonyms. The confusion is also a reflection of the dispute among agents. Therefore, environmental discourse and its different interpretations and uses involve the understanding of environmental practices not only as efficient ones, but also as those that are better situated in the power space involving governmental agencies, NGOs and society. A. Power Sighs The works of Foucault were used as an inspiration because the data collected within a positivist paradigm and with other purposes do not facilitate a more detailed analysis. However, these theories were chosen in order to indicate that new useful insights about our relationship with nature are possible. During in-depth interviews it was possible to identify the green business discourse and a lack of questioning about the ecological limits, since environmental questions were considered efficiency issues linked to processes and profitability. The preoccupation with the company image is also clear in the discourse. The economic growth and free market ideologies are not questioned in the company, nor by the company representatives, and the environmental discourse is one of transformation and responsibility towards future generations. It was possible to observe clashes between FEPAM and companies. The latter stated that the former does not participate in the solution of environmental problems, only inspecting and fining. Although not explicitly mentioned by the interviewees, clashes also exist inside companies, between environmental staff and the board, among different departments and among different job positions. In the first case, environmental performance indicators are used as a power resource to convince top management of the utility of environmental practices; among departments practices and environment consciousness disseminators are mobilized, whereas at the individual level, each employee seeks to enlarge his or her family environmental awareness level.
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_________________________________________________ 6.
Final Considerations It is important to stress that this work has not aimed at presenting complementary theories, but different views of the same question. Moreover, the economic approach was favored for it still is a cornerstone in the environmental practices of companies, as noticed in the interviews. This does not mean that the sociological and political approaches are not interesting. On the contrary, their use in the development of new studies is essential to widen the understanding of the relationships among society, economy and environment. Organizational theories that are directed to economic explanations such as those discussed in this study, reveal the importance of the economic aspect in environmental issues, but also point to its limitations. As already mentioned in the introduction, nature-society relations have a complexity that stretch beyond economic explanations. One is led into inquiring whether management practices based on efficiency or the economizing, such as ISO14000, PML and other market mechanisms may lead to sustainable development or may represent the maintenance of old environmentally aggressive management practices, specially when profitability level is at stake. These economic explanations and their associated management practices do not seem to respond to the necessary changes in nature-society relations as pointed by the United Nations 33 , the World Bank 34 and the Worldwatch Institute. Other theories and world views need to be mobilized so the one can better understand nature-society relations. It was difficult to analyze the data obtained, because they were collected without considering the different theories presented herein. This was particularly relevant during the analysis of the agents' opportunistic behavior and the environmental discourse and associated power relations. Finally, as stated by Simon, decisions are embodied by values. The choice of theories stemmed from the authors need to question environmental practices and their relation to the organizational theory and the economy. The richness of the field seems to open the doors to new views that aggregate different understandings about the subject, in the construction of a discussion space where new elements are constantly added. Each element, individually, and their associated relations can be responsible for the reconfiguration of the field and a different understanding of naturesociety relations.
Notes 1
Antonio C. A. Maximiano, Introdução à administração. (5 ed. São Paulo: Atlas, 2000).
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_________________________________________________ 2
Bertram M Gross, Organizations and their managing ( New York: The Free Press, 1968). 3 J.G. March, H.A. Simon, Les organisations (12 ed. Paris : Dunod, 1969). 4 Gareth Morgan, Images de l’organisation (Canada: Université Laval et Éditions ESKA, 1989). 5 Frederic W Taylor, La direction scientifique des entreprises (Paris : Dunod, 1971). 6 Herbert A. Simon, Comportamento administrativo (Rio de Janeiro: USAID, 1965). 7 Ibid, 207. 8 Ibid, 209. 9 Herbert A. Simon, “Methodological foundations of economics,” Praxiologles and the philosophy of economics 1 (1992): 25-41. 10 Simon, 1965. 11 Herbert A. Simon, “On the concept of organizational goal,” Administrative Science Quarterly 9 (1964) 1-22. 12 Simon, 1965. 13 Cristina A. Carvalho et al., “A inflexão conservadora na trajetória histórica da Teoria Institucional,” CD ROM do XXVIII Encontro Anual da Associação dos Programas de Pós-Graduação em Administração (Curitiba, 2004). 14 Ronald H Coase, “The nature of the firm,” in: The firm, the market, and the law (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988). 15 Ronald H Coase, “The problem of social cost,” in: The firm, the market, and the law (Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988). 16 A. C Pigou, The economics of welfare, (4 ed. London: Macmillan and Co., 1960). 17 Coase, 1988. 18 Oliver E Williamson, The mechanisms of governance (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996). 19 Oliver E. Williamson, “The theory of the firm as governance structure: from choice to contract,” Journal of Economic Perspectives 16 (2002) 171-195. 20 Douglass North, Institutions, institutional change and economic performanc. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990). 21 Williamson, 1996. 22 Oliver E Williamson, “ Transaction costs economics: how it works; where it is headed,” The Economist 146 (1998). 23 Williamson, 2002. 24 Christopher S Boerner, Jeffrey T. Macher, “Transaction costs economics: an assessment of empirical research in social sciences,” Working paper (2005).
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_________________________________________________ 25
Williamson, 1996. North, 1990. 27 Garret Hardin, “The tragedy of the commons,” Science 162 (1968) 1243-1248. 28 Norman Fairclough, Discurso e mudança social (Brasília: Editora Universidade de Brasília, 2001). 29 Michel Foucault, A ordem do discurso (São Paulo: Edições Loyola, 2005). 30 Cynthia Hardy, Nelson Phillips, “No joking matter: discursive struggle in the canadian refugee system,” Organization studies 20 (1999) 1-24. 31 Vania M.F Olivo, Maria C. A. Misoczky, “As estratégias discursivas presentes na origem do referencial para o desenvolvimento sustentável: uma análise crítica do Relatório de Brundtland. CD ROM do Encontro Nacional sobre Gestão Empresarial e Meio Ambiente (São Paulo, 2003). 32 Delyse Springett, “Business conceptions of sustainable development: a perspective from critical theory,” Business Strategy and the Environment 12 (2003) 71-86. 33 UN Millennium Development Goals, (23 April 2005). . 34 World Development Report 2003. Sustainable development in a dynamic world: transforming institutions, growth, and quality of life, (17 September 2004). . 26
Bibliography Boerner, Christopher S., Macher, Jeffrey T. “Transaction costs economics: an assessment of empirical research in social sciences,” Working paper (2005). Carvalho, Cristina A., Goulart, Sueli, Vieira, Marcelo M. F. “A inflexão conservadora na trajetória histórica da Teoria Institucional,” CD ROM do XXVIII Encontro Anual da Associação dos Programas de Pós-Graduação em Administração.(Curitiba, 2004. Coase, Ronald H. “The nature of the firm,” in: The firm, the market, and the law. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988. Coase, Ronald H. “The problem of social cost,” in: The firm, the market, and the law. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press, 1988. Fairclough,Norman. Discurso e mudança social. Brasília: Editora Universidade de Brasília, 2001. Foucault, Michel. A ordem do discurso. São Paulo: Edições Loyola, 2005.
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_________________________________________________ Hardin, Garret “The tragedy of the commons,” Science 162 (1968) 12431248. Hardy, Cynthia, Phillips, Nelson. “No joking matter: discursive struggle in the canadian refugee system,” Organization studies 20 (1999) 1-24. March, J.G., Simon, H.A. Les organisations. 12 ed. Paris : Dunod, 1969. Maximiano, Antonio C. A. Introdução à administração. 5 ed. São Paulo: Atlas, 2000. Gross, Bertram M Organizations and their managing. New York: The Free Press, 1968. Morgan, Gareth. Images de l’organisation. Canada: Université Laval et Éditions ESKA, 1989. North, Douglass. Institutions, institutional change and economic performanc. New York: Cambridge University Press, 1990. Olivo,Vania M.F., Misoczky, Maria C. A. “As estratégias discursivas presentes na origem do referencial para o desenvolvimento sustentável: uma análise crítica do Relatório de Brundtland. CD ROM do Encontro Nacional sobre Gestão Empresarial e Meio Ambiente. São Paulo, 2003. Pigou, A. C The economics of welfare, 4 ed. London: Macmillan and Co., 1960. Simon, Herbert A. “On the concept of organizational goal,” Administrative Science Quarterly 9 (1964) 1-22. Simon, Herbert A. Comportamento administrativo. Rio de Janeiro: USAID, 1965. Simon, Herbert A. “Methodological foundations of economics,” Praxiologles and the philosophy of economics 1 (1992): 25-41. Simon, Herbert A. “Rationality in psychology and economics,” Journal of Business 59 (1986) 209-224. Springett, Delyse. “Business conceptions of sustainable development: a perspective from critical theory,” Business Strategy and the Environment 12 (2003) 71-86. Taylor, Frederic W. La direction scientifique des entreprises. Paris : Dunod, 1971. Williamson, Oliver E. The mechanisms of governance. New York: Oxford University Press, 1996. Williamson, Oliver E “ Transaction costs economics: how it works; where it is headed,” The Economist 146 (1998). Williamson, Oliver E. “The theory of the firm as governance structure: from choice to contract,” Journal of Economic Perspectives 16 (2002) 171-195.
Part IV
The Search for Effective Moral Discourse: Environmental Ethics and Campaigning
Owning Nature: The Case of Hegel Simon Hailwood Abstract This paper is part of a larger project connecting the issue of the social construction of nature with the concept of property and the possibility of embedding non-instrumentalism about (non-human nature) within mainstream political philosophy. Consequently, whilst not denying the importance or urgency of environmental justice, it is concerned with ecological justice, with ‘doing justice’ to the natural world ‘for its own sake’. More specifically, it is concerned with a certain way of thinking that stands in the way of such justice. Using some brief comments on Hegel’s justification of private property by way of illustration, I seek to convey the following ideas: 1) the notion of property plays a crucial intellectual role in our constructing a home in the world; 2) traditional philosophical justifications of property colour ownership in purely anthropocentric ways; 3) they do this even when the philosophers involved have wider metaphysical systems according intrinsic value to non-human nature. I finish by suggesting that given the existence of a non-human nature encompassing non-human interests, theories of property taking into account only human interests are objectionably ideological. Keywords: Landscape, Nature, Property, Hegel, Anthropocentrism, Instrumentalism 1.
Introduction We humans have to make a home for ourselves in the natural world. We must transform our physical environment to satisfy our wants and needs; and we must interpret it, make sense of it and, in doing so, we inject our surroundings with meaning and significance. The landscapes we live in mark our attempts, and those of our ancestors, to modify nature in line with human purposes, and they are filled with historical and symbolic significance. Property ownership is central to this process, not only because forms of property system profoundly affect the shape of landscapes as economic endeavours, as well as the distribution of life chances of their human inhabitants, but because the notion of ownership itself encompasses a fundamental relation, mediating the human and nonhuman, through which we construct our surroundings. Because of this central importance, philosophical accounts of property, their selection of the factors they see as relevant and important, and the way they treat them, are telling indicators of the status given to non-human nature.
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___________________________________________________________ Unfortunately, traditional philosophical theories of property tend to be thoroughly anthropocentric in standardly assuming that only human interests, needs, justice and so on, should be taken into account. Through its adherence to the anthropocentric standard assumption in its treatment of ownership, political philosophy moves in on environmental philosophy, occupying its terrain, pushing aside political consideration of nature for its own sake. Even when a philosopher has a conception of nature allowing for its‘re-enchantment’, say through positing the intrinsic value of natural forms or recognising their valuable status as God’s creation, this is superseded when he turns to the political philosophical task of justifying property. 2.
The Case of Hegel Take the case of Hegel, who of all the great philosophers does most to unpack the multiple senses of the phrase ‘making ourselves at home in the world’. For Hegel, our being at home in the world is not just a matter of modifying surroundings to make them more comfortable, pleasing and efficient satisfiers of physical needs. The philosophical achievement of a satisfying homeliness is through intelligibility; in attaining a form of thought (Hegel’s philosophy) allowing us to see the world – the natural non-human world as well as the human moral world – as comprehensible, or rational. In a recent book, Alison Stone shows that although Hegel’s philosophy of nature allows the positing of intrinsic value to natural forms, this is trumped by considerations of Abstract Right when he turns, in The Philosophy of Right, to the derivation of private property rights 1 . His thinking there entails a duty to transform nature, leaving no space for the moral consideration of natural objects for their own sake. This exemplifies a tension between different senses of making ourselves at home in the world: between the concrete actualisation of freedom on the one hand, and forming a conception of nature adequate to the pre-reflective sense of nature’s intrinsic value on the other hand. In Hegel’s metaphysics of nature all natural forms have a rational element recognition of which brings a homely satisfaction: the natural world is intelligible to reason because it is itself rational. And, because (given his Kantian value ontology) whatever is rational or acts for the sake of reason is intrinsically good, this view of the world is satisfying not only qua intelligible but because in its intelligible rationality it answers to our pre-theoretical sense of nature’s intrinsic value. Hegel takes this as a criterion of adequacy for a metaphysic of nature; grounds for preferring it to the disenchanting, value neutral metaphysic he believes to be presupposed by empirical science 2 . One might have expected this satisfying view of nature as a surrounding field of intrinsic value to inform
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__________________________________________________________ an account of the more straightforwardly practical aspects of making a home in the world: our transforming what is close at hand in our natural surroundings should be performed with its given, objective value at least partly in mind in order to be truly satisfying home-making activity. The transformation of nature should not be without limits other than those provided by human interests, but constrained or qualified by recognition of the value posited in nature independently of human interests and transformations effected for the sake of human interests. But this is not so: such constraint presupposes natural forms have moral considerability in virtue of their value. This is effectively denied, or rendered invisible, in the account of property as Abstract Right, the central context for understanding our making a satisfying home in the world as practically rational agents – free persons 3 . Here satisfactory home making amounts to home ownership, where ownership is understood entirely within the terms of the standard assumption. 3.
The Concept of Property Before looking again at Hegel’s views it will be useful to say a little more about the concepts of property and private property in general. In the rest of this paragraph I paraphrase Jeremy Waldron’s illuminating analysis of these concepts 4 . The concept of property is primarily that of systematic rules determining access to, and control of, scarce material resources (material objects capable of satisfying human wants and needs). The abstract concept of private property as a particular way of organising property systems (distinct from the ideas of collective and common property), is the idea of an object being correlated with some named individual in relation to a rule saying society will uphold as final that individual’s decision as to how the object should be used. The ‘owner’ of the object is in that privileged position. Particular bundles of rights, liberties, powers and duties associated with ownership in particular systems of private property (defining for example just what is entailed in owning a car in a particular society), are particular conceptions of the abstract concept of private property. Such bundles are ‘held together’ by the concept of private property, the underlying idea capturing the lay person’s sense of ownership (notwithstanding the legal complexities of car ownership, this car is mine, I own it). Because they are concerned mainly with issues arising within particular systems (conceptions) of private property, lawyers and legal theorists sometimes deny there is such a concept over and above the bundles. But, as Waldron points out, the concept of private property as such is necessary if one wants to consider the justifiability of private, as opposed to some other form of property 5 . It
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___________________________________________________________ is also required if one wants to consider the anthropocentric instrumental constructionist role of private property. One useful feature of Waldron’s account is his placing of general constraints on harmful behaviour, including harmful use of objects, external to the concept of property 6 . Otherwise that concept would cover most of what people do. Rather property rules are located within such general constraints and determine which generally allowed acts may be performed with what by whom (rules against stabbing people are not part of the concepts of property or private property which concern the allocation of knives within the context of those rules). Thus it is incorrect to build the person/thing distinction into the concept of property such that persons cannot be property by definition. Persons and their labour are in fact material resources and it is a mistake to rule out slavery apriori simply with reference to the concept of property 7 . That persons should not be viewed only as material resources is an ethical issue external to the concept of property itself. Similarly, I think we should view natural (nonhuman) objects as material resources, but not as just material resources. This ethical claim, central to theories of ecological justice and much environmental philosophy, shouldn’t be rendered necessarily true or false, with reference only to the concept of property. But there is an important difference here between the ethical status of slavery and of a purely instrumental ‘resourcist’ view of natural objects, even though both are external to the concept of property. The general, widely accepted, considerations against slavery, although external to the bare concepts of property and private property, are continuous with standard justifications of private property. The very same broadly ethical considerations involved in justifying private property tend also to rule out systems (conceptions) of private property incorporating slavery. In the case of natural objects, the situation is reversed: justifications of private property tend to reduce natural objects to the status of mere resources, just ‘things’ to be owned. Ownership is a relational idea: any rightful claim to ownership implies correlative duties of others to respect that ownership. This defines a tripartite relation locating the relative positions of owners and nonowners with respect to the owned object. Conceptions of private property, specifying bundles of particular rights, entitlements, etc, add further complexity to this fundamental relation. Alan Carter, who brings out clearly this relational aspect of property, quotes approvingly the legal theorist Morris Cohen: ‘the essence of private property is always the right to exclude others…whatever technical definition we may prefer, we must recognize that a property right is a relation, not between an owner
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__________________________________________________________ and a thing, but between the owner and other individuals in reference to things. A right is always against one or more individuals.’ 8 This is not quite right though. Given the standard assumption at the heart of traditional derivations of property rights, it is also a right to ignore the natural status, interests or otherness of the ‘thing’ owned (or of the nature from which it was extracted); and that is a right against the thing owned; a relation between the owner and owned object which establishes the latter as a (mere) ‘thing’. As I have said, this is the assumption that only anthropocentric considerations – human needs, interests, development, distributive justice and so on – need enter into conceptions of property and their philosophical derivations. 4.
Hegel and the Human Ideology Property concerns the systematic allocation of desired goods, and is necessary given a relative scarcity of them. The question of which system to adopt (private, common, collective) has been answered traditionally within the terms of the standard assumption. That this has been a standard assumption is not surprising given the way traditional accounts of property speak to important, sometimes inescapable, aspects of the urgent and necessary enterprise of making ourselves at home in the world. That is they locate crucial seams in the human landscape considered as both a moral and an economic enterprise. Thus private property has been justified for example in terms of utility (human happiness), in terms of enabling the application of the moral notion of desert, and for the sake of enabling individual liberty and autonomy. Hegel offers perhaps the profoundest version of the latter justification. And his account illustrates the general point that a consequence of operating with the standard assumption is that a fundamental idea mediating our relation with material nature is coloured by that assumption, leading us to see the natural world as mine or ours; as if it has been allocated to us to serve our interests. Nature seems to be there just for us, available – end of story. For Hegel private property is legitimate because necessary for the realization of free personality 9 . To be real as a person (in the modern sense) one needs to be recognised as a person, by others and oneself. To be so recognised one must do something to something – to an object. So one must have something to do something to in order to be real as a person; i.e., one must have one’s own thing to do something to. This is not a matter of needing to use things for physical survival, or requiring resources in order to do more of what one wants. Hegel has a more
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___________________________________________________________ fundamental issue in mind. To be more than a mere subjective dream, free distinct individual personality must be identifiable objectively, expressed in public form so as to be recognisable to oneself and others. Ownership of objects allows this: by acquiring and using things recognised to be mine, I myself am recognised and what I own and what I do with it reveals my distinct free personality to myself as well as to others as an objective reality (I/he did this to or with that). Private property allows the required disclosure of personality through its embodiment in particular objects correlated to named individuals. Property, remember, concerns a relation between owners and non-owners with respect to items owned. Different conceptions yield various specific rules concerning what owners may do with or to these items, as against non-owners. Yet this focus on the owner/items owned/non-owner relation, viewed only in the light of anthropocentric concerns, such as the realization of free personality, leaves the non-human items involved with the status only of ‘thing to be owned’. From this perspective there is nothing to them beyond their role in the owner/owned/non-owner relation. They are viewed either as already entirely assimilated to the human home, or only as they might be so assimilated. Thus for Hegel, since we have a duty to realize ourselves as persons, we have a duty to transform the world around us (those parts available through the property system), to make ourselves at home by moulding it in accordance with our will. This duty is limited only by considerations of human interests; nature as such is a moral void to be penetrated as much as possible to allow the human will maximal objective self-recognition 10 . Hegel’s rhetoric of mastery over nature in this context is a familiar concern within environmental philosophy. My concern is with the way it involves maximal assimilation of nature to the human via an anthropocentrically coloured conception of ownership. In the case of many actual items of property (e.g., consumer goods) little original nature remains; it has been transformed through the production process. But given that we don’t follow those who proclaim ‘the end of nature’ 11 , then at least the land and ecosystems (and their ‘natural resources’) from which such items are taken, are not (always) utterly transformed in this way. My claim is that leaving the natural reality out of account, proceeding as if there was nothing to the world beyond its role in human home making, involves an instrumentalizing reduction of nature to human landscape. It presupposes that, in Derek Bell’s phrase, ‘the world is just property to be owned’ 12 . So, to avoid this, an adequate theory, and justification, of property has to take into account the item’s original, (at least relatively) independent natural, status into account.
