Name: Jean Wong Tutor: Mr.

Nicholas Srnicek Date: 10/10/2013 Word Count: 1352 Is sustainable development a meaningful term? Sustainable development has been a pervasive term in recent discussions of populationresource issues. The term first gained prominence during the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED) in 1987 when it was introduced in the conferences report, Our Common Future. Since its introduction, the question of whether there is any real value behind this term has been hotly debated by many. This essay seeks to establish sustainable development as a meaningful term insofar as it has a unifying effect, it brings our attention to resource usage issues and consequently, it has the potential to shape concrete population-resource public policies. This essay will also address the criticism that sustainable development is a vague and hence meaningless term by suggesting that its vagueness does not make it valueless. One of the reasons why sustainable development is such an important and meaningful term is because it is a term that brings together different parties with different ideas. It is a metafix that will unite everybody from the profit-minded industrialist and risk-minimizing subsistence farmer to the equity seeking social worker, the pollution-cornered or wildlife-loving First Worlder, the growthmaximizing policy maker, the goal-oriented bureaucrat and therefore the vote-counting politician (Lele, 1991). In other words, the term sustainable development reconciles groups of people with seemingly contrasting interests, such as between developers and environmentalists. Traditionally, it is believed that pursuing economic growth necessarily means that the environment will be exploited through actions such as deforestation and pollution. Similarly, it is believed that concerning ourselves with preserving the environment meant that there were trade-offs with economic growth, as we are not allowed to fully exploit our resources to maximize economic growth. With sustainable development, it combines the two by proposing that development cannot be achieved unless the environment is taken care of and similarly, the environment will not be in a good condition if development in a region is inadequate. In short, the term integrates the different concerns of the economic, the political, the social and the environment such that it forces us to recognize links and trade-offs, rather than dealing with each concern independently (Hecht, 2007). Hence, the term sustainable development is meaningful in promoting an interdisciplinary take on contemporary population-resource issues. In the context of population-resource issues we face today, a term like sustainable development is meaningful in forcing us to think about and reassess the way we use our resources. According to the United Nations (2011), worlds population is projected to *+ reach 10.1 billion by end of the century. A report by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Board (2005) suggested that nearly two thirds of the services provided by nature to humankind are found to be in decline worldwide and that human activity is putting such strain on the natural functions of Earth that the ability of the planets ecosystems to sustain future generations can no longer be taken for granted. In other words, life on our planet is becoming unsustainable: we are using resources at a rate that is unlikely to ever keep up with population growth and this cannot be continued indefinitely. Against

Name: Jean Wong Tutor: Mr. Nicholas Srnicek Date: 10/10/2013 Word Count: 1352 this backdrop, sustainable development becomes extremely relevant. A popular definition used by the WCED (1987) suggests that sustainable development is the meet*ing+ of the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. By nature of this definition, sustainable development forces us to reassess how we are using our resources today in relation to how this will impact the amount of resources available in future. Sustainable developments pervasiveness as a term will constantly remind everyone of the pressing problem of resource usage and its environmental consequences. Hence, as Jacobs (1995) posits, it is a term that is meaningful in its ability to focus the attention on the environment and on the impacts of current activity on future generations. This is an important attempt, according to Hove (2009), to resignify nature, resources, the Earth and human life itself. Sustainable development is not just a term that is meaningful in an intangible manner. It is also a term that has the potential to create real and significant impact in the arena of public policy. Since its increased prominence, sustainable development has found its way into the debates of many public policy forming process. An example is the British White Paper on Transport. We can see that environmental concerns have largely been incorporated into the decisions to promote alternatives to travel, *+ to encourage cycling and walking, *+ to make public transport more attractive *and+ to promote car sharing and car clubs (Department of Transport, 2011). Baker, the Parliamentary Undersecretary of State for Transport states that the white paper represents a significant step towards meeting two key government objectives: to help create growth in the economy, and to tackle climate change by cutting our carbon emissions (Department for Transport, 2011). His statement is in effective a manifestation of the term sustainable development. What this shows is that the far-reaching impact of the term sustainable development. It is not, as some critics believe, a meaningless term that will produce no concrete impacts. It is instead a meaningful and significant term that has the potential to provide a guiding framework for governments to operate in the future. A very common criticism of the term sustainable development is its vagueness in meaning. Many find that the term is too ambiguous to be of any use as a guideline for policy making and decision making. Luke (1995) argues that as a social goal *+ sustainability is fraught with unresolved questions. It includes questions such as the time period, the target audience, the conditions that come with sustainable development, what are the needs of the future generations as well as whether we are referring to the social, economic, political or environment aspect when we speak of sustainable development. If these questions are unanswered, it is hard for the term sustainable development to have any real impacts. According to critics, ideally, sustainable development should come with measurable criteria such that individuals and groups with widely differing values, political preferences or assumptions about human nature could agree whether the criteria are being met in a concrete development program (Beckerman, 1994). However, it is also possible to argue that the vagueness of the term is essential to creating vital political opportunities

