Battle in Print: What does sustainability mean for the developing world?

Peter Martin, 29 September 2006

Sustainable development is widely accepted to mean ‘development which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’, the definition proposed by the Brundtland Commission (1987). Sustainable development has become a widely accepted principle informing a wide range of specific aims, such as achieving carbon neutrality, minimising the ecological footprint of products through their lifecycles, promoting renewable energy and maintaining biodiversity. The breadth of institutions, governments, organisations and individuals who have accepted the principal – from environmentalist groups to multinational oil companies – has resulted in a spectrum of interpretations which limits the depth of meaning that can be found in the term.

At one end of this spectrum is the traditional model of economic growth but with additional emphasis on the costs of environmental degradation and the intergenerational share of natural resources. This is sometimes called the Conventional Economic Growth (CEG) model. Towards the other end of the spectrum, the emphasis is more on the finiteness of global resources and the necessity for less resource-intensive lifestyles. This is sometimes called the Environmentally Sustainable Lifestyles (ESL) model (OTA 1994).

The CEG model highlights the technological benefits made possible by previous resource use and the future potential of such benefits for all in society. For example, oil giant BP (2005) states that:

For BP, ‘sustainability’ means the capacity to endure as a group: by renewing assets; creating and delivering better products and services that meet the evolving needs of society; attracting successive generations of employees; contributing to a sustainable environment; and retaining the trust and support of our customers, shareholders and the communities in which we operate.

The ESL model highlights that most of the benefits of past economic growth have gone to the wealthy with little improvement in quality of life for most other people, above all in developing countries. Moreover, it associates many of the problems facing developing countries with the results of industrialisation. The ESL model fundamentally redefines development, placing the emphasis on meeting basic human needs, protecting the environment and incorporating the involvement of people at a grassroots level. This model is consistent with most of the recommendations of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development, the 1992 Earth Summit at Rio de Janeiro, known as Agenda 21.

Development by economic and material growth has been the predominant model for the third world since the Second World War. Initially, this was led by large loans from wealthy countries for infrastructural projects to promote industrialisation. In the 1980s, structural adjustment was demanded through institutions such as the International Monetary Fund, with the aim of removing barriers to economic growth. Few would argue that the needs of all the world’s present population have been met by this process, let alone that problems for future generations have been averted. Since the late 1990s, emphasis has been placed on poverty reduction rather than growth as the aim of development.

Implicit in all definitions of sustainable development is the notion that the prevailing models of development have been unsustainable – either because they do not meet the needs of the present and/or because they compromise future generations.

Take Ghana in West Africa, for instance. This country has seen once promising attempts to develop industrially through large-scale projects fail to meet the country’s needs. The Akosombo dam on the Volta River was completed in 1965 and created the world’s largest man-made lake. It was intended to provide hydroelectric power for the country’s population and its industry. Specifically, the electricity was intended to be used to enable Ghana’s bauxite reserves to be mined and smelted into aluminium, thus encouraging integrated industrialisation across the economy. However, the mining operations in Ghana were never sufficiently profitable and aluminium smelting has been conducted only by importing bauxite. In recent years, periods of drought have led to rolling blackouts and the project is considered to have been of limited benefit for the majority of Ghanaians.

In those countries where industrialisation first occurred and which are now considered as developed, the needs of the present are better met. However, this has required considerable retrospective environmental improvement after the effects of initial industrialisation. If all countries were to industrialise, the scale of the pollution and other problems is considered to be too great to fix after the event and not a price worth paying. More fundamentally, the current state of development of industrialised countries is considered to be compromising future generations. Principally this is through excessive use of finite resources and emissions of greenhouse gases. Even George W Bush said in his 2006 State of the Union speech that ‘America is addicted to oil’, to illustrate how contemporary society has compromised itself.

Common to all models of sustainable development is the acceptance of limits to growth. The Brundtland Commission phrases this as ‘not absolute limits but limitations imposed by the present state of technology and social organization on environmental resources and by the ability of the biosphere to absorb the effects of human activities’. Previous models of development were based on the assumption, indeed aspiration, of unbounded growth. The acceptance of limits to what humans can do requires a fundamental readjustment of our expectations.

This poses some specific problems for countries which wish to develop. The desirability and possibility of wholesale industrialisation is off of the agenda, replaced by far more limited poverty alleviation goals. Sustainable development promises benefits through grassroots participation of the poorest, though this could have the effect of entrenching people in a way of life that was only ever a form of adaptation to adverse circumstances. These ways of life may even be celebrated as viable alternatives to Western consumerism. The guilt expressed by industrialised countries over their unsustainability would be little compensation for those in the world who cannot achieve material growth. The Brundtland Commission envisioned ‘a new era of economic growth’ based on sustainability, but this has not been realised, and to most people sustainability means a reduction in consumption.

The ultimate limit proposed by sustainable development is that on the human population. Different views on what would constitute a sustainable world population exist, but the central notion is that excessive population will be a burden to the current environment and cause problems for future generations. Sustainable development would appear to have the best interests of people at heart. However, the notion of overpopulation suggests a misanthropic core which emphasises the burden of people, rather than their potential.

Peter Martin is a lecturer, Department of Engineering Science, University of Oxford

 References

BP (2005). Making Energy More: Sustainability Report 2005. 6 April 2005. BP.

Brundtland Commission (1987). Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development. United Nations.

Gyau-Boakye, P. (2001). ‘Environmental impacts of the Akosombo Dam and effects of climate change on the lake levels’. Environment, Development and Sustainability 3(1): 17-29.

OTA (1994). Perspectives on the Role of Science and Technology in Sustainable Development. US Congress, Office of Technology Assessment. September 1994. Washington, DC, US Government Printing Office.

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