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__________________________________________________________ Consider that in the move from dialectic of object to dialectic of subject (traced in Hegel’s The Phenomenology of Spirit), the search for a satisfying consciousness of the world leads back to the search for a satisfying self-consciousness. This shift in attention from satisfactory conception of the world to satisfactory conception of self is related to the disappearing from view of nature’s value at the level of Abstract Right: self-consciousness is so concerned to discover or realize itself in the highest sense as free personhood 13 , that at that moment everything else is secondary; material to that end. But this is the foundational moment for Hegel’s political philosophy; it sets in thoroughly anthropocentric terms the agenda for his account of the more concrete manifestations of Right at the levels of morality and ethics and the social institutions required to cultivate human desires in accordance with duty. It is the moment when, for the sake of a politically actualized environmental philosophy, selfconsciousness should try, just a bit, to get over itself. For that some recognition of nature as well as personality is required. For Hegel, our surroundings as owned disclose our reality as free persons. Presumably human landscapes, as results of ongoing human home-making projects, disclose the historical personalities (maybe multiple personalities) of societies as property systems. There is no space here to make good this claim but it seems in keeping with Hegel’s holistic understanding of ‘Geist’. I’m not saying that human landscapes, as nature modified by culture, must be thought of in terms of ownership as common or collective property systems. No doubt they are in fact the result of combinations of, and changing balances between, different forms of ownership. But most if not all of the earth’s surface is owned in some sense, and if the ecological crisis discloses something about current and historical human personality it is not very flattering. As I have said, in terms of Hegel’s philosophy, there seems to be a connection here with the content of Abstract Right – its unqualified endorsement of the standard assumption. The point is not that private property is unjustified because an alternative (say ‘non-capitalist’) system would be less destructive of nature. That may or may not be true. Nor is it that the traditional justifications private property are objectionably ideological in the sense of privileging the interests of one human social class over others. I sympathise with that charge (it is noteworthy that. Hegel denies the legitimacy of collective and common property, although it is not clear that he needs to in order to connect ownership with free personality). Rather, using Hegel as an illustration, the issues here are how the property notion, coloured by surrounding justificatory ideas, is an important element of our intellectually constructing a home in the world and how, through the
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___________________________________________________________ standard assumption, we construct it in a way implying the whole world is ours – our home. Given there is a non-human world containing nonhuman interests, this is an ideological process in a different sense (adapted from one familiar meaning of the term ‘ideology’ 14 ): the standard assumption embodies a set of ideas falsely representing the human interest as the only serious interest, the only real consideration. The contrasting true view is that there is a nature to be considered. I want to say that the presence of the standard assumption makes any perspective on ownership, whether collective, common or private, a form of instrumental constructionism about nature; an exercise in the human ideology. The power of this ideology is illustrated by Hegel’s ‘forgetting’ of nature’s own value in his account of property as Abstract Right.
Notes 1
Alison Stone, Petrified Intelligence, Nature in Hegel’s Philosophy, (Albany: SUNY Press, 2005). 2 Ibid e.g., 135-6. 3 Ibid e.g., 154-8. 4 Jeremy Waldron, The Right to Private Property, (Oxford: OUP, 1988), ch.2. 5 Ibid 52-3. 6 Ibid 32-3. 7 Ibid 33n15. 8 Morris Cohen, Law and the Social Order, reprinted in part as ‘Property and Sovereignty’, in C. B. Macpherson (ed.), Property: Mainstream and Critical Positions (Oxford: Basil Blackwell, 1978), 159, quoted in Alan Carter, The Philosophical Foundations of Property Rights, (Hemel Hempstead: Harvester Wheatsheaf, 1989), 130. 9 For the main outlines of his account of private property, see G. W. F. Hegel, The Philosophy of Right trans. T. M. Knox (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1977), §§ 42-53. My brief summary here owes much to the discussion in Dudley Knowles, Hegel and the Philosophy of Right (London: Routledge, 2002), ch.5. 10 Stone 157. 11 For example, Bill McKibben, The End of Nature, (London: Penguin, 1990). 12 Compare Derek Bell’s discussion in his ‘Liberal Environmental Citizenship’, in Andrew Dobson & Angel Valencia (eds.) Citizenship, Environment, Economy (Abingdon: Routledge, 2005).
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__________________________________________________________ 13
This is what the Abstract Right section at the beginning of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right is all about. 14 See Raymond Williams, Keywords, (London: Fontana Press, 1988 [1976, revised 1983], pp.155-7.
Sustainable Development, Bioethics and "Vulnerable" Human Subjects: Ethics of Sustainable Economic Enrichment of Diverse Traditional Cultures Participating in Pharmaceutical Research Janet Brewer Abstract Bioethics is a branch of ethics concerned with issues surrounding health care and the biological sciences, including biomedical research. A recent survey conducted by UNESCO revealed that most ethicists view biodiversity as a key component of a comprehensive bioethics curriculum. i Indeed, the Convention on Biological Diversity sets forth a commitment for maintaining the biodiversity, the sustainable use of its components, and the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits from the use of biological resources. The process of drug discovery based on traditional knowledge and plant remedies illustrates how biodiversity, sustainable development and bioethics are inextricably linked. The International Cooperative Biodiversity Groups, or (ICBGs) programme serves as a concrete example of the dependency of drug companies upon traditional cultures for research and drug discovery, and further illustrates the linkage between ethics and sustainable economic growth. ICBGs are an innovative effort to further human health through pharmaceutical research and development, incentives for conservation of biodiversity, and new methods of sustainable economic enrichment of diverse traditional cultures. Overall, sustainable development is critical to bioethical discourse where certain methods of pharmaceutical research and development practices are concerned. Keywords: Sustainable Development, Human Subjects, Pharmaceutical Research, Bioethics, Biological Diversity 1. The Search for Natural Substances: A Short-cut to Pharmaceutical Development Since the existence of disease and suffering, humans have turned to natural substance for relief. Surprisingly, contemporary pharmaceuticals very often contain a single active ingredient extracted from nature rather than a combination of synthetic substances, and about two-thirds of all pharmaceuticals sold are plant-derived. Most significantly, the profitable pharmaceutical industry derives upward of $40 billion in sales annually from plant-based products, ii, iii and this serves as a reminder that the global economy has, indeed, been buttressed by bioprospecting. Pharmaceutical development is a never-ending project. As new diseases emerge, such as AIDS, and long-battled illnesses, such as cancer
256 Sustainable Development, Bioethics, & Vulnerable Human Subjects ___________________________________________________________ and certain bacterial infections, resist a cure, researchers continue diligently seeking new treatments. As the science of molecular biology has evolved, combining the knowledge of biology, chemistry and biophysics, scientists have made great strides in finding the keys to unlocking the mysteries of diseases, quite literally. Knowing the shape of a given biological “lock,” or receptor site, scientists employ complex laboratory analysis and computational designs to determine the molecular “key,” or enzymatic receptor, capable of intervening in the faulty biological mechanism, resulting in disease management or a cure. iv, v , vi But this method is both tedious and expensive, and so, in practice, researchers are more apt to capitalize on nature’s efforts by extracting and analyzing natural molecules that have resulted from billions of years of evolutionary adaptation. vii Repeatedly, man has confirmed the value of using substances from nature. viii For example, in relieving pain, morphine was extracted from poppy flowers in 1817. In treating inflammation, aspirin was extracted from willow bark in 1829. In regulating heartbeat, digitaline was extracted from digitalis in 1868. In fighting malaria, quinine was extracted from cinchona bark in 1820, and artemisine was extracted from artemisia in 1972. In preventing the rejection of transplanted organs cyclosporin was extracted from a Norwegian mushroom in 1970. In fighting cancer, the derivatives vinblastine and vincristine were extracted from the Madagascar periwinkle between 1958 and 1965, taxol is extracted from the Pacific yew in 1971, and taxotere was extracted from the European yew in 1980. ix And recently, Merck & Co. extracted a phytochemical contained in a Congo mushroom that mimics insulin reactivity. As it mobilizes insulin receptor sites and lowers blood sugar levels, it is slated for diabetic treatment. x, xi Molecular biological methods for detecting and characterizing the active plant molecules outside the living organism continue to evolve, lately employing many technologically advanced methods for understanding the lock-and-key mechanisms that operate living systems. xii However, the point in time in which the active ingredient is isolated and extracted usually takes place a decade or more before the drug is actually marketed. Indeed, despite major advancements in molecular biology, the pathway from plant to efficacious product remains plodding and fraught with uncertainty. As populations in developing countries rely on traditional remedies extracted from plants to treat illnesses, the traditional knowledge of local healers within these cultures can readily narrow the search for effective (and lucrative) plant remedies. xiii For example, Samoans in the South Pacific led scientists to the stem of Homolanthus nutans, used for fevers. Phytochemists subsequently discovered that it contains a molecule, prostratine, which attacks the deadly AIDS virus. xiv, xv
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___________________________________________________________ However, local healers have historically been ill-rewarded for their contributions to pharmaceutical research and development, xvi, xvii and, additionally, aspects of the process, particularly patenting, can adversely impact their cultural belief systems. For two main reasons, negotiations among scientists seeking traditional knowledge and indigenous groups amenable to participation occur on a decidedly imbalanced playing field. First, many developing, as well as industrialized, countries lack adequate laws to regulate commercial use of plant substances. xviii The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office recently voluntarily moved to rescind a patent held by a California man since 1986 on the plant Banisteriopsis caapi, sacred to an Amazonian tribe, and used in religious rituals. Widely acknowledged as a victory for indigenous cultures, the case is of paltry importance where the powerful pharmaceutical industry is concerned, readily claiming intellectual property rights to biological resources. xix, xx Indeed, critics emphasize that scientists’ search for plant-based products is solely driven by greed and establishment of patents and exclusive rights to biological resources. For example, in the 1980s, the plant rosy periwinkle (Catharanthus roseus) spawned two important drugs, vinblastine, used to treat Hodgkin's disease, and vincristine, used to treat childhood leukemia. Both net the drug giant Eli Lilly $100 million dollars annually while source countries receive no compensation. xxi The second main reason that the playing field is not level is that traditional knowledge “falls through the cracks” of existing intellectual property laws, making it difficult to determine and noncompulsory to assign it a value. xxii That, coupled with the fact that big pharma garner huge profits from plant-based products, raises concerns about bioprospecting endeavors often deemed exploitive. xxiii, xxiv 2. Common Heritage versus Proprietary Interest: The Ethics of Bioprospecting Historically, most conceptualized biological resources as the “common heritage of humankind.” In essence, proponents of this philosophical viewpoint asserted that no law or moral precept compelled those who collected natural resources to pay the source compensation. Partly as a result of the realization that biological resources bear a distinct value and that the vanishing biodiversity threatens the global economy, that philosophical viewpoint has changed. xxv, xxvi Bioprospecting can stimulate economic development and conservation of biological diversity, especially in developing countries, if the process of benefit-sharing is introduced. xxvii, xxviii , xxix Increasingly, international organizations and various governments expressed concerns about the loss of global biodiversity and the perceived need for equitable sharing of benefits resulting from bioprospecting. As a result, the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), signed at the 1992 United Nations Conference on
258 Sustainable Development, Bioethics, & Vulnerable Human Subjects ___________________________________________________________ Environment and Development in Brazil, was formulated. The CBD is an innovative treaty establishing new standards that bind more than 175 member countries engaged in bioprospecting; bioprospectors are now expected to compensate source countries. xxx In short, the CBD puts forth a set of guidelines to which governments and industries are expected to aspire when designing access and benefit-sharing agreements. The convention has three main goals: the conservation of biological diversity, the sustainable use of its components, and the fair and equitable sharing of the benefits from the use of biological resources. Key to the CBD are the equitability of agreements and the creation of methods for rendering conservation of biodiversity economically worthwhile. The CBD wisely appreciates that countries in possession and control of biological resources and those entities inventing technologies to utilize those resources are mutually dependent, but also recognizes host nations as independent and sovereign. Host countries, therefore, are individually charged with establishing their own guidelines or legislation for regulating access to resources and equitable benefitsharing agreements, including exemptions of any plant species from patenting and intellectual property rights, for purposes of conservation and rural development. xxxi Although compensation can be in the form of money or royalties, the trend has been that, in exchange for access to traditional knowledge and biological resources, bioprospectors support conservation efforts and local economic development. This is because royalties may never come to fruition or may be realized in the too distant future. Also, it is exceedingly difficult to determine a monetary value for traditional knowledge. xxxii Moreover, clearly, the CBD envisions biodiversity and benefit-sharing as a bioethical issue. Bioethics is a branch of ethics concerned with morality in the context of health care and biological sciences, and the concepts of autonomy and informed consent are central to these ethical debates. The CBD stresses the ethical principles of autonomy and right to selfdetermination, requiring that any entity collecting biological resources obtain the prior informed consent of the source country. xxxiii Since its inception, the pharmaceutical industry, university-researchers, indigenous advocates, environmentalists, and politicians and have together pioneered effective ways to further the convention’s aims. xxxiv 3. ICBGs: Implementing Sustainable Economic Enrichment of Diverse Traditional Cultures Participating in Pharmaceutical Research One organization that has honed an innovative approach to benefit-sharing is the International Cooperative Biodiversity Groups (ICBG) Programme. Funded by the US government in partnership with industry, this trial programme couples pharmaceutical research reliant
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___________________________________________________________ upon traditional knowledge and natural resources with sustainable development projects. Inherent in the programme is the construction of foundational necessities for self-sustaining projects that heighten economic capacity and conservation efforts in developing countries. The programme discourages previous methods of capitalizing on traditional knowledge where researchers either failed to implement or implemented inadequate benefit-sharing schemes. The ICBG Programme has delineated three goals. First, ICBGs seek to improve human health through the discovery of new pharmaceutical agents to treat diseases of importance in both developed and developing countries. Second, ICBGs seek to promote scientific and economic activity in developing countries by sharing the benefits of drug discovery and conservation research. Third, ICBGs seek to conserve diversity through research and appraisal of biological resources and the concomitant development of local capacity to manage and conserve them. Programmes incorporate means for countries to develop local pharmaceutical industries, including the building of infrastructure and training, as well as extensive means of inducement for local governments and indigenous groups to conserve biodiversity. xxxv, xxxvi In so doing, ICBGs reconcile two historically opposing philosophical viewpoints - that biological resources are the common heritage of us all; yet, property rights are vested in all biota, and biological resources have value that can be shared. Thus far, relying heavily on traditional knowledge from indigenous groups to identify phytochemcial substances, ICBG projects have been conducted in 12 developing countries, xxxvii and teams are able to process 10,000 plant samples per week. While it is still too soon to tell whether any of the sampled plants will yield a drug discovery, traditional cultures and host countries have already been offered some benefits as a result of participation. ICBGs have succeeded in creating a synergistic relationship between themselves and participating local populations, resulting in selfsustaining industrial development. For example, in Nigeria, ICBG researchers have created a model bioprospecting agreement that encourages economic development, resource conservation and improvement of human health within the region where the bioprospecting is conducted, such that the local population derives a direct benefit. Researchers screen traditional medicines and other natural products for cures for malaria and other diseases that impact that developing nation, diseases in which the Western pharmaceutical researchers have largely abandoned. While ICBGs worldwide are not without conflict, they have shown that bioprospecting can be a successful venture for researchers, global public health, and source countries when agreements are equitable and ethical. xxxviii
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Notes i
Dr. Hank. ten Have, UNESCO Director of the Division of Ethics of Science and Technology, personal communication, August 27, 2004; UNESCO Bioethics Declaration, 2005. ii Susanne Grabley and Ralf Thiericke, "Bioactive Agents from Natural Sources: Trends in Discovery and Application," Advances in Biochemistry, Engineering & Biotechnology 64(1999): 101-154. iii Cecile Guerin, "Out of the Forest and into the Bottle," The Courier. UNESCO (May 2000): 1. iv David Dressler and Huntington Potter, Discovering Enzymes (New York, New York: Scientific American Press, 1999). v Grabley and Thiericke, p. 101-154. vi Guerin, p. 1. vii Grabley and Thiericke, p. 101-154. viii Ibid. ix Guerin, p. 1. x Peter Vachuska, “Morel Foray,” The Newsletter of the Wisconsin Mycological Society 16 (1999). xi Guerin, p. xii Grabley and Thiericke, p. 101-154. xiii Ibid. xiv “Anti-AIDS Compound Found in Samoa: A U.S. Researcher Identifies the Substance and Saves the Rain Forest Where It Is Formed.” San Francisco Chronicle. (August 24, 1992). xv Guerin, p.1. xvi Joshua P. Rosenthal, et al, "Combining High Risk Science with Ambitious Social and Economic Goals," Pharmaceutical Biology 37(1999): 6-21. xvii Charles R. McManis, "Traditional Knowledge, Intellectual Property, and Indigenous Culture," Cardozo Journal of International & Comparative Law 11(2003): 547-575. xviii Fogarty International Center. "International Cooperative Biodiversity Groups (ICBG)." (2006). xix Guerin, p. 1 xx Elaine Torelly de Carvalho, "Protection of Traditional Biodiversityrelated Knowledge: Analysis of Proposals for the Adoption of a Sui Generic System," Missouri Environmental Law and Policy Review 11(2003): 38-76. xxi Guerin, p. 1.
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___________________________________________________________ xxii
McManis, p. 547. Rosenthal, p. 6-21. xxiv McManis, p. 554-558. xxv Brian G. Schuster, "A New Integrated Program for Natural Product Development and the Value of an Ethnomedical Approach," Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine 7 (2001): 61-72. xxvi McManis, p. 550-553. xxvii Rosenthal, p. 6-21. xxviii McManis, p. 555-563. xxix Fogarty International Center. "International Cooperative Biodiversity Groups (ICBG)." (2006). xxx McManis, p. 555-563. xxxi Ibid. xxxii S.D. Doel, University of Illinois-Chicago Department of Medicinal Chemistry and Pharmacognosy, personal communication, 2002. xxxiii Paul Oldham, Negotiating Diversity: A Field Guide to the Convention on Biological Diversity. (2001). xxxiv Corliss Karasov, "Who Reaps the Benefits of Biodiversity," Environmental Health Perspectives 109(2001): 1. xxxv Rosenthal, p. 6-21. xxxvi Fogarty International Center. "International Cooperative Biodiversity Groups (ICBG)." (2006). xxxvii McManis, p. 553. xxxviii Karasov, p. 1. xxiii
Bibliography “Anti-AIDS Compound Found in Samoa: A U.S. Researcher Identifies the Substance and Saves the Rain Forest Where It Is Formed.” San Francisco Chronicle. (August 24, 1992) de Carvalho, Elaine Torelly. "Protection of Traditional Biodiversityrelated Knowledge: Analysis of Proposals for the Adoption of a Sui Generic System." Missouri Environmental Law and Policy Review 11(2003): 38-76.
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Dressler, David and Potter. Huntington, Discovering Enzymes. York, New York: Scientific American Press, 1999.
New
Fogarty International Center. "International Cooperative Biodiversity Groups (ICBG)." (2006). Grabley, Susanne and Thiericke, Ralf. "Bioactive Agents from Natural Sources: Trends in Discovery and Application." Advances in Biochemistry, Engineering & Biotechnology 64(1999): 101-154. Guerin, Cecile. "Out of the Forest and into the Bottle." The Courier. UNESCO (May 2000): 1. Karasov, Corliss. "Who Reaps the Benefits Environmental Health Perspectives 109(2001): 1.
of
Biodiversity."
McManis, Charles R. "Traditional Knowledge, Intellectual Property, and Indigenous Culture." Cardozo Journal of International & Comparative Law 11(2003): 547-575. Oldham, Paul. Negotiating Diversity: A Field Guide to the Convention on Biological Diversity. (2001). Rosenthal, Joshua P. et al. "Combining High Risk Science with Ambitious Social and Economic Goals." Pharmaceutical Biology 37(1999): 6-21. Schuster, Brian G. "A New Integrated Program for Natural Product Development and the Value of an Ethnomedical Approach." Journal of Alternative and Complementary Medicine 7 (2001): 61-72. UNESCO Bioethics Declaration-12 points Text for an address at the opening session of the Inter-Governmental Bioethics Committee held at UNESCO Headquarters, Paris. (January 24, 2005).
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___________________________________________________________ Vachuska, Peter. “Morel Foray.” The Newsletter of the Wisconsin Mycological Society 16 (1999).