Name: Jean Wong Tutor: Mr. Nicholas Srnicek Date: 10/10/2013 Word Count: 1352 for cooperation and negotiation on many platforms. Robinson (2004) notes this as a form of constructive ambiguity in the messy world of politics whereby it can bring together people from all over on a common ground to discuss the future of our planet. On top of that, it may actually be unnecessary to seek a single operational definition of sustainable development. The fact that that sustainable development is a complex and contested term does not negate its value and meaning. Most key concepts are contestable in nature and according to Dresner (2002), sustainable development can be likened to words such as justice and liberty. The fact that there are numerous interpretations of these words does not imply that they are meaningless. Similarly, the term sustainable development also contains vital principles which we can guide ourselves with. In conclusion, the term sustainable development is so widely used such that it is almost impossible to not find any debate about the environment, resources and development without the term. Because of its popularity, it has also been widely debated if it is a term that has any significance and meaning behind it. While it may have limited impact as a technical and operational term, it is still a meaningful term in unifying people, bringing the focus to population-resource issues in policy making procedures and subsequently, making real impacts on public policy. More importantly, sustainable development will be a term that holds even greater meaning if we recognize that it is made up of conflicting ideas and that there is no one right answer to it. It is also not an end point we are working towards. Rather, sustainable development is a term that implies a process of re-evaluating, improving and managing our lifestyles, habits and behaviours in a way that is conscious of the environment we live in.

Name: Jean Wong Tutor: Mr. Nicholas Srnicek Date: 10/10/2013 Word Count: 1352 Works Cited Beckerman, W., 1994. Sustainable Development: Is it a Useful Concept? Environmental Values, 3 (3), p191-209. Department of Transport, 2011. Creating Growth, Cutting Carbon: Making Sustainable Local Transport Happen. United Kingdom: The Stationery Office. Dresner, S., 2002. The Principles of Sustainability. London: Earthscan. Hecht, J., 2007. Can Indicators and Accounts Really Measure Sustainability? Considerations for the US Environmental Protection Agency. [WWW]. Available from: http://www.joyhecht.net/professional/papers/jhecht-sust-ind&accounts-may07.pdf [08/10/13] Hove, H., 2004. Critiquing Sustainable Development: A Meaningful Way of Mediating the Development Impasse? Undercurrent, 1 (1). Jacobs, M., 1995. Sustainable Development, Capital Substitution and Economic Humility: A Response to Beckerman. Environmental Values, 4 (1), p57-68. Lele, S., 1991. Sustainable Development: A Critical Review, World Development, 19 (6), p613. Luke, T., 1995. Sustainable Development as a Power/Knowledge System: The Problem of Governmentality, p21-22. In Fischer F. and Michael B., editors, Greening Environmental Policy: The Politics of a Sustainable Future. London: Paul Chapman Publishing. Millennium Ecosystem Assessment Board, 2005. Living Beyond Our Means: Natural Assets and Human Well-Being. [WWW]. Available from: http://www.unep.org/maweb/documents/document.429.aspx.pdf [08/10/13] Robinson, J., 2004. Squaring the circle? Some thoughts on the idea of sustainable development. Ecological Economics, 48, p369-384. World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987. Our Common Future. Oxford: Oxford Press. United Nations, 2011. Global Population to pass 10 billion by 2100, UN projections indicate. [WWW]. Available from: http://www.un.org/apps/news/story.asp?NewsID=38253#.UlX1ylBORfQ [08/10/13]