Water Rights are Human Rights Maria Baldwin Abstract Perhaps a global common that most could agree upon is the human need for water. No matter where one lives, whether in an urban or rural area or in a developed or developing nation the need for water is universal. Yet according to a study by the World Health Organization, in a world of six billion people 1.1 billion lack access to safe, clean water. The problems surrounding the current water crisis are often unnoticed; waters importance frequently recognized only in its absence. If water supplies are inadequate, control and access of water can become a great source of power and a source of various human rights violations. For this reason water is much more than an economic commodity; it is a human right. The extent of the environmental crises we face demands that we reconceptualize our understanding of environmental problems. Re-orienting the environmental debate is an essential first step toward creating solutions that work. This paper asserts that using a human rights framework will emphasize water as a global common, too important to be left to the whims of governments or businesses. Only when we realize this will we be able to find solutions to the global water crisis. Keywords: Water rights, global common, human rights, General Comment 15, World Water Council, International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights, Mar del Plata Water Conference The Chinese Philosopher Lao-tsze said long ago that “Nothing on earth is so weak and yielding as water, but for breaking down the firm and strong it has no equal.” In the end, even the powerful must bow to the muted power of water. According to a United Nations study more than two billion people are affected by water shortages in over forty countries; 1.1 billion people do not have sufficient drinking water and 2.4 billion have no provisions for sanitation. This UN study predicted that one of every four people will live in a country affected by chronic or recurring shortages of fresh water by 2050. 1 This water shortage and inadequate sanitation may not get the attention of the mainstream media or have telethons in its name, but we ignore it at our peril. Consider, that according to the World Health Organization (WHO) and UNICEF every fifteen seconds a child dies of diarrhea, caused largely by poor sanitation and water supply; a rate that
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____________________________________________________________ exceeds that for HIV/AIDS for this group. 2 Water is the substance of life on Earth. It is necessary for consumption, cooking, hygiene, and for cultural practices, securing livelihoods, and adequate housing. For these reasons water is a basic, universal human need. However, simply understanding water as a basic need reduces individuals to passive receivers of this global common without bestowing them with any reciprocal responsibility for the conscientious use of this life-giving element. If a human rights approach is taken, people will be empowered to act on their own behalf because they are at the center of the problem and are actively engaged in creating solutions, rather than being the passive recipient of aid which removes agency. A human rights approach would be especially beneficial for vulnerable groups, such as children, who would benefit greatly from global recognition that water is a human right, rather than an economic commodity. This paper asserts that elevating water rights to human rights is an important step toward creating global solutions that work; solutions that are based in transnational, long-term cooperation from governments and global citizens. There is a legal international premise for this approach to the water problem and it makes sense to take advantage of the established international mechanisms to attempt to fix this international problem. There has been an evolution of thought regarding water and health-related human rights over the last thirty years. The WHO as early as 1946 stated in its constitution that the enjoyment of the highest standard of health is one of the fundamental rights of every human being. 3 The Universal Declaration of Human Rights asserted that individuals had a number of political and civil, as well as social and economic rights. Within this declaration, the right to life as well as the right to a standard of living adequate for health and well-being came together. The drafters of this document stressed the interdependence and universality of these rights upon one another. These non-binding declarations and statements of purpose were followed by binding treaties, which required governments to act to ensure the availability of water and sanitation to various populations. Therefore establishing water as more than a basic need, but also a human right, that governments were required to secure and protect under international human rights laws. One of the first legally-binding human rights documents which explicitly found water to be a human right, was the International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (1979) which guaranteed women the right to “enjoy adequate living conditions, particularly in relation to housing, sanitation, electricity and water supply.” 4 Also the Convention on the Rights of the Child stated
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____________________________________________________________ that disease and malnutrition with be combated “through the provision of adequate nutritious foods and clean drinking water.” 5 In addition, several of the Geneva Conventions refer to the human right to water. The Geneva Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War stated that “sufficient drinking water shall be supplied to prisoners of war” and the Geneva Convention Relative to the Treatment of Civilian Persons in time of War stipulated that “sufficient water” should be available for personal cleanliness and that “sufficient drinking water shall be supplied to internees.” 6 These and other international treaties that were legally binding have provisions that identify water as a human right. In addition to these binding rules of law, there are also several soft laws which morally compel governments to act on behalf of a water solution. Soft laws on the right to water include resolutions, declarations, and action plans of various conferences and forums and the United Nations; they are not legally binding but they have lent momentum to the water rights campaign. Such as the Millennium Summit at the United Nations in 2000, which resulted in the adoption of the Millennium Declaration where one hundred and fifty heads of state and government pledged by 2015 to “reduce by half the proportion of people without sustainable access to safe drinking water.” 7 The 2002 UN Earth Summit in Johannesburg created an action plan which contained a similar goal but added a concern about sanitation. 8 This was an important addendum to the Millennium Declaration which failed to address the issue of sanitation. Also in 2000 the General Assembly of the United Nations issued Resolution 55/196 which designated 2003 as the “International Year of Freshwater.” Three years later the UN General Assembly adopted Resolution 58/217, “The International Decade for Action, ‘Water for Life’- 2005-2015” in recognition of the growing international water crisis and the need to raise global awareness of it. The resolution stated the goals of the Decade, should be a greater focus on water-related issues at all levels and on the implementation of water-related programmes and projects, while striving to ensure the participation and involvement of women in waterrelated development efforts, and the furtherance of cooperation at all levels, in order to help to achieve internationally agreed water-related goals contained in the United Nations Millennium Declaration and the Johannesburg Plan of Implementation. 9
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____________________________________________________________ This resolution also established 22 March 2003 as the starting date of the water decade and as World Water Day as an ongoing annual commitment to the international water crisis. Another example of non-binding action which none-the-less created momentum in the area of water rights, was the establishment of the World Water Council in 1996. The Council encourages participation at all levels of government to achieve its mission and especially encourages representatives from the local community to participate in its activities. The World Water Council's mission is to promote awareness, build political commitment and trigger action on critical water issues at all levels, including the highest decision-making level, to facilitate the efficient conservation, protection, development, planning, management and use of water in all its dimensions on an environmentally sustainable basis for the benefit of all life on earth. 10 The primary international event, which the Council uses to achieve this mission, is an annual World Water Forum. These forums encourage multilevel participation and dialogue to influence global water policy. 11 The World Water Council believes the result of its activities will result in a “better living standard for people all over the world and more responsible social behavior towards water issues in-line with the pursuit of sustainable development.” 12 Despite all of these efforts, the political will to fix this problem has not been sufficient to confront the problem and there remains confusion regarding the fundamental question: is water a right or a need? The way this question is resolved will have important ramifications on the solution to this problem. The rights approach requires a grassroots movement by global citizens, actively engaged in addressing the problem. A needs based approach is largely a top-bottom solution that emphasizes the governments’ role and de-emphasizes the participation and ideas of individuals working on the local level. These people are cast as problematic end users rather than allies in the struggle to reverse the accelerating water crisis. The international community has waffled between calling water a basic human need and a human right from the 1970s until the present. The Mar del Plata Water Conference in 1977 was an important milestone in the history of water development because it was the first intergovernmental conference on water and it led to a United Nations General Assembly Resolution which proclaimed the 1980s as the “International Drinking Water Supply and Sanitation Decade.” Significantly at this early stage in
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____________________________________________________________ the international debate about water, the conference stated that all people had a right to water that equaled their basic needs in terms of quality and quantity. The plan outlined by the Mar del Plata Conference provided a promising roadmap but in the years that followed, the plan was outpaced by population growth, climate change and questions concerning the nature of water rights. This conflict was highlighted by the Rio Conference of 1992, which stressed that priority be given to the satisfaction of basic needs without referring to the right to water. This vacillation in approach between basic need and human rights was continued during the three World Water Forums held in Marrakech in 1997, The Hague in 2000, and Kyoto in 2003. Despite this waffling there had existed since 1966 an international Covenant which recognized a human right to water; the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR). It should be noted that this interpretation of the ICESCR was only extrapolated this way by the Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights in 2002. This committee issued its General Comment No. 15 which stressed the finite nature of water, that it was a public good, and that water was a prerequisite for the realization of other human rights. General Comment No. 15 was based on article eleven of the ICESCR, the right to an “adequate standard of living” and article twelve of that agreement, the right to “the highest attainable standards of mental and physical health.” The Committee’s Comment stated explicitly the connection between human rights and water rights. The human right to water entitles everyone to sufficient, safe, acceptable, physically accessible and affordable water for personal and domestic uses. 13 This explicit statement confirming water rights as human rights illustrate the evolution and expansion of human rights ideology by the turn of the century. The ICESCR enshrined social, cultural, and economic human rights also known as “second generation rights.” Civil and political rights were “first generation rights” which were generally prioritized by powerful western countries such as the United States. This divided approach to human rights was increasingly seen as incompatible with the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, which stressed the interdependence and universality of all human rights. The evolved thinking on the interdependence of human rights produced “third generation rights” or “solidarity rights” which focused on the right to development, a clean environment, and others. Achieving these goals
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____________________________________________________________ depended upon the realization of political and civil rights in conjunction with social, cultural, and economic rights for individuals and the communities in which they lived. General Comment No. 15 conceptualized water as a “third generation right” which recognized that the realization of human rights was dependent upon available resources. The comment also used the principle of progressive realization which created a constant and continuing duty for States to move quickly and effectively toward the full realization of rights. While the committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights does not have the power to create new obligations under the ICESCR their choice to progressively interpret the ICESCR carries significant legal weight and has reinvigorated the debate about the correct approach to the water crisis. What good would come from simply re-conceptualizing how we think about water? Perhaps most importantly, re-framing water as a human right compels us to think about water. This may sound strange but water is normally taken for granted except in its absence. As a result, we only think about water when it is already too late, a crisis has already occurred if water became a problem where once it was not. Not only do we begin to think about water, we also begin to think about it differently when water is seen as a human right. Once it is cast as a right, if that right is denied or not protected there are mechanisms to address the problem. By way of illustrating the effectiveness of this approach let us look at the alternative? If water is only a basic need, but one has no right to it, what happens if this need goes unfulfilled? This is a familiar scenario if one replaces water with food. The United Nations requests governments provide money and resources to assist in this humanitarian crisis and as a result some governments respond with shipments of water or money. All too soon the money runs out and compassion fatigue sets in before the crisis has been arrested. The need still exists but to whom do these needy people complain, and on what grounds? Do they complain that the charity given to them was not enough? How do they establish a claim that the governments of the world have a duty to make sure their water needs are satisfied? If there is a right to water, these needy people have the rule of law on their side and intergovernmental and national governments are then compelled by law to aid in the water crisis. A human rights framework provides an opportunity for needy people to re-define themselves as more than needy people dependent on the charity of others; they become global citizens with the same rights and duties as others. This re-definition is more about semantics than reality. According to human rights ideology this re-definition was not necessary; these people were always global citizens with many human rights, including the right to water. The redefinition is necessary not because suddenly these water-deprived people
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____________________________________________________________ became global citizens but because perceptions have to change in order to deal with this problem. When water is understood as both a need and a right, relieving the water crisis and working toward a solution is not simply an act of voluntary charity but a legal requirement. These formerly needy people, re-defined as global citizens, can then take advantage of the mechanisms used by human rights advocates to monitor, publicize, and demand action based on their rights and needs, a powerful combination. In addition, a human rights approach recognizes that the water crisis is not just a problem for individual states, but a universal problem that transcends political borders. It removes national borders as stumbling blocks to international action and it recognizes the importance of collaboration between levels of government and interaction and participation at all levels to improve the crisis. The established human rights framework has a history of capitalizing on and organizing action from the international community without minimizing the value of the local community. The human rights work done on the international level recognizes that the systematic reasons for the water crisis-global warming and population growth must be addressed if there is to be fundamental improvement. Re-conceptualizing water rights as human rights invites the active participation of individuals at the local level as well. By recognizing that this is an international problem people can act as global citizens to encourage their national governments involvement in the solution, as well as joining forces across borders to create real change. Reconceptualizing water as a human right also stresses the other side of rights, which are duties. An individual is not only entitled to water but they are obligated to respect it as it is being used. In addition, just as governments have an obligation to work to improve the water situation, each person has an obligation to be a wise end user of water. Individuals bear a responsibility to acting locally to implement wise water policies as well as to lobby for these policies from the government. They have a right and a duty to demand their legal rights and therefore are active in the debate of water, with the ability to control what happens to them, their families, and their community. As the adage goes, if you are not part of the solution you are part of the problem and each person has the obligation to build a better future beginning with deliberate and wise use of water, whether they live in a village or city in a developed or developing nation. Finally, we can begin to see the problem of the water crisis and stress the importance of this problem even in areas that do not appear to be in crisis by thinking about the global consequences of inaction. Just as with human rights, the water crisis and other environmental problems are not problems for nations, they are problems for the world as a whole. It is not a question of if the water crisis will affect all parts of the world, it is a
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____________________________________________________________ question of when and how. To be sure, the problem will be more acute in some areas just as different human rights violations appear to affect some areas more than others, but human rights violations anywhere diminish humanity and human dignity in general. The same can be said for the water crisis; we will all feel the effects of it. The problems of the water crisis can not be contained within political borders. Disease, famine, migration of peoples, political instability, and poverty will compound the water crisis, but will ensure that the crisis is a global experience. The best way to address the problem, is to emphasize each individual as a global citizen, each affected by the problem and each vested with the responsibility to play a role in the solution. A human rights approach does not guarantee success and it will be a long time before the full benefits will become obvious; however, it took a long time for us to cause the problem and it should be expected that the solution would take at least as long. Human rights work provides evidence of the benefits of thinking long-term. The state of human rights around the world is fundamentally better than it was following World War II. While there are still problems, the gradual improvements in many areas of the world in the area of human rights provide a hopeful picture of the future with regard to the water problems across the globe and just as human rights have been elevated from national concerns to international concerns, so to should water for many of the same reasons.
Notes 1
United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization, Water for People, Water for Life: The United Nations World Water Development Report, (Paris: UNESCO Publishing, 2003), 10. 2 The World Health Organization, The Right to Water (Geneva: Publications of the World Health Organization, 2003), 7. 3 World Health Organization Constitution (1946). 4 International Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women (1979) Article 14 (2). 5 Convention on the Rights of the Child (1989) Article 24 (2) 6 The Geneva Convention Relative to the Treatment of Prisoners of War (1949) Article 26 and Geneva Convention Relative to the Treatment of Civilian Persons in time of War (1949) Articles 85 and 89. 7 United Nations Millennium Declaration. New York, NY, United Nations, 2000 (available on the Internet at http://www.un.org/millennium/declaration/ares552e.htm).
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Salman M.A. Salman and Siobhan McInerney-Lankford, The Human Right to Water: Legal and Policy Dimensions (Washington D.C: World Bank, 2004), 15. 9 United Nations General Assembly Resolution 58/217 International Decade for Action, “Water for Life,” 2005-2015. 78th Plenary Meeting, December 23, 2003. 10 http://www.worldwatercouncil.org 11 At the 4th Annual World Water Forum held in Mexico City March 1622, 2006, 1,631 presentations of local actions were represented. 12 http://www.worldwatercouncil.org 13 The Committee on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (2002). General Comment No. 15-The Right to Water Geneva.
The Mobilisation of Norms for Legitimacy in the Global Warming Debate Cassandra Star Abstract Contemporary debates surrounding global commons issues and their amelioration are inextricably linked with a parallel discourse of environmental justice. This paper examines the normative discourses of rights and justice in the international arena, particularly in relation to the global climate change debate. It is argued that the discourse of environmental justice has served as a focus in negotiations on the issue of climate change. However, justice and rights, and how they are defined, have also been significantly contested. The terms “justice” and “rights” have been mobilised by numerous stakeholders in the debate over climate change as they seek moral and political legitimacy for their understandings of environmental justice regarding emissions reduction proposals, and justice for the currently, and potentially, affected populations. Differing claims within the discourse pivot on arguments over equity versus equality and what might constitute them in the politics of climate change. In particular, this paper focuses on the claims of nongovernmental environment groups campaigning on the climate change issue in the Asia-Pacific region. The non-governmental organisations (NGOs) and others argue that the humanitarian impact of global climate change presents significant issues for the Asia Pacific region. These groups draw significant connections between environmental justice and human rights in their advocacy for vulnerable populations in the Pacific, arguing for environmental justice. This paper examines two instances of the use of established normative frameworks that are used to gather and mobilise legitimacy in the global warming debate. Keywords: norms, global warming, legitimacy, justice, rights. 1.
Introduction Climate change represents one of the key international dilemmas of the 21st century. It provides a rich ground for investigating and understanding the international politics of the environment. In this paper, the politics of climate change is used as a case study to illustrate one example of how international actors mobilise, and attempt to mobilise, accepted international norms to gain legitimacy for their positions within politically contested policy arenas. The role of ideas and norms within the international arena has recently been highlighted in international relations literature as a having an important influence on power and outcomes.
The Mobilisation of Norms for Legitimacy 276 ____________________________________________________________ It is the argument of this paper that we can see the use of normative language and normative discourses to harness moral power in support of particular positions in climate change negotiations. Stakeholders in the debate over climate change have, through negotiations and other public actions, mobilised different normative frameworks in an attempt to secure legitimacy for their positions. The key discourses that we can see mobilised in this particular case include those around justice and rights. In this paper I will briefly outline the literature on norms in the international arena, investigate the search for legitimacy in climate change debates by different stakeholders, and in particular the role of nongovernmental organisations in mobilising the discourse of justice in support of their position. 2.
Norms in the International Arena The role of norms and the power of ideas in international relations is a recent development 1 . Knowledge and information has always been regarded as a key ingredient in determining interests, evaluating relative or absolute gains or losses, and ensuring compliance 2 , in cooperation between states. However, the focus has been clearly on material and military power determined by the careful pursuit of gains or limiting of losses by individual states 3 . Nevertheless, research has over time suggested that rationalist explanations fail to provide a full picture of how power is gathered, mobilised and exercised in the international arena. This new development has largely been advanced by constructivist theorists. Constructivist theorists advance two key propositions about social and political life which define their perspectives on international relations. Firstly, human agents and social structures are mutually constitutive. Second, the most important dimensions of social structures are normative, ideational and cultural, not material 4 . This is where constructivists depart from rationalist analyses - material power is not everything, and social structures don’t just constrain state behaviour, they also shape and change states and their behaviour. In constructivism, social interaction in the international system leads to collective understandings, and these collective understandings constitute reality. For instance, it has been argued that sovereignty, a taken for granted reality of the international system in rationalist theory, is in fact a collective understanding of actors in the international system 5 . Thus constructivists focus on the discursive and the intersubjective in their research; they are interested in how actors understand and find meaning in the world, how they form and transform their
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____________________________________________________________ interests, how it impacts upon decisions, and thus on international politics and governance. The constructivist field certainly opens up understandings of international cooperation on the environment to the role of norms. 3.
The Search for Legitimacy in Climate Change Debates This paper will focus on one aspect of the mobilisation of norms and moral power within the climate change debate. While states and institutional actors actively seek legitimacy for their positions within international debates, increasingly non-state actors are also involved in these debates at the international level. Non-governmental organisations are concerned with securing legitimacy for their position and frequently attempt to utilise norms and moral power to highlight the deficiency of the actions or non-actions of other actors. I argue that NGOs have sought to do this in the climate change debate using two normative frameworks justice and human rights. In the climate change debate they have experienced significant success using the discourse of justice, but have struggled to mobilise the language of rights in support of their position. Below I explore these two outcomes. Climate change campaigns are characterised by significant differences in the focus, orientation, and understandings of the groups involved. Research into the campaigns of major environmental nongovernmental groups reveals expected differences in the targets of climate change campaigns, orientation of campaign, and campaigning methods 6 but also a particular conception of good environmental decisions. Sections of the environment movement have long argued for less focus on issues of environmental quality, and more focus on equity within environmental issues: the embrace of social justice. This environmental justice approach refers to an attempt to encompass a wider range of socio-political concerns in environmental debates. Proponents argue that “[e]nvironmental problems are a component of social exclusion and an issue of social justice” 7 . The movement has re-defined the environmental debate toward issues of justice and equity to, implicitly or explicitly, mobilise these discourses to provide greater legitimacy for their position(s). As Obiora argues, “peoples across the globe are intoning and rallying around novel concepts, norms and standards of environmental protection as a social justice objective” 8 . Many climate campaigns display a well evolved and articulated notion of ecological citizenship at the core of their advocacy. Central to this are issues of justice and equity, as well as respect for human rights in relation to environmental issues 9 . This approach goes beyond recommendations for good environmental governance,
The Mobilisation of Norms for Legitimacy 278 ____________________________________________________________ encompassing a vision for ethical individual and community citizenship 10 . In essence, it involves the mobilisation of normative discourses and moral power to legitimise some actions and delegitimise others within the climate change debate. With the advent of global environmental problems and their entry onto the international political agenda, the contributions of, versus the burdens of, lesser developed countries within these issues were highlighted 11 . The discourse of environmental justice recognises the lack of capacity for adaptation to serious environmental problems such as global warming in developing countries, as well as the relatively small contributions that they have historically made to global environmental problems. In the Asia Pacific, much NGO activity around climate change has centred on the projected impacts of climate change on a number of vulnerable countries and communities in that region 12 . A number of states have been strong critics of the current Kyoto Protocol requirements, of the overall acceptance of global warming and an adaptation strategy, as well as the current negotiating positions of the United States and Australia. The Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS), with a 0.06% share of the world’s current emissions, is collectively one of the least prodigious producers of climate changing gases 13 . Meanwhile, these small islands are already suffering the impacts of climate change 14 . Clearly, for this group, adaptation is an unacceptable international strategy that leaves them vulnerable to social, political and economic disruption and dispossession: it is an issue of social justice. This has certainly been demonstrated within climate change campaigns: The ability of the rich countries to be able to say, well, we’re going to keep polluting even though we know it could have catastrophic consequences for the whole world including people who didn’t create any of this pollution … but the rich countries are thinking in the back of their minds - but it’s ok because we have the resources to be able to adapt … 15 . Thus, environmental justice, as a globally oriented discourse highlighting the “winners” and “losers” in relation to the burdens and costs arising unequally and inequitably from environmental issues, is an appropriate discourse for understanding climate change. Environmental NGOs (ENGOs) have experienced excellent resonance in terms of mobilising support and legitimacy for their position 16 . In the Asia Pacific, the justice discourse has secured support from faith-based communities, unions, and
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____________________________________________________________ other social justice organisations which have given greater legitimacy to this position. This is an example of the use of the normative framework of justice and the accompanying moral power within the climate change debate. The established framework and understanding of global justice debates and issues provided a clear discourse that ENGOs and other international actors were familiar with and that was accepted within the international arena as legitimate. ENGOs were able to mobilise this discourse to provide legitimacy, acceptance and strength for their position. However, attempts to effectively mobilise the norms and moral power associated with human rights have been much less successful. The dialogue about human rights and environment within the climate change issues have centred on the projected population movements associated with sea level rise and climate changes in different geographical regions. For the purposes of this paper, I concentrate on the Asia Pacific. Environmental degradation was identified among the four underlying sources of refugee flows by the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees’ (UNHCR) State of the World’s Refugees report 17 . Approximately 25 million people are estimated to fall into this category, with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) predicting an increase to 150 million by 2050 18 , largely through the projected flow of peoples due to climate change impacts. In her early seminal work, Jacobson argued that “environmental refugees have become the single largest class of displaced persons in the world” 19 . Consequently, NGOs working in the environmental issue arena have adopted the term “environmental refugees” to highlight the population movements stemming from climate change. In Australia, NGOs have focused on the particular vulnerabilities of the small island states of the Pacific region. However, refugees are defined by the international community using a very narrow legal definition derived from the UN Convention Relating to the Status of Refugees (1951). The use of the term “environmental refugees” by ENGOs quite obviously has ramifications for current understandings of what constitutes a refugee and the wider discourse of human rights. This has motivated spirited discussion within international organisations and refugee studies about if, and how, environmental refugees might be defined, and whether the term has legitimacy. The refugee convention represents one of the most commonly accepted norms in the international arena 20 . Many in international debates argue that the term “refugee” should be reserved for a narrow class of displaced persons. Particularly, they argue that the limited legal definition of refugees should be the measure applied to cases of displaced persons 21
The Mobilisation of Norms for Legitimacy 280 ____________________________________________________________ and related human rights issues. However, several significant periods of debate about the connection between environmental degradation and refugees have occurred since the convention was negotiated in 1951. The two most significant discussions for the purposes of this paper were parallel to large-scale institutional concern about climate change, circa 1988-1995, and more recently in the early half of the first decade of the 21st century. However, there has been vigorous criticism of the application of the term refugee to environmentally induced displacements in some circles 22 . It is clear that environmental refugees lie outside the current international legal definition of refugees, outside the regime in place at the international level for resolving refugee issues 23 , and thus outside the legitimate discourse on refugees and their rights. The UNHCR itself has denied a basis for environmental refugees, instead highlighting the importance of its existing mandate, and has argued that individuals impacted by environmental degradation will be able to avail themselves of the protection offered by their own governments, and through internal resettlement 24 . Obviously, the case of climate change refugees challenges this argument, especially given the projections of small island states in the Pacific ceasing to be viable, or to exist. Given the attention paid to the issue by international organisations and policymakers, while it has failed to gain widespread legitimacy, it has proved difficult to dismiss outright. Despite the lack of legal recognition of the plight of environmental refugees, there is considerable recognition within the international community of the role of environmental causes in the displacement of people from their homes. But, there remains significant debate over what to call these individuals, questions about the appropriateness of calls for international protection and/or asylum, and how to define the group of people who should be eligible for the term environmental refugees. One result of this ongoing contest however is a rejection by other international actors of attempts by ENGOs to mobilise the discourse of rights to legitimise. This rejection leaves ENGOs withoutt legitimacy and lacking other forms of power in relation to environmental refugees and they are therefore unlikely to leverage support for their case using this normative framework.
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____________________________________________________________ 4. Preliminary Thoughts on Norms, Legitimacy and Moral Power in Climate Change Debates As the discussion above highlights, there is a clear engagement of the discourses of environmental justice and rights within the literature and campaigns of ENGOs in the climate change debate at the international level. We can view these approaches represent a cohesive attempt to mobilise a normative and moral position in regard to global environmental issues. However, as a strategy by ENGOs, this has had mixed success. While within the discourse of justice, stakeholders have been able to gain some traction and received acknowledgement, support and attraction of allies, the same cannot be said of the discourse around rights. The rights discourse is already highly codified in international legal terms and within existing international organisations. Thus, the attempts to mobilise this discourse has met with strong opposition and limited success. These insights provide a potentially valuable starting point for understanding the role of moral power in the shaping of debates and the outcomes of issues in the international arena, particularly by actors that do not possess military or material power to gather support for their position in other ways. Thus, mobilising existing normative frameworks and discourses is one way to overcome the lack of tangible power in the international arena. How this power is effectively mobilised, as well as the limitations and factors dictating success, are elements of these findings that deserve further investigation. 5.
Conclusions This paper provides an investigation into one case study where ENGOs have attempted to mobilise two different normative frameworks and discourses to legitimise their position in the international arena. The international debate on climate change provides fertile ground for the mobilisation of moral power from the perspective of justice and human rights. However, while both frameworks are applicable in the case of climate change, ENGOs only managed to effectively mobilise the discourse of justice to gather legitimacy and support for their position. A number of factors operated in relation to each framework that predisposed it to success or failure. Key amongst these factors, based on this initial research, is the level of codification and investment of other actors in the existing normative framework and discourse. Future research focussing on the factors that either inhibit or facilitate effectiveness in mobilising norms and moral power for legitimacy is required. Further research would provide not only greater
The Mobilisation of Norms for Legitimacy 282 ____________________________________________________________ insight into international political debates, but also into the role of nonmaterial power in international relations theory.
Notes 1
For an overview of these developments see: K. O’Neill, J. Balsiger, & S. D. VanDeveer, “Actors, Norms, and Impact: Recent International Cooperation Theory and the Influence of the Agent-Structure Debate,” Annual Review of Political Science 7 (2004): 149-175. 2 D. A. Baldwin, Neorealism and Neoliberalism: The Contemporary Debate (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993). 3 For example see the key neo-realist and neo-liberal positions outlined by Waltz and Keohane respectively: K. N. Waltz, Theory of International Politics (New York: Random House, 1979); R. O. Keohane, After Hegemony: Cooperation and Discord in the World Economy (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1984). 4 J. G. Ruggie, "What Makes the World Hang Together? NeoUtilitarianism and the Social Constructivist Challenge," International Organization 53, no. 4 (1998): 856-879. 5 J. G. Ruggie, "Territoriality and Beyond: Problematizing Modernity in International Relations," International Organization 47, no. 1 (Winter) (1993): 139-174. 6 Hall & Star, this volume. 7 J. Agyeman, “Constructing Environmental (in)Justice: Transatlantic Tales,” Environmental Politics 11, no. 3 (2002): 46. 8 L. A. Obiora, “Symbolic Episodes in the Quest for Environmental Justice,” Human Rights Quarterly 21 (1999): 465. 9 C. Star, “Ecological Citizenship – A New Landscape for Human Rights Debate?” Australian Political Studies Association conference, (Otago University, Dunedin, New Zealand, 2005); C. Star, “Notions of Ecological Citizenship in Climate Justice Campaigns,” Ecopolitics XVI: Transforming Environmental Governance for the 21st Century, (Griffith University, July 2005). 10 Ibid. 11 G. Esteva, 1992. “Development” in The Development Dictionary: A Guide to Knowledge as Power, ed. W. Sachs (London and New Jersey: Zed Books, 1992), 6-25; R. Hofrichter ed, Toxic Struggles: The Theory and Practice of Environmental Justice (Philadelphia: New Society Publishers, 1993); M. Khor, “Economics and Environmental Justice: Rethinking North-South Relations,” in Toxic Struggles: The Theory and Practice of Environmental Justice, ed. R. Hofrichter (Philadelphia: New Society Publishers, 1993), 219-225.
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Kiribati has begun moving vulnerable populations to higher ground, Niue accepted the migration of seven families from Tuvalu, the Cateret Islands of Papua New Guinea have experienced significant salination related crop failure and will need to be relocated. 13 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Climate Change 2001: Impacts, Adaptation & Vulnerability Contribution of Working Group II to the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press, 2001). 14 Ibid 15 J. A. Richards, Coordinator of the Climate Action Network Australia, personal communication, 2004. 16 Hall & Star, this volume. 17 United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR). State of the World’s Refugees (New York: UNHCR, 1993). 18 IPCC 19 J. Jacobsen, Environmental refugees: a yardstick of habitability (Washington: Worldwatch Institute, 1988): 6. 20 L. Barnett, “Global Governance and the Evolution of the International Refugee Regime,” International Journal of Refugee Law 14, no. 2/3, (2002): 238-262. 21 R. Black, “Fifty Years of Refugee Studies: From Theory to Policy”, The International Migration Review 35, 1, (2002): 57-78; R. Black, Environmental Refugees: Myth or Reality? New Directions in Refugee Research, Working Paper No. 34. (Geneva: UNHCR Policy Evaluation Unit, 2001). 22 For example see: G. Kibreab, G. 1997, “Environmental Causes and Impact of Refugee Movements: A Critique of the Current Debate,” Disasters 21, no. 1, (1997): 20-38; J. A. McGregor, 1993. “Refugees and the environment” in Geography and refugees: patterns and processes of change, eds. R. Black & V. Robinson (London: Belhaven Press, 1993), 157–170. 23 J. C. Hathaway, The Law of Refugee Status (Toronto, Butterworths, 1991); Z. Rizvi, Z. 1988, “Causes of the refugee problem and the international response” in Human Rights and the Protection of Refugees under International Law, ed. A. E. Nash (Ottawa and Montreal: Institute for Research on Public Policy and The Canadian Human Rights Foundation, 1998), 107-120. 24 New Economic Foundation. Environmental Refugees: The Case for Recognition (London: New Economic Foundation, 2003).
Promoting Environmental Citizenship? A Critique of the Moral Persuasiveness of Direct Action Environmental Protest Belinda Clements Abstract During the 1990s Britain witnessed a rapid growth in what has been termed ‘direct action’ environmental protest. This paper focuses on direct action campaigns where ‘protest camps’ have been set up at the site of a proposed development, and is based on ethnographic data and interviews with activists and local campaigners from two camps in south east England undertaken in 1999 and 2000. At each site, members from the local community had initiated campaigns by forming action groups and engaging with local decision-making processes. When these efforts appeared unsuccessful, activists (from both within and outside the community) set up a protest camp to defend physically the site of the proposed development. While the local campaigning groups were largely focused on halting the particular development in question, protest camp activists were found to have a more complex set of aims. The majority of activists interviewed were also attempting to influence the local community by demonstrating and promoting alternative relationships between both other human beings and with nature. In particular, activists maintained that they could strengthen civil society by encouraging individuals to come together and take direct responsibility for their local environment. The paper examines their attempts to do this both in terms of their moral arguments and discourses and, importantly, their actions. Key Words: direct action environmental protest, environmental ethics, moral argument, environmental citizenship. 1.
Introduction A substantial body of literature now exists that questions our current ethical stance in relation to the world around us. As Aldo Leopold notably argued, instead of seeing ourselves as “conquerors” of the land we should instead see ourselves as “plain members and citizens of it”, 1 an idea expanded by Mark Sagoff when he argued that we should see ourselves not as consumers of a nature that we can buy and sell, but as citizens that should protect it. 2 While not all environmental philosophers speak in terms of ‘environmental citizenship’, the underlying message is often similar - we should expand our current circle of ethical consideration past solely attributing intrinsic value to other human beings to include parts (or all) of the nonhuman world.
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___________________________________________________________ However, despite the wealth of philosophical literature proposing alternative approaches to our relationship with nature, some environmental philosophers are becoming increasingly concerned that their ideas still have little impact on environmental decision-making and that environmental ethics (if recognised at all) remains a minority discipline in universities. 3 The problem, some argue, is that environmental philosophers are not applying themselves to problems and issues that are central concerns for environmentalists and policy-makers. 4 Light and de-Shalit 5 therefore suggest an alternative approach to the study of environmental ethics. Philosophers have traditionally, they argue, reflected on ideas from within the academic community. Why not take these reflective skills, and use them to consider actual problems faced by and theories expressed by environmentalists? This, they stress, is more than simply applied philosophy. Rather than merely using case studies to illustrate pre-defined philosophical arguments, some environmental philosophers could instead use the ideas expressed by environmentalists as a starting-point for study. This paper takes this approach, which Light and de-Shalit term Public Reflective Equilibrium (PRE), and applies it to the notions of environmental citizenship expressed by two particular groups of environmental activists. According to de-Shalit, philosophical reflection should not only use ‘internal criteria’ (such as consistency, coherency and simplicity) to examine ideas, but also ‘external criteria’, that is, “whether the theory explains what must be done, whether it relates to actual problems, and whether the intuitions tie in with other, moral and metaphysical beliefs about policies”. 6 In the analysis that follows, attempts have therefore been made to examine not only the consistency of the activists’ intuitions or theories within themselves, but also the “practicality of the theory”, i.e. how it operates within its socioenvironmental context. 7 The analysis therefore attempts to “analyse the moral codes and imperatives latent in the practicalities and actual deeds of environmental activists, as well as in the theories they develop”. 8 The paper starts by describing the particular groups of activists studied here and by giving some background to the wider environmental direct action movement in Britain to which these two groups belong. In order to begin to provide some comment on their politics and intuitions we then look in more detail at what some of these activists were aiming to achieve through their protest, and discover that some activists are indeed trying to promote what is taken here to be a form of environmental citizenship through their actions. The ways in which the activists attempt to promote these ideas are then considered in more detail. First, some comment is made about the consistency of their arguments in terms of
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___________________________________________________________ their general persuasiveness. We then look more closely at the question of whether direct action can strengthen civil society. Philosophers who have addressed this question argue that we must consider each action on a caseby-case basis. With this in mind, the two case studies are therefore assessed in more detail in order to ascertain whether in each particular socio-environmental context the activists’ arguments and methods of promoting environmental citizenship were successful. 2.
Direct action environmental protest During the 1990s in Britain a particular brand of environmental activism arose that rejected the by then more established campaigning organisations such as Friends of the Earth and Greenpeace who, while once the radical end of the environmental movement, had come to be seen as ineffective and institutionalised by some, particularly younger, activists. Not content with going on marches and waiving banners or writing letters to their democratic representatives, these individual activists came together and took what is now widely termed ‘direct action’ against the environmental destruction that they witnessed. Gaining initial momentum from the support for the campaign against the M3 motorway extension through the chalk downland at Twyford Down in Hampshire (Southern England) in 1992, where activists not only camped at the protest site but also physically put themselves between the bulldozers and the countryside, activists went on to undertake many high-profile campaigns against other road projects. Direct action campaigners diversified to tackle issues such as housing developments and genetically modified crops, but the overall ethos remained the same: directly doing something yourself, rather than relinquishing the responsibility of taking action to an elected representative or to an established environmental campaigning group. This paper focuses on two particular protest camps in Essex (south east England) active in 1999 and 2000. 9 The first of these, at Rettendon, was set up in opposition to a bypass of the A130 road that, at the time, ran straight through village, and that in recent years had been the site of a series of road accidents, some fatal. Environmental activists not only argued that the proposed bypass would destroy valuable woodland but were also concerned that the bypass was part of a larger plan to create an outer M25 orbital north-south road link between Chelmsford and Kent, a scheme which would encourage infill development in the area. While there had been some local activity in the form of the MWay NoWay campaign in neighbouring towns, activists living at the protest camp came largely from outside the local area. In Rettendon village itself the bypass was largely welcomed and, with the notable exception of a few very active local residents, the camp had a generally low level of local support in
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___________________________________________________________ terms of provision of food and other supplies. After a notable eviction in February-March 2000, during which five activists stayed in tunnels under the woodland for forty days, the bypass was completed later that year. The second protest camp considered in this paper took place in the nearby village of Hockley. In July 1999, Christina Tugwell (then aged 15) and some of her friends set up a camp in woodland opposite her home in an attempt to protect the site from sixty-six luxury homes due to be constructed by the property developers Countryside Residential. While the site attracted some ‘seasoned’ activists, it remained small, often with only five or six activists living on site. Most notable at Hockley were the actions taken by the developers to secure and evict the site. Several weeks before the camp was evicted, Countryside Residential had taken the unprecedented step of fencing off the protest camp, allowing anyone to leave the site if they wished, but not permitting anyone to return. Attempts to impede the supply of food and water to the camp were partially thwarted by the Tugwell’s solicitor, Richard Buxton, who secured a High Court injunction restraining the security staff from preventing the delivery of provisions, and, further, from indulging in any form of intimidation or harassment. 10 Nevertheless, the activists held that this injunction was frequently ignored. After an apparent agreement that the activists could remain on site during the work, they were caught off guard and, before anyone could reach the tunnels under the site (although one activist managed to lock-on to a tree for a night), the camp was cleared on 1st March 2000. The eviction from the site was later held to be unlawful by the Court of Appeal, 11 and the activists and local residents maintained that the security services contracted by the developers were extremely heavy handed. While each of these two camps was fighting different issues, there were many similarities between the two camps. Both ‘failed’ in terms of stopping the particular development. A few of the activists at Rettendon also moved to the camp at Hockley, and activists drew from the environmental direct action tradition, making similar arguments and using similar tactics at each camp. However, in terms of promoting environmental citizenship, one camp was far more successful than the other. After considering the general tactics and arguments used by the activists interviewed at both camps, the paper goes on to consider why this was the case. 3.
The activists’ aims On the surface, the aim of the protest camp residents may seem obvious - they are trying to halt the particular development they are opposing. However, while there have been a few successes, protest camps
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___________________________________________________________ are generally ineffective at stopping the particular development they are opposing. Why, then, expend so much time and energy on such a form of protest? Closer inspection of protest camp activists reveals a far more diverse range of aims than solely wanting to stop the particular development in question. While tactics used to resist eviction such as locking onto machinery and trees, or burying yourself in a tunnel, may well serve a practical purpose by delaying the clearing of the site (and perhaps acting as a financial deterrent against future projects), they also serve to promote the protesters’ ideology. Activists are taking direct responsibility for their negative reaction to the environmental destruction, and are clearly demonstrating to the outside world their strength of feeling against the particular development. 12 Doherty describes this practise of purposefully putting oneself in danger as ‘manufacturing vulnerability’ against the state, thereby asserting one’s moral high ground. Activists have developed a range of strategies to accentuate their vulnerability, particularly during eviction. While few activists firmly maintained that they were there solely to stop the particular development, and that “protest camps are not about changing people’s ideas”, 13 the majority of activists interviewed argued that their main aim was to promote an alternative worldview and lifestyle, and to make people “wake up” to the environmental destruction around them. 14 While most were also attempting actually to stop the development, contrary to the first group they believed it was more realistic to aim to affect people’s ideas than to ‘win’ the particular campaign. As Roo argued, “For me it’s a public awareness thing. There are cases of protest stopping developments, but the main thing is a public awareness thing”. 15 It is on the arguments made by the second (larger) group of activists that this paper focuses. By attempting to ‘educate’ the public and encouraging people to engage directly with the fate of their physical surroundings, these activists are attempting to promote a form of environmental citizenship not dissimilar to ideas being suggested by some environmental philosophers outlined above. A recurrent theme expressed by the activists interviewed in this study was the promotion of what they referred to as anarchism, largely in terms of the importance of ‘individual autonomy’. Activists were keen to stress that the social organisation of the camps was non-hierarchical - no one individual or group of individuals were ‘in charge’. Wherever possible individuals made their own decisions (for example, about where to build tree defences) and when group decisions were necessary, meetings were (in theory) ordered around principles of non-hierarchy. As found in other studies, 16 activists emphasised the importance of creating free,
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___________________________________________________________ autonomous spaces where individuals can flourish and which, as far as possible, were free from state intervention. Such a principle may not, at first glance, seem to say much about citizenship or social cohesion. However, inseparable from the idea of individual autonomy is the notion of individual responsibility. Rather than be led by whatever decisions had been taken by, for example, the headquarters of established environmental campaigning organisations, activists make their own decisions about how to demonstrate their strength of feeling against the environmental destruction. Current decision-making processes, they maintain, are inherently corrupt and while most do not discourage people from engaging in such processes, a two-pronged approach was needed that included local people taking direct action against the development in an attempt to even up the balance of power. By so doing, activists argue, stronger links can be made within the local community, not only in terms of the relationships between people, but also by fostering closer bonds between people and their physical environment. Activists, then, hope to promote a stronger sense of environmental citizenship by encouraging people to engage in direct action. But how, exactly, do they hope to achieve this? There has been some discussion of the importance of direct action in terms of ‘image events’ - while the activists might not ‘succeed’ in immediate terms, their action may well increase public consciousness of an issue. 17 If successfully captured by the media, DeLuca argues, these events may serve as what he terms ‘mind bombs’ in society by altering public consciousness. However, by the end of the 1990s, the media (certainly at a national level) appeared to have become rather weary of what had arguably become a rather formulaic form of protest. So if they were no longer gaining much media coverage, then how did the activists hope to promote their ideology? Interestingly, the majority of activists interviewed denied that they were trying to attract the attention of the (national mainstream) media at all, and would have agreed with de-Shalit and DeLuca, 18 who argue that the media coverage of direct action rarely scrapes below the surface of the ‘event’ to explore the wider context of the struggle. Instead, activists maintained they were simply attempting to affect people by setting an example for those who came in contact with them to follow. As John argued, “You’ve got to start by changing a few people, and eventually it’ll spread.” 19 4.
Promoting environmental awareness By undertaking direct action, the majority of activists hoped to promote a deeper sense of environmental citizenship amongst the local population. A vital step towards achieving this was to highlight the
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___________________________________________________________ seriousness of environmental problems and the need for people to engage with the process of addressing these issues. In this section we look at the arguments that the activists gave for the importance of environmental issues. Unlike environmental philosophers, in large part activists did not attempt to do this through rational dialogue. They instead demonstrated their strength of feeling through their actions, both in terms of the more visible resistance to eviction of the camp, but also in their endurance of day-to-day living in what were, in the main, very basic conditions. In interview, activists tended to maintain that it was through witnessing their actions and lifestyles that the local residents could be encouraged to follow their example, rather than through spoken dialogue. Even when asked specifically about the ways in which we value nature and the reasons why the woodland should be saved, most activists wanted to avoid moral debate about the rights of environmental destruction, and instead asserted that we have to do it for the survival of ourselves and the planet. While activists maintained that they were attempting to avoid moral debate, such arguments in themselves do involve assumptions concerning a moral imperative to take action to protect us, other humans, future generations and, perhaps, the non-human world. In order to reflect upon the consistency and coherency of their position, activists’ interviews were therefore scrutinised in an attempt to uncover the discourses and assumptions underpinning their arguments. Moreover, Johnstone urges us when we analyse discourse to scrutinise the text not only for discourses that are used, but also to consider how the text could have been different. 20 What discourses that we might expect activists to have used were omitted, and why might this have been? Much of the literature in environmental ethics journals tends to focus on nonanthropocentric approaches to environmental ethics. 21 However, despite the radical nature of their protest and strength of feeling against the destruction of the woodland, the activists studied here did not, in the main, use nonanthropocentric arguments for preserving the woodland, but instead articulated basic instrumental arguments concerning human health and survival. These activists vigorously argued that the main reason we should be saving the woodlands is that people need the environment ‘intact’ in order to survive. Sometimes this was expressed in broad statements such as, “At the end of the day, that’s it. We can’t keep destroying it [nature] and expect to stay alive” (Tara), or a more specific focus on the function of trees, such as from Flo, who argued, “We need more trees to live, we die if there are no trees, as simple as that”. Others were concerned with the more specific local health risks associated with increased traffic from the development.
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___________________________________________________________ And, in the main, activists did not use discourses about nature that we would recognise from nonanthropocentric philosophies such as deep ecology, which often focus on the preservation of ‘wilderness’ to the extent that humans are to be excluded from ‘wild’ areas. 22 For the activists interviewed here, the emphasis was not on the exclusion of humans from wilderness but on our greater need for connection with such ‘green spaces’. While Flo, for example, was concerned that “there’s not that much proper countryside, there’s no moors, there’s no real wild places around here”, her concern was not only to conserve wildlife habitat but also that people should have access to it. My argument that this indicates that they are not using ecocentric arguments may be rather simplistic. Central to deep ecology, for example, is the notion that we should directly experience our natural surroundings in order to recognise its value. Nonanthropocentric arguments do not preclude human-use values; they additionally extend the consideration of value to the nonhuman world. Nevertheless, for the majority of activists, the value of the woodland was defined largely in terms of the survival (both physically and psychologically) of people. In addition to basic human survival and health concerns, for over half of the activists interviewed the recreational loss to the local community was also an important consideration. It was anthropocentric arguments that were most commonly and forcefully used by the activists. And where the need for a closer relationship with nature was stressed, this was not presented as a prima facie ‘right’ to have access to the countryside, but was instead expressed in terms of our need to foster close relationships with nature. Another striking omission was the lack of scientific argument used to back up their claims about the value of the woodland. While some environmental groups may bemoan the effect on society and nature of technological progress, expert, scientific knowledge is often seen to give an accurate and unproblematic reflection of environmental problems and is used to legitimate the environmentalists’ claims. 23 However, the activists studied here rarely used scientific discourse of ‘facts’ to make the case for preserving the particular site under threat. Although a few defined the value of the area in part in terms of the presence of rare species, even broadly scientific terms such as the ‘biodiversity’ of the area were rarely used. Even where activists did speak in terms of what they were doing being the ‘right’ thing to do (and indicated some degree of moral judgement), rather than using reasoned, philosophical argument or emphasising the value of the area with recourse to scientific knowledge, activists instead tended to argue that saving the woodland simply seemed to them to be the most obvious course of action. Coffee said that he left his
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___________________________________________________________ post as a security guard at one camp and joined the activists because “I just thought to myself, these people are right in what they’re doing”. Interestingly, this approach does have parallels with deep ecology - the implication is that activists intuitively know the value of the site because they live in and experience its value. But while such intuitionism has a rich philosophical historical legacy in the study of epistemology, 24 several commentators have pointed to failings in the arguments concerning the use of intuitionism by deep ecologists. 25 While deep ecologists overcome the problem of explaining why their intuitions are more reliable than, say, the road builders’ by emphasising their direct experience of nature, this argument has a number of flaws. First of all, far from removing any ‘ontological divide’ between people and nature (as deep ecologists purport to do), it instead maintains this divide; implicit within the assumption that we can instead live our lives within nature is the supposition that it is possible to live a life outside nature. Such a position risks failure to gain a deeper understanding of the complexity of our socio-environmental relations. Second, even if we loosely define those people who are actively living in and experiencing nature as people who perhaps work and live in remote rural areas, what does this theory say about the people who lead this kind of life, and yet do not share the intuitions of deep ecologists? And as Humphrey asks, is it not likely that the “decision to go and live an active life in nature will itself be the result of, not a cause of, a set of strong intuitions about the value and beauty of nature[?] The process of living in nature would thus be reinforcing, rather than transforming, a set of already extant intuitions”. 26 Such an argument is therefore rather circular. Activists who argue that they have an intuitive urge to save the woodland offer no clear argument to persuade those for whom it is not obvious. Rather than using moral debate or scientific discourse, when arguing that the woodland should be saved activists instead resorted to what Johnstone recognises as a widespread strategy used to circulate or reproduce discourse: assertion. 27 Rather than presenting themselves as ‘supposers’ of what is happening in the world, activists instead put themselves forward as ‘knowers’. The truth-status of their knowledge about the world was presented as irrefutable, as indeed was their ‘knowledge’ of policy-makers’ motivations and the ideas and opinions held by the general public. Activists not only spoke in very certain terms about the “fact that there’s not much countryside left” (Flo), but also that people “know that they’re consuming the planet and poisoning people” (Bob). The general public was presented as, at best, ill-informed about the effects of their actions or, at worst, as knowing but simply not caring. Even if members of the general public were presented as ‘dopes’ who
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___________________________________________________________ could not help but blindly follow the powerful capitalist propaganda, by implication this still makes them more stupid than the activists, who have somehow been able to pull free from this influence and see the ‘true’ way of the world. 5.
Promoting environmental citizenship? Consideration of the types of arguments used by direct action environmentalists at protest camps does not reveal a particularly firm basis from which to promote environmental citizenship. An examination of the type of moral arguments they use suggests that their arguments are not likely to be persuasive to those who are not already sympathetic to their perspective. However, stressing the importance of environmental issues was not the only way in which activists hoped to promote environmental citizenship. A key argument from the activists is that, by undertaking direct action against developments that threaten woodland, they can demonstrate an alternative politics and way of life to local communities, which in turn would strengthen the position of these individuals to take collective action on future environmental issues and to engage in decisionmaking about the immediate localities. While there is not a wealth of literature concerning direct action in the environmental ethics literature, some discussion has been undertaken to examine the notion that direct action is ‘good’ for civil society. 28 The central argument in support of direct action is that it encourages participation in the democratic process, thereby strengthening democracy. Following the assumption that we do not all have an equal share of power in the democratic process, ‘civil disobedience’ is therefore justifiable and, even, required in order to highlight inequalities and to change unfair laws. However, while in general the authors are positive about the possibility of direct action strengthening civil society, the position taken is largely a consequentialist one - no general principles could be found that make all ecosabotage justifiable, and each case should therefore be judged on its individual merits. 29 While this is not an easy task, this section attempts briefly to assess and compare the impact on the local community of the two protest camps. As we have seen above, activists tend to use anthropocentric arguments for preserving the woodland rather than ecocentric justifications. However, despite this, local residents at Rettendon appeared to resent the activists’ position, and commonly believed that activists held that preserving the woodland was more important than the lives of the children who might be injured or killed if the bypass to the village was not completed. While in interview some activists stressed that theirs was not a ‘no roads anywhere’ message, and had specific concerns
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___________________________________________________________ about the viability of this bypass, this subtlety seems to have been missed by most local resident interviewees. In the main, local residents who were not already sympathetic to the activists’ cause seemed unmoved by their perspective, and it was not clear that the local community were brought together or empowered in any sense by the protest - those local residents who did support the camp apparently felt significant hostility from some other villagers. The anarchist message of individual autonomy and responsibility appeared to be lost on those interviewed - indeed, the ‘anarchist’ label itself was used negatively by residents who otherwise in favour of the camp, who tended to distinguish between the ‘true ecos’, who were thought to be “good people,” and the ‘anarchists’ who were thought to be troublemakers who were “not really bothered about the trees”. 30 In contrast to this, despite the comparatively low numbers of activists at the camp, local residents at Hockley appeared to have been more positively affected by the activists’ arguments of the wider effects of the destruction of the woodland, and the community appeared to have been brought together by the protest. There could be several reasons for this. First, many villagers at Rettendon were in favour of the bypass for reasons of safety. Few people, however, are likely to be in favour of a housing development adjacent to their property as at Hockley. Second, activists at Rettendon remained more like ‘outsiders’ to the community than at Hockley. The camp at Rettendon was some distance from the village and was only passed by dog-walkers, whereas the camp at Hockley was very close to local houses. Moreover, the camp at Hockley had been started by a local resident, whereas activists at Rettendon appeared to have far fewer links with local residents. However, whether the camp at Hockley promoted the form of environmental citizenship discussed in this paper is debatable. While some locals called for greater accountability of elected representatives, those local residents interviewed rarely picked up on the more radical political message promoted by activists. As we saw above, in the main activists maintained that they were attempting to promote their perspective through their actions, rather than through reasoned argument. At both camps activists utilised tactics that Doherty would see as ‘manufacturing vulnerability’. 31 It was certainly the case that even at Rettendon such techniques proved productive. The five activists appeared to increase local support considerably by staying underground for forty days - local residents who have previously thought little of the activists expressed some respect for their commitment to the issue, although there was some concern when it was reported in the local press that taxpayers money would be used to foot the £6 million bill for the eviction. 32
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___________________________________________________________ It is through such acts that activists can demonstrate their strength of feeling for protecting the woodland and can suggest some kind of moral high ground over the developers. Nevertheless, while in this sense they may be effective, such actions can also have a negative impact in terms of encouraging other local residents to take action. The recurrent image (portrayed both by journalists and by activists themselves) of the brave, fearless ‘eco-warrior’ fighting for the woodland was recognised by some activists to be itself a barrier to participation in the camps. As Tara maintained, on the one hand the image served to highlight the activists’ strength of feeling by “Showing people there’s people willing to fight for a site or that particular tree, know what I mean, a hero in a tree you know in a newspaper or something, then someone’s going to think, ‘Bloody hell, they really, really care about that.’” On the other hand, earlier in the interview she had explained that through direct action she hoped to demonstrate a way of tackling issues that other people could emulate, so she wanted to make clear that she was “no different from anyone else […] I’m essentially no different from all the next-door neighbours, all the people who live in the street. I’m not some hero, or some eco-warrior or anything like that.” Although activists hope to empower people by showing them ways to create power and fight social and environmental injustice, they in danger of creating an image that most people feel unable to follow. The practice of ‘manufacturing vulnerability’ to create a moral high ground necessarily sets the activists apart from the ‘normal’ population. In general, local residents interviewed in this study did indeed describe their gratitude in terms of the activists being there on “their behalf” and “admired them” for doing something that they themselves would not or could not do. 33 Moreover, the decentralist style of camp politics frustrated rather than impressed some local residents (and, in fact, some camp residents) interviewed, as they felt that so much more could have been achieved with a little more organisation. 6.
Conclusion What, then, did the activists achieve? The conclusions above may seem rather harsh or unrepresentative to some readers. But the purpose of this paper is not to provide an overt criticism of all direct action environmentalists, far from it. The objective has merely been to examine why the activists might or might not have been successful in terms of one, arguably narrow, view of a type of environmental citizenship that some activists maintained they were attempting to promote. But given the parameters of the paper, the general conclusion drawn from the type of methods that the activists use to persuade others to
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___________________________________________________________ follow their example is that, in the main, their verbal arguments are unlikely to be persuasive to those who are not already sympathetic to their position – it is doubtful the intuitionist argument will be credible to those who do not already share the activists’ assumptions about the world, and the portrayal of themselves as ‘knowers’ in contrast to the public’s blind faith in ‘progress’ is unlikely to be appealing to those outside of the counter-cultural community. Furthermore, the ‘eco-warrior’ style of protest and decentralist forms of decision-making on camp could be a barrier to participation. Even at Hockley there was little evidence that the radical political message had been adopted by those locals interviewed. Nevertheless, this is not to suggest that these protests ‘failed’. The situations at both Rettendon and Hockley have necessarily been simplified for the sake of this paper, and the evidence on which the conclusions are based is far from conclusive - for a start, without the aid of a crystal ball it was obviously rather difficult in a study such as this to interview local residents before a protest camp was in place. Activists may sow a seed in someone’s mind that may not take effect for many months or years. This research merely hopes to explore the ways in which environmental philosophy could be more useful to environmentalists and policy makers. The question of whether this has been achieved here is left open.
Notes 1
Aldo Leopold A Sand County Almanac, and sketches here and there. (London: OUP, 1949). 2 Mark Sagoff The Economy of the Earth: Philosophy, Law and Environment. (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988). 3 Eric Hargrove, ‘What’s Wrong? Who’s to Blame?’ Environmental Ethics 25(1) (2003) 3-4; Avner de-Shalit, The Environment - Between Theory and Practice. (Oxford, University of Oxford Press: 2000); 4 See, for example, Ben Minteer and R. Manning, ‘Pragmatism in Environmental Ethics: Democracy, Pluralism, and the Management of Nature’ Environmental Ethics 21(2) (1999): 191-207. 5 Light and de-Shalit. 6 de-Shalit, 31. 7 de-Shalit, 33. 8 Ibid. 9 This empirical data for this paper has been selected from a study of four protest camps. Activists’ names have been changed. See B. Daly (now Clements) Direct Action Environmental Protest in Britain. A Critique of
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___________________________________________________________ Radical Environmentalism and Environmental Ethics. Ph.D. thesis, Imperial College, University of London, 2005. 10 Dated 24th February 2000, Claim No. CBO 90004. 11 R. Macrory, ‘Eco-protesters win test case against developers’ ENDS Report 303, April 2000, 56-67. 12 Brian Doherty ‘Manufactured vulnerability: protest camp tactics’ in Direct Action in British Environmentalism, ed. Ben Seel, Matthew Paterson and Brian Doherty (London: Routledge, 2000), 62-78. 13 ‘Joff’ in interview 14 e.g. ‘Dales’ in interview 15 Fieldnotes 11/02/00 Rettendon. 16 Seel, B. (1997a) ‘Strategies of Resistance at the Pollock Free State Protest Camp’ Environmental Politics 6(4) (1997): 108-139. 17 See, for example, Kevin DeLuca (1999) Image Politics - The New Rhetoric of Environmental Activism (New York: Guildford, 1999). 18 de-Shalit ‘Ten Commandments of How to Fail in an Environmental Campaign’ and DeLuca Image Politics. 19 ‘John’ in interview. 20 B. Johnstone Discourse Analysis. (Oxford: Blackwell, 2002). 21 de-Shalit The Environment - Between Theory and Practice. 22 See, for example, Arne Naess ‘The Shallow and the Deep: Long Range Ecology Movements’ Inquiry 16(1) (1973): 95-100 23 See, for example, B. Szerszynski ‘On knowing what to do: environmentalism and the modern problematic’ in Risk, Environment and Modernity. ed. Scott Lash, Bron Szerszynski and Brian Wynne (London: Sage, 1996) 104-137 24 See, for example, J. McMahan ‘Moral Intuition’ in The Blackwell Guide to Ethical Theory ed. H. LaFollette (Oxford: Blackwell, 2000): 92-109. 25 M. Humphrey ‘Intuition, Reason and Environmental Argument’ in Moral and Political Reasoning in Environmental Practice ed. Andrew Light and Avner de-Shalit (London: MIT Press 2003): 45-76 26 Humphrey, 53 27 Johnstone Discourse Analysis. 28 See, for example, T. Young ‘The Morality of Ecosabotage’ Environmental Values 10 (2003) 385-93. 29 See Young ‘The Morality of Ecosabotage’ 30 Fieldnotes 27/06/00 Rettendon. 31 Doherty ‘Opposition to Road-Building’ 32 Clow ‘Eco-Protest Has Cost £6M’ 33 Fieldnotes 06/06/00 Hockley.
Part V
Making Knowledge Count? Environmental Education
Environmental Education in a Course on Ethics and International Development Judith Andre Abstract Students from American suburbs grow up in a culture antithetical to genuine appreciation for the environment. Lacking mass transportation, they go from house to school or shopping malls by car, “outside” only for a minute or two a day. Suburban culture is also consumerist: shopping has become, notoriously, an end in itself. Students from this background nevertheless have kind hearts. They respond with passion to certain sorts of issues – the mistreatment of animals, corporate polluters, famines overseas. But they do not recognize the interconnections between these issues and their own lifestyles. The students need a deeper awareness of their own rootedness in the earth. Our course “Ethics and [International] Development” can move students toward this deeper understanding. One central concept is the position that development consists not in markets or technology, but in the ability of individuals to develop their central human capabilities. One of these capabilities, arguably, is being able to live with concern for and in relation to the earth. The course also addresses the power of global economic systems, in producing or alleviating poverty, and in protecting or destroying the environment.
Keywords: environment; education; development; suburbs; students; ethics I teach at Michigan State University, situated in a small town about 90 miles from Detroit, one of the United States’ infamous “rust belt” cities, poor, black and desperate. Many of our students come from the suburbs of Detroit, whose largely white population fled Detroit a generation or more ago. These suburbs lack mass transportation and ordinarily have no central business districts. The closest equivalent to the central business districts (American “downtowns,” British “high streets”) of years past is the shopping mall (possibly called retail parks in Britain): large enclosed sets of stores – clothing, shoes, jewelry, electronics, gifts, restaurants, movie theatres. In place of public space, in other words, there is private commercial space. Professional and government offices are scattered in small clusters along arterials, as are supermarkets and pharmacies. None of this – the mall, the dentist, city government, the supermarket – can be reached except by car. For high school and college students the most frequent destination is the shopping mall. This residential geography and the pattern of life it encourages prevent much sense of the
302 Environmental Education in a Course on Ethics & Development ___________________________________________________________ natural environment and its value. First, given the dominance of the automobile, children in these settings may be “outside” only for a minute or two a day, going from house to car to school, doctor, or shopping. Furthermore, because of the severity of the North American climate, together with the ubiquity of central heating and air conditioning, the natural world can be experienced primarily as a nuisance. It is often either uncomfortably warm or cold; clothes that would protect against the cold are uncomfortable inside any heated building, and so most people choose to dress lightly, simply enduring their brief exposures to the elements. These hurried journeys to and from the car reveal nothing about the life and pulse of the earth. Frost on the branches, the return of songbirds, the oppressiveness that can precede violent storms – such details will hardly be noticed. Uncomfortable weather is something to be suffered; it has no further meaning. Second, the dominance of the shopping mall both reflects and reinforces the consumerism of the culture. Shopping has become, notoriously, a major component of life, an end in itself. Shopping as such, of course, can be consistent with a reverence for nature; it is natural to adorn oneself and one’s dwelling, to try to make life easier, to want to see more and hear more. Affluence – having a considerable amount of disposable income – means all these things can be done to a higher degree. It is not easy to identify the point at which adorning oneself (and so on) become consumerism. [Other major youth activities – seeing movies, connecting through cyberspace, and listening to music – could also cut several ways, but for this paper I will focus on shopping.] For this paper let me stipulate the following characteristics of consumerism: shopping for the pleasure of acquisition, not because of a felt need for something in particular; shopping done without attention to its impact on the environment; and habitual wasting of what one has bought. This way of living – automobile dependent, consumption driven – provide no natural sense of connection with the earth. Students from suburban backgrounds nevertheless have kind hearts. They respond with passion to certain sorts of issues – the mistreatment of animals, corporate polluters, famines overseas. But often their passion is unsophisticated. They may not recognize the interconnections among these issues, and between the problems “out there” and their own lifestyles. Their concern tends to be about what other, “bad,” people do, or to take the shape of isolated individual behaviours: some, for instance, are dedicated recyclers. Such students need a deeper awareness of their own rootedness in the earth, and of the complexities in the relationship between human life and the nonhuman environment.
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___________________________________________________________ Education must play a role in this deepening of understanding. Some may argue that classroom activities cannot counterbalance a lifestyle so thoroughly divorced from the natural world; that political and economic forces alone can change things. Dependence on the automobile, for instance, is unlikely to change until the price of gasoline makes it politically possible to change land use policies. Others will object that consumerism is virtually inevitable once a society becomes relatively affluent. Averaging across individuals that is probably true: most students will change a few habits, acquire a little guilt, and that will be the end of it; I would also agree that there is nothing quite like experience. A trip outside the United States, especially with guides who understand the larger picture, would do far more than a classroom experience alone. Yet a university course can make a difference. Notoriously, people can act – and vote – against their own economic interests. There is a not insignificant number of “political” consumers, and of “green” voters. If in the end only politics and economics will change suburban life, one step is the education of voters and consumers. Students, obviously, are both. And if education accompanied by experience – by travel, especially – is the ideal, study can motivate travel. I believe that our course “Ethics and [International] Development” can move students in these directions. The course looks at ethical aspects of “development” activities: largely but not exclusively projects originating in wealthier countries, intended to benefit poorer countries. The central and deepest issue is the question of what counts as development, that is, as change for the better. For years the definition, or at least the criterion, was economic: growth: a larger gross domestic product, or an increase in per capita income. It was gradually recognized that such criteria are inadequate. To begin with, an improvement in an average tells little about the status of individuals; the situation of those below the average might have worsened, but been offset mathematically by improvements for those above. Beyond these calculative deficiencies, the deeper problem is the assumption that increased market activity and more advanced technology, simply as such, improve the quality of life. In place of these earlier definitions of development, the community of scholars and activists now largely use the ‘capabilities approach’ formulated by Amartya Sen and others.1 Fundamentally Aristotelian, this approach holds that real development consists not in an increase in markets or technology, but in the ability of individuals to develop and exercise those capabilities which make them human. Another centrally relevant concept in the field is the power of global economic systems to create, reinforce, or alleviate poverty. Most of the
304 Environmental Education in a Course on Ethics & Development ___________________________________________________________ poorest countries on the globe for instance, are former colonies of the richest countries; extractive colonialism clearly played a role in what is happening now. In addition, the structural adjustment policies imposed by the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank in the 1980s and 1990s were often severely damaging. “Structural adjustment” required countries to privatize most governmental services, including education and health care, and to open their markets to outside goods, requirements that sometimes helped countries but often hurt them badly. Education and health care, for instance, are preconditions for most development, even if development is defined narrowly in terms of economic development. More cynically, the exercise proved the inextricable intertwining of economics with politics:, the richer countries who rushed in to the newly open markets did not always open their own markets. Furthermore, it was economic and political factors that allowed such conditions to be imposed in the first place. The oppressive debt carried by many poorer countries resulted largely from global inflation (given adjustable rate loans). In addition there had been political pressure on the poorer countries to borrow; the loans were to the advantage of major financial institutions. These two issues – what should count as development, and the hegemony of the global economic system – provide a rich context for deepening environmental awareness. This awareness, of course, cannot be the central goal of the course. On the other hand, the course would be deracinated if it did not attend to the physical and biological world in which human poverty exists. The first issue – what should count as true development – requires thinking about what constitutes a good human life. Most theorists in the capabilities school avoid making lists of which capabilities are central, pointing instead to a few obvious candidates: the ability to live long and in good health, the ability to learn, the ability to work meaningfully, to love, and to have and rear children. (Anyone can choose not to exercise their capabilities; societies and governments are measured, for instance, not by how many people choose to have children, but whether that choice is impeded.) Martha Nussbaum, however, is bold enough to offer a list, ‘humble and tentative,’ but quite worth discussion.2 On her list is the ability to live with concern for and in relation to animals, plants and the earth. This not uncontroversial suggestion provides much food for thought. She formulated it after discussions in Scandinavia, where spending time in wilderness is considered a central part of a full human life. In the crowded cities of India, however, her suggestion has been greeted with skepticism. Discussing this ‘capability,’ exploring reasons for it that go beyond specific cultural preferences, requires considering human nature not just in what
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___________________________________________________________ distinguishes it from the rest of the world but also in what connects and embeds it. Other less controversial capabilities provide the opportunity for the same sort of exploration. Why, for instance, should procreation be considered a central human capability? What does it tell us about the nature of human life, and its situatedness in a planet of life – which is to say, of change? More practically, how does the condition of the natural world impede or foster the ability to have children? Such questions are conducive to a more sophisticated understanding of ‘natural,’ since what comes ‘naturally’ might be far too many children for anyone’s good. Similar questions can arise with other capabilities: How does the condition of the environment affect the possibility of living a long, healthy life? Pollution and desertification, not to mention global climate change, threaten health. Yet human health also requires suppression or even elimination of certain microbes and, for instance, their insect vectors. The second issue – the inexorable power of global economic systems – also leads naturally to, and indeed requires, discussing environmental issues. The ways in which economic ‘development’ ravages the environment are legion. The book with which we open the course, Joe Kane’s Savages, recounts the struggles of the Haorani (indigenous Ecuadorians) against petrochemical companies seeking to build oil pipelines in the jungle. The damage is ruinous – not only spills from haphazardly engineered lines, but the inherent, invisible, but deadly disruption of feeding and migration patterns for the animals who are the Indians’ food source. The oil which is extracted helps fuel the lives of my suburban students. Similar points can be made, more quickly, elsewhere in the course: the (environmental and other) costs of growing cotton; the ways in which the low prices at Walmart inflict costs on others. Kane’s book is well written, powerful and engaging. It describes a way of life utterly different from any the students know: a life not only embedded in and immediately dependent on the non-human world, but one lived completely in the present. The life of the Haorani is so different from ours that its lessons, its food for thought, must be consciously extricated: we are not less embedded than the Haorani, but our rootedness is less obvious and less immediate. Because our dependence meditated, we are more secure; neither snakes nor starvation threaten us. Yet we pay a price for our greater security: Because we can to a significant extent affect our future, we are constantly thinking about the it; on the other hand, because we find our food in the supermarket rather than the jungle, we think about shopping rather than about plants and animals. The price we pay every day is an inability to see the physical beauty and mystery around us. The longer term price is, of course,
306 Environmental Education in a Course on Ethics & Development ___________________________________________________________ looming environmental disaster. Some theorists would count parts of the ‘developed’ world as undeveloped; sections of Detroit, like its infamous Cass Corridor, would certainly qualify. Environmental degradation is both cause and effect of the poverty (and political impotence) of the people who live in this ghetto. Versions of the questions asked about the Haorani and about the affluent suburbs of Detroit could also be asked about life in the city’s slums: how obvious is the embeddedness of human life in the earth? What price is paid, and what is gained, from the particular relationship to nature required by these three patterns of life? Kane’s book, like the capabilities approach itself, not only raises student awareness but also complicates the naive enthusiasms with which some arrive. Specific topics can also be usefully complex; one example is the absolutely basic need for clean drinking water, and the tradeoffs required to supply it. No single aspect of life is more important to good health. Diarrhea, for instance, is the largest killer in the developing world; safe drinking water can cut its incidence by two thirds. Sometimes a single well can make safe water available; yet artesian wells often contain arsenic, replacing the bacterial contamination of surface water with (natural) chemical contamination. This in turn can require decontamination plants, specially designed filters, and the problems that arrive with any factory. A similar problem arises when surface water is contaminated by animal waste. Controlling the animal population through trapping, and perhaps through the cruelty of leg traps, may be the only way to avoid installing chemical treatment plants. Again, consideration of one of the most fundamental of human needs, clean water, emphasizes not only to the biology we share with all animals, but also to the ways in which human welfare necessarily takes a toll. Similar issues arise with ecotourism, a fast growing set of activities aimed at educating the tourist and nurturing the local environment. In theory ecotourism is vastly superior to the tourism that consists of ‘home plus’ (sand, sea, exotica), but can in fact pit the welfare of local people against the conservation of the environment. The tension can be so great that protected areas, for instance, are threatened by the people whose livelihood they have destroyed. And for the tourist, knowledge may be gained out of context and therefore have limited value. Conclusion: Ethical issues in assisting poor countries should be treated in an environmental context. Doing so is crucial for a full understanding of the lives of the people that ‘development’ is out to help. But the environmental context is equally important for students from wealthier countries – and particularly those who have grown up in American suburbs. It
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___________________________________________________________ helps them recognize their own separation from nature and the ways in which their consumption, for instance of oil, has impact across the globe. Finally, such a context forcefully illuminates the inescapable conflict between human welfare and at least some aspects of the ‘natural’ environment.
Notes 1. Amartya Sen, Inequality Reexamined (Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1992). 2. Martha Nussbaum, Women and Human Development (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 78-80.
Bibliography Nussbaum, Martha. Women and Human Development. New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000. Sen, Amartya. Inequality Reexamined. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1992. Judith Andre is a philosopher in the Center for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences at Michigan State University.
Forward Thinking: A Teaching Project David Hunter Abstract The aim of this paper is to explain a project that we are undertaking at the University of Ulster in Northern Ireland as part of our on going commitment to Science and Society. We are building a program of community engagement by offering in school “Forward Thinking” sessions for 14 year olds. The sessions focus on topics in bioethics, and aim to engage the students in consideration of both the ethical and scientific issues at stake for example in cloning, genetic modification, human enhancement, humanities interaction with their environment etc. This project is based around a slightly modified version of the community of inquiry (Also known as Philosophy for Children) teaching methodology developed by Professor Matthew Lipman. This methodology aims to engage the participants, both teacher and students in collaborating with each other to grow in understanding of the world around them, forming a community of inquiry. The community of inquiry model has been shown to be very effective at engaging students in learning and exploring ideas, improving critical thinking skills, affective skills and collaborative skills. In the paper I will discuss both the project, the methodology we are using and why we have adopted this methodology. Key Words: Community of Inquiry, Future Thinking, Philosophy for Children. Bioethics. 1.
Community of inquiry methodology: A community of inquiry is simply a group who are focused on solving the same problem through reasoning together collaboratively. The essence of this activity is built around a slightly modified version of the community of inquiry (Also known as Philosophy for Children) teaching methodology developed by Professor Matthew Lipman. 1 This methodology aims to engage the participants, both teacher and students in collaborating with each other to grow in understanding of the world around them, forming a community of inquiry. The community of inquiry model has been shown to be very effective at engaging students in learning and exploring ideas, improving critical thinking skills, affective skills and collaborative skills. 2 The community is developed by engaging a group of students in regular, student driven inquiry into discussion of common, central and
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____________________________________________________ contestable concepts. Each of these elements generates student engagement making it their community of inquiry. This is done by providing some stimulus material (A talk, book, news article, video, anything which can be used to generate questions), getting the students to generate questions from this source material and then organizing these questions. 3 And finally selecting and discussing one of the questions. At the end of the session it is usual to summarize where the discussion has gone, and what future direction the group might want to explore. 2.
The role of the facilitator: The community of inquiry flourishes only when certain preconditions
are met: 1. Readiness to reason; 2. Mutual respect (of children towards each other, and of children and teachers towards one another); 3. An absence of indoctrination. And it is the facilitator’s role to provide this environment. 4 The facilitator mediates the discussion and encourages both rigorous thinking and collaborative thinking by the use of modeling and procedural questions (Such as, can a distinction be made here? Can anyone think of another explanation of that? etc). Importantly they do not drive the discussion with substantive inputs, instead they create an environment where the participants generate the substantive inputs themselves. Students are engaged because it is their questions which are being addressed, and because the topics are important to them, they are engaged in the intellectual process of trying to discover the right answer. The facilitator helps the students to develop skills by using procedural questions that reflect critical thinking skills (E.G. “Could that be clarified?”, “Can anyone think of a counter example” etc) which develops these skills in the students both by modeling them, but also by demonstrating how they are useful in getting what the students want, answers to questions that are important to them. By ensuring the discussion is rigorous and well focused the facilitator imparts skills and avoids students getting frustrated with a pointless discussion which comes to no conclusions. As the community matures the facilitator becomes less important since as the participants internalize the critical thinking skills modeled by the
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_______________________________________________________________ facilitator they will come to ask procedural questions removing the need for the facilitator’s intervention. In many senses the community of inquiry pedagogy subverts the typical student-teacher relationship shifting the role of the teacher from the font and giver of all knowledge to a co-explorer discovering knowledge and exploring ideas alongside the students. 3.
Benefits of the community of inquiry: The major strength of the community of inquiry methodology is the level of engagement it generates. Done right, it becomes clear to the participants that they are in control, and they can direct the questions, which generates a huge level of buy in from students who presently are used to just being told what to do in schools. To give an example while in New Zealand over the course of 4 years I developed a program of philosophy for children at Epsom Girls Grammar School. While being more general in focus than this activity is intended to be, this was highly successful, with student demand being such that while in the first year there was just one class of 20 students, by the fourth year we had 5 classes of 30+ students running. This was driven purely by word of mouth among the students. When the community of inquiry was first developed it was primarily aimed at developing critical thinking skills, and there is solid evidence that it is a very effective means of doing this. 5 The process of the community of inquiry itself engenders affective and collaborative skills and attitudes, since the participants are engaged in thinking together, and if they want their view to be respected, they will learn that they need to respect other view points. Furthermore they will discover that respecting another view point doesn’t just mean waiting their turn to express their view, but to engage with that view, and challenge it to discover just how robust it is. 6 Finally, and most important, implicitly the community of inquiry model encourages thinking as a means of problem solving and in particular collaborative thinking. 4.
The disadvantages of the community of enquiry model: It is often hard for lecturers, teachers and tutors, even good ones, to adopt this model because the way they need to behave to facilitate its success will usually go precisely against their instincts. So for example rather than answering students questions these often should be left for the other students to answer. Another particularly frustrating case is when you feel the inquiry is heading the wrong way, instead of adding a substantive comment as you
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____________________________________________________ would in a normal classroom to steer the conversation back to the ‘correct’ path you have to trust the class to spot the problem that is irking you and to do the steering themselves. 7 The community of inquiry model cannot be used if you are wishing to ensure that the students will believe a particular thing. So for example in teaching about ethics to professionals you will often have several goals such as raising ethical awareness, improving critical thinking skills etc which are perfectly compatible with the community of inquiry. However other goals of professional teaching like students having specific knowledge sets for exam purposes or a belief in certain professional codes are incompatible with the community of inquiry, its student driven nature makes it an unreliable tool in these regards. 5.
Forward Thinking project: We believe that people in general and in particular children are getting increasingly out of touch with the end products of science, the ways those products are generated and the social and ethical implications of science. In the Forward Thinking project we intend to harness the community of inquiry methodology to interest children (Key stage 3) in the engagement with and discussion of contested scientific ideas and techniques such as the use of stem cells, cloning, genetic modification, human enhancement etc. In essence we want to harness a teaching methodology which has been shown to be effective in other areas, and apply this to developing in children the skills and knowledge necessary to engage with the social and ethical implications of bioscience. To do this we intend to do develop brief stimulus materials which explains the actual science behind these contested notions these will draw heavily on the Science and Society website 8 that we have developed at the University of Ulster and other online resources such as the Bioethics Education Project. 9 We will also develop a body of predicted directions and discussion points to support the facilitators in their role along with a set of skill development activities. Initially we will focus on four topics, cloning, xenotransplantation, human enhancement and global warming. We think these four topics cover a wide range of questions and opportunities to stimulate thinking about the social and ethical implications of science. However part of the project will be the development of further topics to support teachers who adopt this methodology.
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_______________________________________________________________ We aim to do more than just stimulate debate, we aim to inform the debate with access to succinct but precise information on the latest state of play in regards to the science involved in these advances. In particular though we aim to encourage a general attitude towards thinking about these issues, where it is acknowledged both that an access to the facts surrounding the science is crucial and that the best way to think about these issues is collaboratively. The methodology that we are intending to use enables us to achieve this in two ways. Firstly, by its own nature the community of inquiry model resists the teacher trying to direct or shape the discussion, communities of inquiry function well when they are student, not teacher driven. 10 Secondly, the community of inquiry does implicitly model certain social norms, such as engaging with ideas rather than people, listening closely and respecting others ideas. It is hoped that these social norms will shape the engagement of the pupils so that they learn to think collaboratively. To do this each year we will offer ten Northern Ireland schools the chance to have 8 sessions of Forward Thinking material taught for them, by our trained facilitator. (Two on each topic) These sessions will cover learning objectives both within the citizenship curriculum and the science curriculum and it is anticipated that the sessions will be spread throughout the year in two session blocks. The standard teachers for these times will be asked to attend, and if they are interested then we will provide training in this methodology for them to implement in the following year. 11 The groups are anticipated to contain 26 children, the normal amount for a Northern Ireland class. Each of these sessions will be followed up by a discussion online involving all of the Forward Thinking groups in all the schools. This will be supported by C2K, an online learning environment connecting all of the Northern Ireland schools. The C2K service now provides 40,000 Internet ready computers to 330,000 students and 20,000 teachers in NI schools. This level of interconnectedness is presently only available in Northern Ireland. 12 This online discussion will be stimulated and informed by summaries of the students own discussions produced by the facilitator using Free Mind, a free mind mapping software. Our facilitator will serve as a moderator and prompter for the discussion boards and it is hoped that these will enable the students to continue to engage and discuss topics they are interested in throughout the year. Finally the boards will facilitate cross community engagement. At the end of the year the students will be given Forward Thinking certificates, and asked if they, in small groups, want to participate in the Forward Thinking competition. This will require the group to create a presentation which critically engage with a piece of public policy and suggests
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____________________________________________________ modifications. The best three of which will be presented at the Forward Thinking congress, an event where all the students, their parents, and the Minister of Science for Northern Ireland will be invited to attend. The next year, the same pattern will be repeated at different schools. To deliver these initial sessions, develop the stimulus materials, predicted directions and discussion points we intend to employ a post doctoral student, with a bioethics background and preferably training or experience in working with children. This person will collaborate with myself on the development of the materials, do most of the initial delivery of the material, and ultimately, with me, be responsible for training further volunteers in the delivery of the material. To ensure that they are able to use the methodology appropriately they will be trained by SAPERE, the coordinating body for Philosophy for Children in the UK. Likewise before they are involved in training others to deliver the Forward Thinking sessions, they will be trained by SAPERE to do this. We are hoping also to have set up the project to be self sustainable aiming to have at least 15 teachers trained in this methodology and hopefully some of them trained to teach others as well. All the material generated will be freely available from our website to support these teachers. 6. Sample topics to be developed: Neuroscience and Neuroethics Implantable drug dispensers and mood control Stem Cells Genetic Modification Genetically Modified Foods IVF Pre-implantation diagnostics Genetic Screening Genetic Testing Human/Machine Interface Nanotechnology The Nature of Science The Nature of Scientific Knowledge The relationship between Science and Religion Genetics, Neuroscience and Free Will
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Environmental justice and global citizenship? You may now be wondering what did all that have to do with environmental justice and global citizenship? Well, one of the hopes of the project is that by both engaging school children in talking and thinking about the ethical and social implications of advances in the biosciences we will also get them engaged and interested in being socially responsible citizens. The topics we have chosen are intended to stimulate considerations about responsibilities to others, and global responsibilities. It is hoped that imparting critical thinking skills and a wider interest in these issues will lead the students onto further consideration of the problems that are facing us all.
Notes 1
For further information see Lipman, M., Sharp, A. M. & Oscanyan, F. S. Philosophy in the Classroom. Philadelphia, PA, Temple University Press, 1980. and Lipman, M. Thinking in Education. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991. 2 Pardales, M & Girod, M. Community of Inquiry: Its past and present future. Educational Philosophy and Theory, Vol. 38, No.3. 2006, 299-309. See also Sprod, T. Improving Scientific Reasoning through Philosophy for Children: an Empirical Study. Thinking, vol. 13, no. 2. 1997. 3 It is often a good idea to allow the students to organize the questions. This also allows further critical thinking skills development, either by directing organization towards some end i.e. find the question which needs to be solved before the other questions can be sensibly addressed or by allow free organization of the questions by the students but requiring them to explain their organization and reorganization when they are finished. 4 Lipman, M., Sharp, A. M. & Oscanyan, F. S. Philosophy in the Classroom. Philadelphia, PA, Temple University Press, 1980 p. 45. 5 See for example Shipman, V. Evaluation Replication of the Philosophy for Children Program - Final Report. Thinking Vo. 5 no. 1, 45-57, 1983. Data was obtained on Questioning Task 4, a test designed to assess the thinking skills taught in the P4C program, for approximately 2.200 5th through 7th grade students in New Jersey. Despite differences in the extent of teachers’ understanding and implementation of the P4C program, and in students’ background characteristics and abilities, the data from this large diverse sample of New Jersey school systems and students indicated that even after
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____________________________________________________ adjusting for initial relevant group differences, students in program classes were superior to their non-program peers in formal and informal reasoning skills. 6 See for example Gardner, S. Participation in a “Community of Inquiry” Nourishes Participants Perspective-Taking Capacity: A Report of an Two Year Empirical Study. in Palsson, H, Sigurdardottir, B, Nelson, Y b. Philosophy for Children on Top of the World. Akureyri: Univ. Akureyri. 1999. 7 Indeed strategies of successful teachers such as humour can sometimes be counterproductive in the community of inquiry context, since humour is really just a tool to gain engagement, which should be provided by the method itself in the community of inquiry. 8 http://www.ulster.ac.uk/scienceinsociety/ (Accessed 09/06/06) 9 http://www.beep.ac.uk/content/15.0.html (Accessed 09/06/06) 10 Gardner, S. (1996). Inquiry is no mere conversation. Critical & Creative Thinking 16.2, 41- 49. 11 This will be done in collaboration with SAPERE, the coordinating body for Philosophy for Children in the UK. http://sapere.org.uk/ (Accessed 09/06/06) 12 http://www.c2kni.org.uk/corp/corporate.htm. (Accessed 09/06/06)
‘Environment’ and ‘Sustainable Development’: Investigating the Content and Social Dimension of Two Central Environmental Education Concepts Among University Students Chatzifotiou, A. Liarakou G.. Daskolia, M Abstract In the last 10 years a growing bulk of research focuses on how teachers and prospective teachers view environmental education and its practices. Significantly fewer are those studies which examine how certain concepts, which are central in the environmental education discourse such as ‘nature’, ‘environment’, ‘sustainability’, ‘environmental issues’ to name but few, are perceived and discussed by teachers. However, there is a particular theoretical and practical interest in this line of research, as these concepts reflect inherent ideologies and values which are then echoed in teachers’ practices of environmental education. Within this rationale, we have conducted a qualitative study with prospective secondary school teachers to explore two fundamental environmental education concepts, namely ‘environment’ and ‘sustainability’. Four focus group discussions were run with students from the Philosophy, Pedagogy and Psychology Department of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. Our basic aims were to identify: a) how ‘environment’ is viewed in relation to other social issues and within different disciplines, b) how the students prioritise significant issues that concern contemporary societies and c) how they perceive ‘sustainability’ and ‘sustainable development’ and their relation to ‘environment’. The findings showed that students conceived the environment as one of many important issues that concern contemporary societies. The issues that were primarily and readily mentioned were unemployment, drugs use, criminality, terrorism and war. The reasoning they gave for considering these issues as most important to them had to do with their personal circumstances at that point in life. When it came to discuss how they perceive the term ‘environment’ the majority discussed both its physical and social aspects. Finally ‘sustainability’ as a term was hardly known to them, although they were able to discuss the relationships developed amongst economy, environment and society when prompted by the facilitator of the focus group. Key Words: environment, sustainability, university students, social issues, environmental issues, environmental education, sustainable development.
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Introduction This study forms part of a larger project which explores how Greek pre- and in-service teachers perceive the concepts of environment, environmental issues and sustainability. These concepts have a central place in environmental education and they also put forward social, political, cultural and economic foci. At the same time, though, these concepts can take many different meanings reflecting technocentric, ecocentic or anthropocentric approaches.1 Over the past ten years a great number of studies in environmental education have focused on how in- and pre-service teachers view environmental education and its practices.2 Mappin and Johnson noted that environmental education is not based only on natural science and conservation but it has also acquired a more social and political perspective.3 Nevertheless, it is difficult to distinguish how these social and political perspectives of environmental education can be achieved in a subject-orientated school curriculum that is delivered by teachers whose training is mono-disciplinary and their environmental knowledge, values or concerns are elusive. This becomes even harder if one considers the conceptually restricted connotations of the term environment, which is most often equated with nature and its conservation, ecology and the bio/natural systems.4 For example, a critical analysis of 29 international documents relating to EE (guidelines, recommendations, policies, etc.) has identified, among other trends, that the environment is mainly perceived as a pool of resources, associated with resource management where socioenvironmental issues are rarely addressed.5 Likewise, the term sustainability is also a concept that can be assigned different meanings depending on various ideological approaches.6 The concepts of environment, environmental issues and sustainability contain inherent (a priori) ideologies and values that are not necessarily taken into consideration when investigating environmental education practices. The importance of having these concepts further investigated is shown as well by Le Roux and Ferreira who, while reporting on in-service education and training workshops in the field of EE, highlighted the complex interaction of social, political, economic, cultural and ecological factors.7 They mention that when a socioconstructivist view of the environment and its issues is taken, then prominent people like educators have a responsibility to facilitate the socio-environmental changes. Nevertheless, the study of Gayford indicated that teachers did not think it was their responsibility to attempt to solve contemporary social, political and economic problems.8 In our research the primary goal was to shed light on how preand in-service teachers come to understand the concepts of environment, environmental issues, and sustainability. That is what are their knowledge,
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___________________________________________________________ ideas, values and concerns when discussing these topics which are also central to environmental education. Our project used a combination of quantitative and qualitative methodology. Here, we present part of the qualitative research with pre-service teachers (university students). A brief summary of our survey study indicated that environment is perceived as an important social issue but not the most important one when it was next to other issues like unemployment, drugs, wars, criminality.9 Furthermore, students were aware of the most well known environmental problems, such as the ozone hole, acid rain, deforestation, pollution, etc. Similarly, when they were asked to rate the significance of these issues the most important ones were presented again in a similar order. The survey study, however, did not enquire about the sources of information students had, the way an environmental issue can become a social one or about the way students rationalised social issues as most/least important. Thus, the qualitative study reported here is an attempt to further explore the survey results as well as to delve into students’ thinking of the above concepts.10 Its aim was to reveal such various meanings that university students may assign to these concepts that are multi-ideology laden. 2. Methodology and Sample In order to delve into teachers’ and students’ thinking of the above concepts, a qualitative methodology was chosen with the use of focus group as its main instrument. The focus group method is a flexible research tool that allows greater interaction both between the researcher and the participants and among the participants themselves.11The use of the focus group method in educational studies is limited even though it can provide useful insights. We conducted four focus groups with students from the Department of Philosophy, Pedagogy and Psychology of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. Their degree qualifies them to become secondary school teachers in modern and classical Greek language and literature. The number of focus group (four) was deemed sufficient based on the literature and on the fact that from the third focus group there were general themes running through the sessions.12 Students knew a little about the research we were doing but were attracted to participate in it as they were told that they can have a certificate of attending a social science workshop. The sessions took place in the Environmental Education Research Centre of Athens University. Each focus group contained on average six to eight students who were of similar age, socio-economic status and at the time they all lived in Athens for their studies. All focus groups were recorded and were conducted by a moderator who dictated a number of questions encouraging a conversation and a facilitator who kept notes and made sure the tape recorder was working properly. For the focus groups we used a
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_________________________________________________ total of six questions with more than one leg at times. These questions helped the moderator to maintain a structure in the conversation, keep its duration under two hours but at the same time allow more questions to be asked as each focus group demanded. The first question asked students to discuss issues that concern contemporary societies. Then they were asked to state which issue they thought was most important and how/why they concluded to a particular issue. In all focus groups, environment was mentioned as an important issue that is of concern to contemporary societies and this helped us shift the conversation smoothly into the topic of environment. The focus groups were transcribed and two different teams of researchers categorized students’ replies in each question. Then the categories of each team were discussed and compared against each other in order to conclude with the final response categories. This process contributes towards minimizing the subjective procedure of categorizing qualitative, ‘rich’, textual data. 3.
Findings and discussion The content analysis of the data was centred on four broad fields. The first one examines whether students view the environment and environmental issues as social issues. The second relates to the ways students use in order to rationalise social issues as most/least important. The third one addresses the various aspects that students assume the environment has; and finally the fourth is about students’ awareness of sustainability. As far as the first analysis field is concerned, what was revealed is that students view environment and environmental issues as social issues. This was also supported by the survey study we conducted with early childhood education students in which ‘environment’ scored quite high (54.9%) being third in students’ list of significant current social issues (the issues that scored the highest, before environment, were unemployment (96.1%) followed by drugs (75.2%).12 The focus group analysis showed that both the environment in general and particular environmental issues (with pollution being the most prominent) were mentioned as issues that concern contemporary societies. Issues like pollution, environmental topics, unemployment, drugs, education and criminality were readily provided by the students who participated in all four focus groups. These were issues that were somehow expected to be heard because they are also largely popularised through media and newspapers. The second analysis field is about the ways that students use to rationalise and prioritise social issues as most/least important. The survey questionnaire here demonstrated that when students were given a list of 12 social problems asking them to rate the degree of their importance, environment scored a lot lower (with a mean of 8.15) than other issues
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___________________________________________________________ such as war (with a mean of 3.40), poverty (with a mean of 4.86), hunger (with a mean of 4.41), unemployment (with a mean of 5.03), etc. The focus groups results gave unemployment priority followed by other social issues like education, environmental destruction, social indifference and inequalities. With the focus groups we had the opportunity to delve deeper into students’ thinking of considering unemployment as most significant. Students said that current circumstances (graduation due in a year’s time) made them think of an issue that they will have to face in their lives sooner than later. They felt that unemployment does not only deprive them of a job but it also deprives them of further personal and emotional development. Most students discussed the negative consequences upon their lives of not having a job in general and of not having a job that they are trained for. At the same time, they did make a further connection that their school education and families have not necessarily orientated them towards issues like the environment. In one focus group it was expressed that it is difficult to put issues of such an importance in a hierarchy. Thus, we differentiated the question a bit and asked them what factors play an important role when judging the importance of an issue. Unanimously, participants to this focus group mentioned the issues that have direct consequences upon a large part of the population. The third analysis field of this study showed that students equate the environment either only with its physical aspect (e.g. nature, forests, mountains, greenery, etc.) or both with its physical and social aspects. The social traits of the environment have been defined by the students as people and other living organisms that all live in a closed system and everything is interlinked with and interdependent upon each other. One student made a further connection stating that humans have lost a sense of time and consequently a sense of future prospect as humans seem to live only for the present without thinking the planet’s future existence. This statement bears elements of the sustainability rhetoric but it has not been further explored and discussed by that particular focus group. Additionally, we asked how the environment becomes a social issue. Students identified three major factors that contribute to this. These are: a) education and the state’s provisions, b) advertisement and c) problems whose impact is great upon humans and the society. Students mentioned the lack of a comprehensive environmental culture in education and society. They noted that people equate pro-environmental attitudes with isolated actions like throwing rubbish into the bin or caring for animals. They acknowledged that there needs to be something more systematic with hands-on approaches where all disciplines can contribute. They said: “…we need some directional guidelines upon which we can base our actions…even in social sciences…it is not necessary to have one school subject that addresses the environment only…” or “…all environmental problems involve society as well…it may be due to lack of
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_________________________________________________ appropriate education that citizens are not able to understand that the problems they cause themselves, will have ramifications on their own lives…”. Students also thought of the advertising sector as having an effective role in popularising environmental issues. One example had to do with recycling. A student said: “…when I was in primary school recycling was in fashion…it was heard in all TV channels…”. However, a further discussion revealed that students also feel advertisement does not have long lasting effects. Most advertisement spots seem to be erratic and without continuity. Finally, they talked about the way environmental issues influence the quality of their lives. They all agreed that most often humans do not understand the gravity of a problem unless it ‘knocks their doors’. One student brought an example from his region where it is planned to have a landfill and mud from another area transferred in his region. He commented how people opposed to it because they felt they were reduced to second-rate citizens. The fourth analysis field examined the students’ awareness of the concept sustainability. Before we go further, it is necessary to make some linguistic clarifications. In Greek language there are two terms used to describe ‘sustainability’; one has an archaic origin while the other is closer to modern Greek language. We initially posed the question using the archaic form of the term as this is the term that tends to be established in Greek official documents in recent years. The students of all four focus groups had not heard this term before but they were able to deduce a possible meaning when approaching it etymologically. The term is composed of the preposition “aei” which means always and the verb “fero” which means carry. They attempted definitions based on its component grammar parts, only to end up with the idea that ‘something always carries or is carried’. They did not make any connections with the conversation we had had so far about the environment and they failed to identify any instances where they might have heard the term. Then we introduced the modern form of the term and students said that this sounded more familiar but still they could not discuss what it was all about. Again, students approached the modern term etymologically and they were able to deduce that it had to do with life, with continuity of life, with ecosystems and biodiversity. They traced this knowledge back to the subject of biology in high school and to media. At that point, it was evident that there was not going to be much discussion about a term that students knew almost nothing about it. Hence, we introduced the terms economy, society and environment. We explained that these three make up the basic components of the term sustainability. We asked them to tell us if there were any relations developed among these three and if yes, what were these. We asked them to do the same as
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___________________________________________________________ well on a piece of paper where they could give a schematic depiction of these relations in an ideal world and in reality. Students discussed how all these three elements are important and that they are interlinked with each other. This means we cannot consider one as better/worst than another. Some quotes indicative of this said: “I believe that if any of these three elements changes, positively or negatively, then all three are instantly influenced…” or “I think this question as to whether there are links among these three is untimely because by now we have all understood that everything is connected to anything on earth…”. Students’ responses, when discussing the schematic depiction of these relations in an ideal world, reflected similar replies and most of them mentioned how all three elements are supposed to be interlinked with each other. They said such things as: “…it is like a triangle where each element influences the other…” or “I made a balancescale…where there is an absolute equilibrium between society and economy…hence the environment is the ideal host...”. Another response category highlighted an imbalance in the relations developed among economy, society and environment with economy always having the best place. Students mentioned such things as: “…we gave more emphasis to economy and we by-passed society and environment…thus we, humans are losing out…” or “…it has become an end in itself…everything for economy…we have grown indifferent for all the rest and we harm the environment and society itself…”. In the schematic depiction of these relations in the real world, they mentioned such things as: “…I put the environment on the bottom of this arrangement and on top I put economy…” or “…there is a circle again but economy rules. Economy influences the environment and not vice versa…”. However, this imbalance was also expressed when students were discussing the ideal situation and they put the environment first and foremost. Thus, they said things like: “…the environment should come first and foremost because we are born in it…it gives us oxygen…humans must protect the environment…and step on economy to make our lives better…” or “…first and foremost the environment should be influencing the society…and the economy…”. Finally, there were two viewpoints, one wrong and the other over-generalised respectively, about the renewable energy sources. The wrong one said: “There is a negative relation among these three elements…in favour of economy, renewable energy sources are being used and these stem from the environment. The result is that the environment is destroyed and society the same…”. At the time it was mentioned no other student contested it but it was not supported either by any other student. The over-generalised view said: “Exactly because some forms of energy are depleted, society has created a programme that economises in these
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_________________________________________________ sources and tries to find other sources as well”. Again, none of the students contested it, agreed with it or took further this viewpoint. Summarizing, all students perceived the environment as one of many important social issues. They did not clearly state that environmental issues are social issues but they certainly discussed their consequences in social terms. This is so because environment has been partly in school curriculum, in governments’ policies, in advertisements and it influences human’s quality of life. Students also have personal experiences of the physical and social environment blending together and impacting upon each other. That is, environment has acquired some tangible traits that students can see and talk about. Sustainability, on the other hand, both as a term and as content has not been familiar to students. Admittedly, these students were not identified as having any particular environmental concerns. However, they were able to converse about the relations developed among economy, environment and society. They identified the strong links among these three elements and expressed the imbalances that exist today as a result of human activity (e.g. economy being the first thing in mind) or inactivity (e.g. lack of systematic and holistic education). Based on language itself, students were able to deduce what sustainability might mean. There seems to be a gap though between what the actual language (the term) transmits and what sustainability refers to. Participants to the study made some weak and superficial connections relating the term sustainability to biology, life, ecosystems and biodiversity. Society and economy seem to be absent altogether. Thus, there is a need to popularise the term and what it stands for. Acknowledgements The present research was backed by the research program ‘PYTHAGORAS’ of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens, Greece.
Notes 1) O’Riordan, Timothy, “Contemporary Environmentalism,” in Horizons in Human Geography, ed. D. Gregory & R. Walford (London: Macmillan). 2) Spellman, G. Field, K. Sinclair, J., “An investigation into UK higher education students’ knowledge of global climatic change,” International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education 12 (2003): 6-17.
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___________________________________________________________ Boyes, E. Chambers, W. Stanisstreet, M., “Trainee primary teachers’ ideas about the ozone hole,” Environmental Education Research 1 (1995): 133-145. Corney, G., “Learning to teach environmental issues,” International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education 7 (1998): 90-105. Summers, M. Corney, G. Childs, A., “Teaching Sustainable Development in Primary Schools: an empirical study of issues for teachers,” Environmental Education Research 9 (2003): 327-346. Jeronen, E. Kaikkonne, N., “Thoughts of children and adults about the environment and environmental education,” International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education 11 (2002): 341-353. 3) Mappin and Johnson, Environmental education and advocacy: Changing perspectives of ecology and education (Cambridge University Press, 2005). 4) Flogaitis, Ε., Environmental Education (Athens: Greek Letters, 1998). 5) Sauve, L. Brunelle, R. Berryman, T., “Influence of the Globalised and Globalising Sustainable Development Framework on National Policies Related to Environmental Education,” Policy Futures in Education 3 (2005): 271-283. 6) Huckle, J., (1996) “Realizing Sustainability in Changing Times,” in Education for Sustainability, ed. J. Huckle & S. Sterling, (London: Earthscan, 1996), 3-17. 7) Le Roux, C. and Ferreira, J., “Enhancing Environmental Education Teaching skills through In- service Education and Training,” Journal of Education for Teaching: International Research and Pedagogy 31 (2005): 3-14. 8) Gayford, C. ,“Controversial environmental issues: a case study for the professional development of science teachers,” International Journal of Science Education 24 (2002): 1191-1200. 9) Flogaitis, E. Daskolia, M. Liarakou, Z. Chatzifotiou, A. “Conceptions of the environment and of environmental problems as social issues among Greek students of early childhood education.” Proceedings (under Press) of the 3rd World Congress of Environmental Education 2006, Turin. 10) O'Brien K., “Improving survey questionnaires through focus groups,” in Successful focus groups: advancing the state of the art, ed. D. Morgan, (London: Sage, 1993), 105-118. 11) Morgan D.L., Focus groups as qualitative research (London: Sage, 1988).
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_________________________________________________ 12) Basch, C. E., “Focus group interviews: an under-utilised research technique for improving theory and practice in health education,” Health Education Quarterly 15 (1987): 411-448. 13) Flogaitis et al. 2006.
Bibliography Ballantyne, R. “Evaluating the impact of teaching/learning experiences during an environmental teacher education course.” International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education 4 (1995): 2946. Basch, C. E. “Focus group interviews: an under-utilised research technique for improving theory and practice in health education.” Health Education Quarterly 15 (1987): 411-448. Boyes, E. Chambers, W. Stanisstreet, M. “Trainee primary teachers’ ideas about the ozone hole.” Environmental Education Research 1 (1995): 133-145. Corney, G. “Learning to teach environmental issues.” International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education 7 (1998): 90105. Dimitriou, A. Kostopoulou, A.. “Endiaferon, stasis kai simperifora fititonmellontikon nipiagogon gia periballontika zitimata.” 6ο Pan-Hellenic Conference for the Environment, Sustainable Development and Environment. Thessaloniki, 9 –12 December 2004. Dove, J.. “Student Teacher understanding of the Greenhouse Effect, Ozone layer Depletion and Acid Rain.” Environmental Education Research 2 (1996): 89-100. Earls, C. Lawrence, A. Harris N. and Stiller, S. “The Campus Community and the Concept of Sustainability.” Chrestomathy: Annual Review of Undergraduate Research at the College of Charleston 2 (2003): 85-102 Flogaitis, Ε. Environmental Education. Athens: Greek Letters, 1998. Flogaitis, E. Daskolia, M. Liarakou, M. Chatzifotiou, A. “Conceptions of the environment and of environmental problems as social issues among Greek students of early childhood education.” Proceedings (under Press) of the 3rd World Congress of Environmental Education 2006, Turin. Gayford, C. “Controversial environmental issues: a case study for the professional development of science teachers.” International Journal of Science Education 24 (2002): 1191-1200. Huckle, J. “Realizing Sustainability in Changing Times.” in Education for Sustainability, edited by J. Huckle & S. Sterling, 3-17. London: Earthscan, 1996.
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___________________________________________________________ Jeronen, E. Kaikkonne, N. “Thoughts of children and adults about the environment and environmental education.” International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education 11 (2002): 341-353. Johnson E. and Mappin, M., Environmental education and advocacy: Changing Perspectives of Ecology and Education (Cambridge University Press, 2005). Le Roux, C. and Ferreira, J. “Enhancing Environmental Education Teaching skills through In-service Education and Training.” Journal of Education for Teaching: International Research and Pedagogy 31 (2005): 3-14. Mappin and Johnson. Environmental education and advocacy: Changing perspectives of ecology and education. Cambridge University Press, 2005. Morgan D.L. Focus groups as qualitative research. London: Sage, 1988. O'Brien K.“Improving survey questionnaires through focus groups.” In Successful focus groups: advancing the state of the art, edited by D. Morgan, 105-118. London: Sage, 1993. Sauve, L. Brunelle, R. Berryman, T. “Influence of the Globalised and Globalising Sustainable Development Framework on National Policies Related to Environmental Education.” Policy Futures in Education 3 (2005): 271-283. Spellman, G. Field, K. Sinclair, J. “An investigation into UK higher education students’ knowledge of global climatic change.” International Research in Geographical and Environmental Education 12 (2003): 617. Summers, M. Corney, G. Childs, A. “Teaching Sustainable Development in Primary Schools: an empirical study of issues for teachers.” Environmental Education Research 9 (2003): 327-346. Summers, M. Kruger, C. Childs, A. and Mant J. “Primary School Teachers’ Understanding of Environmental Issues: an overview study.” Environmental Education Research 6 (2000): 293-312.
Empowerment of Professionals as a Strategy for Effective Sustainability of the Built Environment Joseph Akin Fadamiro Abstract The development professionals by their training play vital roles in the shaping of the built environment. However the environmental threats, real or potential, to the quality of life, environmental movements have begun in virtually all sections of industrialized countries in the area of business, manufacturing, transportation, agriculture and construction. With the whole world embracing the concept of sustainability, the present planning, design and development professionals in the developing countries are challenged to address their environmental problems through their proposals. This paper examines the level of intervention of the professionals through their principles of sustainable designs. It thereafter investigates the effect of their contributions to the development of the urban environment in the bid to enhance the achievement of comfort and sustainable management of the built environment. Key Words: environment. 1
Empowerment,
professionals,
sustainability,
built
Introduction The built environment is an expression of the very basic desire by man to enhance comfort within the area where he lives works and recreates. Built environments take their shapes from the very functions they are expected to perform. Besides, since man is a gregarious animal, and community living makes for increased security, benefits and pleasures of social contacts with neighbours, buildings are clustered together into villages, towns and cities. This is corroborated by the submission that “the built environment, whether it is a village or town is a product of the skillful organization of space in order to express in the one instance the peoples’ social ideals and in another, man’s notion of reality.”1 The development of the Nigerian built environment brought with it the uncontrolled urban growth, leading to environmental degradation, deformation and depletion of man-supportive resources, increase in manantagonistic ones and its reckless exploitation has spelt doom or outright annihilation for plants and animals including man. This degradation is caused by three basic factors, which include accelerated population growth, increased urbanization and new expanding technology, with associated increase in the demand for space and natural resources. None of these is damaging to the environment, but the “uncoordinated and unplanned efforts to accommodate them into a complex environment and
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___________________________________________________________ to manage land resources properly have caused severe environmental problems in most countries.” 2, 3 These conditions have thereafter produced unsatisfactory settlement system that use resources inefficiently, increase development costs, and produce unequal distribution of the benefits and costs. However, “the essential condition for the survival of humanity is the reduction and eventual elimination of these conflicts by the effective management of the environment.”4 Therefore, it is necessary to establish a balance among the economic and social aims of development on the one hand, and the physical and social aims of development on the other. “The challenge here is to establish an equitable way of living, within the limits of nature and qualitative environment.”5 Despite the emergence of institutional frameworks under the government’s relevant ministries and parastatals, there have been few achievements related to environmental protection and natural resources management. Several problems identified, include land degeneration, pollution, flood and erosion, desertification, inefficient use of energy resources, loss of biodiversity, environmental disasters and deforestation. Poor access to improved sanitation facilities in Nigeria is blamed on poor implementation of health, housing and other related policies, high levels of poverty, low level of awareness about issues concerning environmental sustainability and the general underdevelopment of rural areas. This in turn results in low quality of life, or poor health conditions emanating from poor nutrition, water, housing, and sanitation or from poor living conditions leading to outbreak of diseases. However, these could be solved by raising the quality of life and removing conditions of poverty through development plans directed at a higher growth output. Although development is a process by which some environmental problems relating to poverty can be solved, it can also bring other serious environmental side effect unless they are accompanied by sound environmental management practices and professionalism. In designing education and training programme to solve the problems of the environment, it is essential to take into account not only what may seem to be the local problems, but also problems which could affect the local scene indirectly from elsewhere. Hence the necessity to empower the development professionals with adequate and necessary knowledge, in order to utilize such for the sustainability of a qualitative built environment. Given the importance attached to professionalism and its assumed impact on the sustainability of the built environment the following key issues were addressed in the study; i)
An inventory of the concept of sustainability, to assess the environmental impact of human activities on the environment
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____________________________________________________________ ii) iii) iii)
2
Available frameworks on the built environment as provided by government. The identification of the major targets and prospects of professionalism. A conclusive and recommended approach of the findings for the benefit of the people and the environment.
Concept and Status of Sustainable Development Sustainable development could be regarded as a process of change in which the exploitation of resources; the direction of investments, the orientation of technological development, and institutional change are in harmony and enhance both current and future potentials to meet human needs and aspirations. The World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED) defines sustainable development as one that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of the future generations to meet their own needs. It is also defined as “a development strategy that manages all assets, natural resources and human resources, as well as financial and physical assets for increasing long term wealth and well being.”6 Sustainable developments “reject all policies and practices that support current living standards by depleting the productive base, including natural resources and leaves future generations with poorer prospects and greater risks than our own.”7, 8 Discussion on Sustainable Development in the environmental conservation received significant exposition through the influential Brundtland report of 1987. Notable organizations such as the International Union for the Conservation of Nature, World Wildlife Fund and the United Nations Environmental programme, all contributed to the enshrinement of the tenets of sustainable development in the environmental circles. The United Nations conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio in1992 and the second Habitat Conference held in Istanbul in 1992 further brought the idea of sustainable development into limelight. However the actions aimed at ensuring environmental sustainability in Nigeria gathered momentum following the Earth summit held in 1992. Awareness has grown regarding the integration of environmental concerns into resource management, policy and planning processes as a way of promoting sustainable development. The recognition of the critical linkage between the environment and national development led to the establishment of the Federal Environment Protection Agency (FEPA) in 1988 and the launching of the National Policy on Environment (NPE) in 1989. In 1999, FEPA was transformed into a full-fledged Federal Ministry of Environment and the NPE was revised partly in view of the necessity to integrate environmental concerns into the activities of all sectors of the economy. Despite this institutional framework, achievement
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___________________________________________________________ relating to environmental protection and resource management has been rather limited. Sustainable development, according to the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) Report is “therefore being threatened by a plethora of environmental problems including land degradation, pollution, flood and erosion, desertification, inefficient use of energy resources, loss of biodiversity, environmental disasters and deforestation.”9 The proportion of people with access to improved sanitation facilities declined marginally from 56.5% in 1990 to 55.5% in 2000. The major factors underlying the low level of access to improved sanitation facilities include poor implementation of health, housing and other related policies, high level of poverty, low levels of awareness about issues concerning environmental sustainability and the general underdevelopment of the rural areas. With regard tot the proportion of people with secure tenure as one of the indicators of environmental sustainability, the available data does not reflect the true situation. While there is evidence of poor shelter conditions in urban areas, tenure security in 1988 was quite high. For examples in two major urban centers, 93% of the residents of Lagos and 85.8% of those in Ibadan had access to secure tenure. However, these cities are also known to be centers of deteriorating social services and environmental conditions. Thus, if the MDG target of achieving a significant improvement in the lives of at least 100 million slum dwellers by 2020 is to be met, not only should there be significant improvement in the access to improve sanitation, the problems of inadequate housing, over-crowding in urban centers, homelessness, waste disposal and poor quality housing in general should also be effectively addressed. The country faces the following challenges in its effort to achieve environmental sustainability: i)
ii)
iv) v)
Implementation of strategies to improve the living standards and quality of life of the people in the face of rapidly growing population without destroying the environment. Dealing with the increasing trend of environment related social unrest and dislocations, rising pollution and environmental degradation. Promoting private sector participation in the provision of housing, improved water supply and urban waste management. Fostering the adoption of efficient and environment friendly technologies for the generation, transmission and distribution of energy in the face of unending crisis in the sector.
In this regard, “city policies, planning and management are expected to be predicated on partnership involving all the relevant actors like the public, private and voluntary bodies at all levels.”10 This will lead to new
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____________________________________________________________ approach of different buildings, built environments and agro-urban relationships, thereby serving as the central challenge for design and designers of the built environment while sustainability and sustainable features will be available only through a purposeful design. Hence the paper addresses the necessary empowerment of the professionals with the principles that can contribute to the creation, maintenance and sustainability of the qualitative built environment. This in effect is to promote the conservation, rehabilitation and maintenance of the city; and to serve as an appropriate and adaptable in-house community based solutions to the environmental problems. 3
Capacity Building and Empowerment of Professionals Capacity building is the process of acquiring the ability to use human, institutional and environmental resources and policies to perform functions effectively, efficiently and on a continuing sustainable basis, with reduced dependence on external resources. It involves human resource development, efficiently functioning institutions and the conducive environment for the management of development and achievement of sustainable results. Capacity building for sustainable environmental development hence requires changes to be made in the education of the new generations of technicians and professionals. All the stakeholders should be taken into account for the development of the curriculum and participate actively in the process as the major need is to find solutions to their problems. In some recent studies many curricula are seen to be unresponsive to socio-economic and technological changes in the developing countries and are inappropriate for the local context. There is a long history of foreign training in which the more developed countries offer superior facilities in the form of well-stocked libraries, functioning laboratories and access to experienced scientists. However, the type of training provided is usually inappropriate to the developing countries, and the frustrations this causes a feature that continues to be one of the important causes of the “brain-drain”. Fortunately, the possibilities for overcoming the lack of facilities in these countries are growing, due to modern communication technology. The Internet services are rapidly becoming available in the developing countries. This electronic communication helps to overcome the limitation to scientists and relevant current literatures accessible through e-mail communications. It is believed that students can make a better contribution to development by being provided with guidance and information in their environments rather than receiving education in the industrialized countries where conditions are vastly different. The context in which education is set can influence its content although much of the inappropriate training, taking place in many universities in developing countries is admittedly the proof of the opposite. However the
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___________________________________________________________ inappropriateness of the traditional education is in regard to the capacity of the environmental research system to generate relevant technology and thereby provide the needed knowledge for the professionals and the capacity to promote environmentally sustainable policies. It is expedient to make this a national goal and budgetary allocation in which donor agencies would assume secondary and subsidiary roles. Coherent strategies should be formulated with realistic time frame, while allocation of resources; utilization of human skills and institutional relevance has to be adequately analyzed. It should be possible to deliver services to the population in ways that are responsive to their needs. The beneficiaries should also receive capacity building training as a way of improving their participatory and economic relevance. 4
Human Development Dimension in Nigeria According to Wahab, “Nigeria’s rich human and material resources endowments give it the potential to become Africa’s largest economy and a major player in the global economy.”11 But much of its potential has remained untapped due to faulty conception and pursuit of unsustainable strategies. Some of the challenges of development in Nigeria include acute poverty, low investment and economic growth rates, excessive dependence on oil, inefficient public sector spending, low productivity of the private sector, high urbanization rate and high unemployment which threatening social cohesion, security and democracy. The education system is dysfunctional, as graduates of many institutions cannot meet the needs of the country. The development models adopted since independence, fueled by decades of corruption and mismanagement has created perverse incentives, inefficiencies and waste. A culture of graft and impunity ensured that Government became an instrument for constant acquisition of wealth, distorting the incentive to work and to create wealth in the private sector. With government as the major source of patronage and rent-seeking, the fight for public office became fierce. An incentive framework was created that did not reward enterprise, enthroned mediocrity, allowed weak institutions to endure and ignored the dire need for sustained human development. However to empower the people, the focus of the government’s new economic strategy, National Economic Empowerment and Development Scheme (NEEDS), on the environment is to ensure a safe and healthy environment that secures the economic and social well being of Nigerians on a sustainable basis. The specifics of the agenda are “to take full inventory of the country’s natural resources, assess the level of environmental damage and design; and implement restoration and rejuvenation measures; aimed at halting further degradation of our environment”. The development planning in this context places people at the centre of development efforts. NEEDS in recognition of education as
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v) vi)
To ensure and sustain unfettered access to education for the total development of the individual. To improve the quality of education at all levels. To use education as a tool for improving the quality of life through skill acquisition and job creation for poverty reduction. To ensure periodic review and effective implementation of the curriculum at the secondary level to meet the requirements of higher education and the workplace. To mobilize and develop partnerships with the private sector and local communities to support and fund education. To promote information and communication technology capabilities at all levels.
vii) The Federal Government, within the framework of NEEDS further recognizes the critical importance of tertiary institutions for developing high-quality human resources, especially in an increasingly technologydriven world economy. Consequently, fundamental reforms have been introduced in the higher education system with the following objectives: i) ii)
iii) iv)
Encouragement of private sector participation in the educational sector. Restructuring and updating curricula to meet the demands of the national economy, with special focus science and technology especially information and communication technology. Establishment of an effective mechanism for monitoring Universities to ensure strict adherence to standards. Developing innovative approaches to ensure continuing retraining and capacity building of lecturers to ensure high standard performance.
v) The influence of the Environmental Technology Sector in the orderly development of the human environment is a critical aspect of overall national development. Given the current impetus on environmental protection, resource conservation and sustainability; development of requisite manpower in the constituent fields of Architecture, Building, Estate Management, Industrial Design, Quantity Surveying, Urban and Regional planning as well as Geo-informatics are crucial to the attainment of the national goals identified in the NEEDS programme. The architects are traditionally, trained to conceptualize the environmental envelope that is conductive to various human needs and to deploy their creative talents to order space through designs that are
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___________________________________________________________ influenced by existing prototypes and the local setting. While the primary objective of Urban and Regional Planning is to stimulate and control development through spatial organization and the designs of master plans to track man at work, play and rest; and to capture the inter-relationships between housing, social services and work such as industries, agriculture, construction and commerce. The Quantity Surveyor as a cost-planner and adviser is expected to provide uniform mechanism to facilitate value for money pricing. This is done through the compilation of necessary schedules, specifications and preparation of appropriate quantities for pricing. Engineers, through their design provide structural and service solutions to guarantee the stability and integrity of various structures, facilities and infrastructures. The training of Builders focuses on the necessary skills for production planning and management systems, for project execution. These find expression in the preparation of production drawings, method statement, scheduling and organization of physical construction and inspection of on-going projects. Estate Surveyors create and exchange value, manage and maintain record of transactions on physical assets, and promote land economy through efficient utilization. Geo-informatics (Surveying) provide the necessary tools for the development and improvement of physical assets. Location, perimeter and cadastral survey services facilitate effective planning and design, delineate boundaries, establish references and guide charting. These traditional roles have come under increasing pressure for reform in the light of rapid changes in the society and the dynamics of socio-economic growth, to retain the continued relevance of the sector. 5
Targets and Prospects of Empowerment An effective attempt to align the country’s educational system with the demands of the market place and the society shall entail a combination of these and other strategies: i)
ii)
iii)
The Catch Them Young Scheme, which requires visits to secondary schools for career talks to be supplemented with exposition and feature programmes in both print and electronic media. Innovative Teaching Methods which is expected to foster team spirit and nurture the inter-relationship of the various professions in the sector, lectures should emphasize interaction, while studio sessions should be integrated to mirror real life situations in practice. Other areas of focus should be building materials and local content identification, community services to improve current use, upgrading of depressed areas, e.t.c.
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____________________________________________________________ iv)
v)
vi)
6
Entrepreneurship scheme involves acquiring skills for job creation, expanding frontiers and creating ways in the private sector for construction related fields. Research and Development which perhaps is the most important function of a University should be well funded. Lecturers must be constantly exposed to new trends in technology, exchange programmes, sabbatical and study tour. Stakeholders’ participation in community development (similar to what is practiced by the NYSC) shall promote understanding and acceptance. Concern for the environment and collective ownership of its resources should promote the concept and practice of efficiency and sustainable development.
Conclusions and Recommendations In this paper, it is obvious that some old issues have been raised within a new perspective in order to re-awaken environmental awareness for evolving problems to be examined and possible solutions preferred. The concept of environmental sustainability was treated by emphasizing the importance of the natural and built environments as the basis for the emancipation of a healthy and livable environment. The environmental problems emanating from the poverty and lack of development as well as those from development processes were also highlighted. The challenge for the tertiary institutions is to design programmes and curricular that is responsive to the needs and demands of our changing society. There is the need to encourage our young men and women to dream big, envision, explore and unleashed their creative talents, in finding solutions to our multifarious problems. That is the clear path for future growth and greatness. However, the role of environmental education as the people’s means of enlightenment towards a resolution of the problems was enumerated. While the paper also support the view that knowledge is for everyone and is an action process that relates to and builds upon the work of all other professionals and general studies. It is therefore recommended that all those involved in shaping the environment should be made to understand the issues and problems of the environment, to weigh their actions against the local cultural background and the proposals for the environment. The corollary is the need for higher institutions to engage in researches on environmental issues in Nigeria to find appropriate solutions for the creation of a good environment for quality life.
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Notes 1
2 3
4
5
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7 8 9 10
11
Fadamiro J. A., “Impact of landscape Architecture on Environmental Protection and Management” UNESCO – MAB Regional Training Workshop, FUT Akure, Nigeria, 1995. Onibokun, A. G., Olokesusi, Egunjobi L., Urban Renewal in Nigeria. Femsod Industrial Press, Ibadan, Nigeria, 1987. Falade J.B., “Public Acquisition of Land for Landscaping and Open Space Management” Journal of Nigeria Institute of Town Planners, II (1998): 1-13. Tairu T.T. Towards Protection of Environment and Ecology. In Current Issues in Nigerian Environment, Ed. Prof. A. Osuntokun, Davidson Press, Ibadan, 1998. Gellar E.S., “Actively Caring for the Environment: An Integration of Behaviour and Humanism” Journal of Environment and Behaviour. 27:2 (1975): Safe Publications. Pearce, D., Barbier, E., and Markandya, A., Sustainable Development: Economic and Environment in the Third World, London: Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd. (1990): 2-10 Repetto, R., World Enough and Time, New Haven, Connecticut Yale University Press (1986): 15-16. Smith P.C. “Reinventing the City: Sustainability and the Built Environment” HKIA journal First Quarter, 1997. National Millennium Development Goals Report, Nigeria, (2004). Olayiwola L.M., “Techniques for Achieving Sustainable Development of Towns and Cities in Nigeria”, Ife Planning Journal, Ile-Ife (ICONDEST), 1:2 (2000). Wahab K.A., “Federal Government Economic Reforms, Human Development and Due Process”, First Annual Lecture, School of Environmental Technology, Federal University of Technology, Akure, 2006.
Notes on Contributors Kristy J. Buckley is the Director of Strategic Development at the Climate Institute, Washington, D.C. She holds an LL.M. in International Law from the University of Kent at Brussels, and has focused much of her research on international environmental law and economics. Contact information: 1785 Massachusetts Avenue, Suite 100, Washington, D.C. 20036. E-mail:
[email protected] Rana Ghose is a doctoral research candidate at the Institute of Development Studies at the University of Sussex in Brighton, England His area of research is the regulation of genetically modified cotton in Maharashtra, India, with a particular focus on Bt Cotton in the Vidarbha region. E-mail ranaghose(at)gmail.com Martin Phillipson is an Associate Professor at the College of Law of the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada. Kendal Hodgman is a Ph.D. candidate at the Institute for Sustainability and Technology Policy, Murdoch University, Perth, Western Australia. She is also a Principal of Hodgman & Lancaster, consultants in Communications, Strategy and Sustainability. Kendal has also enjoyed a decade as Senior Journalist with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation. Jo Kehoe is law lecturer at the Faculty of Business & Informatics, Central Queensland University, Australia:
[email protected] Kim Loyens is a Ph.D. candidate at the Leuven Institute of Criminology (LINC), University of Leuven, Belgium. E-mail:
[email protected] Tania Sourdin is a Professor of Law and Dispute Resolution, and Director, Conflict Resolution Research Centre and Centre for the Study of the Professions, La Trobe University, Melbourne, Australia. She would like to acknowledge the work of Jane Elix whose PhD work she supervised and has been referred to in this paper. Henrike Rau is a lecturer in political science and sociology at the National University of Ireland, Galway. Her current research focuses on socio-temporal consequences of environmental change and physical mobility. Contact address: Department of Political Science and Sociology, NUI, Galway, Galway, Ireland. e-mail:
[email protected].
John McDonagh is a lecturer in the Geography Department at the National University of Ireland, Galway. His main research interests are in Rural Geography and Sustainable Environments. Contact address: Geography Department, NUI, Galway, Galway, Ireland. e-mail:
[email protected]. Timo Peuhkuri, Ph.D, sociologist, is a researcher at the Department of Sociology of the University of Turku, Finland. His research interests include environmental conflicts and water protection with a particular focus on roles of knowledge and participation in environmental policies. Mei -Fang Fan is an assistant professor at the Department of Public Administration and Institute of Public Policy, Tamkang University. Email:
[email protected] Funding from National Science Council (NSC 94-2420-H-032-004) is gratefully acknowledged. Maie Kiisel is an assistant and PhD student at the University of Tartu, Department of Journalism and Communication, Estonia. Her research is focused on public participation in environmental issues. Linda Hadfield is a freelance writer, consultant and independent researcher. She holds a PhD in Innovation and Technology Assessment from Cranfield University in the UK. Her background is highly interdisciplinary, and her research interests focus on public perceptions of science and the environment. She has published papers on the evolution of environmental management, the Phillips Inquiry into BSE, and the debate on genetically modified food. http://www.geocities.com/lindahadfield/ Eszter Kollár, sociologist, political scientist, is a PhD student at LUISS University, Rome. Attila Fonyó, sociologist, is a PhD student at Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest Miklós Sükösd, sociologist, is an associate professor at Central European University, Budapest. Nina Hall is a PhD candidate in the Graduate School of the Environment, Macquarie University. Dr Cassandra Star is a scholar whose work focuses on the international politics of climate change, with a particular interest in climate justice. Cassandra is a member of the Australian Centre for Sustainable
Catchments and teaches politics within the Faculty of Business at the University of Southern Queensland, Australia. Sarah Wilks is a PhD candidate in the Department of Biological Sciences, Macquarie University, NSW 2109 Australia. Kriss A. Kevorkian MSW, PhD, holds a doctoral degree in thanatology, and is the leading authority on environmental grief®. She is an adjunct professor at Antioch University in Los Angeles, Executive Director of The Center for Conscious Dying and Grieving, and Co-Chair of the Los Angeles County Bar Association Bioethics Committee. Deepika Mathur is a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning, University of Melbourne, Melbourne, Australia. Email:
[email protected] Doriana Daroit is Professor at FEEVALE, Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. She is finishing her doctoral studies at Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brazil. Research interests: economic, social and environmental impacts of innovation processes. E-mail:
[email protected]. Luis Felipe Nascimento is Associate Professor at Federal University of Rio Grande do Sul, Brasil. Research interests: enviornmental quality, cleaner production and environmental innovation. E-mail:
[email protected]. Simon Hailwood is a Lecturer in Philosophy at the University of Liverpool, and specialises mainly in moral, political and environmental philosophy Maria Baldwin, Ph.D. is a history instructor at Bowling Green State University, USA. Belinda Clements Ph.D. is tutor and course author in Environmental Ethics for the University of London Distance Learning Programme. email dlptutor02(at)gmail.com Judith Andre, Ph.D., is a philosopher in the Centre for Ethics and Humanities in the Life Sciences, Michigan State University. She also teaches within the Ethics and Development graduate specialisation of the university. Janet Brewer, JD, PsyD is Lecturer in Law at the University of Manchester, United Kingdom, where she is a member of the Institute of
Law, Economics & Global Society and the Center for Social Ethics & Policy. David Hunter is Lecturer in Bioethics, University of Ulster, Northern Ireland. A. Chatzifotiou, is Senior Lecturer with Sunderland University at the School of Education and Lifelong Learning. G. Liarakou is a lecturer with the University of Aegean in Greece. M. Daskolia is a research fellow with the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens in Greece Joseph A. Fadamiro has a Ph. D. degree in Architecture, with specialization in Urban Design and Landscape Architecture. He is an Associate Professor in the Department of Architecture, Federal University of Technology, Akure; Nigeria. e-mail:
[email protected] 
