posted
I'm participating in a workshop on campus next week looking at transitioning to a sustainable society. There are people coming from all over the world form many different disciplines, so I'm pretty hyped.
But this workshop is not so much on defining sustainability, but transitioning to it. So I began to think about what I mean when I say sustainability and began to wonder what other people mean when they say it. So just this morning I sent an email to everyone coming and asked them. I've already got six responses.
So I submit to you all: what is sustainability? What do you think of when you say it? What do you not think of? Here's the email, snipped somewhat:
quote:Fellow participants,
After reading through the Natural Step Sustainability Primer, I began pondering the definition of sustainable development that it provides:
"Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." (Brundtland Commission, 1987)
There are many other definitions out there, and they don't always seem to agree. For instance, here's a more economic definition for sustainability:
"[sustainability is] the maximum amount that could be spent on consumption in one period without reducing...real consumption expenditures in future periods." (Broadway and Bruce, 1984)
I am curious. What definitions of sustainability, sustainable development, or similar phrases do you all use? I am willing to gather and compile a list of definitions from all of you and share it by the end of the workshop. I don't expect to nail down sustainability (I doubt that's even possible), but I think it could be very interesting to see the full spread of the definitions from a variety of different disciplines.
What do you guys think? I'll share my compilation at the end of the week, too, if you're interested. And I'll give which definition I like best, but only after I hear from some of you. Posts: 1711 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
Sustainable? I don't know. means different things based on which timeframes we're talking about. You could be demanding 'sustainability for the life-age of the earth,' or sustainability to the heat death of the universe, or whatever. We'll never have that sort of sustainability. We're too massive as a species, and bound to chew through ubiquitous resources like accessible coal, petroleum, gallium, phosphorous, whatever. I generally default to sustainable within seven generations, or the Iroquois confederation model, where anything that can truly be called sustainable must at minimum succeed a conceptual test of not coming at the cost of "the effect on seven generations in the future."
most talk of sustainability is buzzwordy. sustainable is a pretty word to spruce up your campaigns with. that's why we get oxyymoronic crap like 'sustainable growth.'
On the macro level, nothing we do is sustainable, not even within seven generations (too many people on earth). Anytime someone is talking about sustainability, they're talking about a limited scope, limited frame, in a closed case. Like 'sustainable development' within a single county or state. 'sustainable energy' is another big one. Kinda rubs off as hollow. I dunno.
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posted
I wonder if your workshop will even approach the idea of population control. In my personal opinion, population control is a necessary factor in any 'sustainability' discussion.
Posts: 1813 | Registered: Apr 2001
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posted
Population is certainly a factor, and one of the working groups (not mine), will address it.
Whether we'll discuss population control, though, I don't know. People don't like talking about it.
And Samp, I'm not looking for a complete definition, because there really isn't one. But there are definitions for sustainable development, sustainable growth, sustainable culture, etc. That's what I'm trying to throw together. I like that Iriquois example. I'll try and look more into that. Thanks.
Posts: 1711 | Registered: Jun 2004
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posted
There are definitions for 'sustainable' development or growth, I'm sure. I'm with Samp, though. They're an oxymoron. Basic math will tell you that such a thing is impossible.
posted
As for a definition: Sustainability is determined by the comparison of how fast resources are being used versus how fast they are replenished. That's about as basic as you can get. Most other definitions are mere handwaving.
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posted
Being able to predict that a certain practice, action, or behavior can reasonably continue into the future barring unforeseen or cataclysmic events( i.e. a huge nuclear war, asteroid impacting the earth, the sun turning into a red giant etc.) should grant most things "sustainability." You should always be careful about taking language to extreme meanings, in this case that sustainability needs to be something akin to perpetual motion and be able to continue infinitely. Many world views would say that the universe itself is not sustainable in that sense.
Posts: 1753 | Registered: May 2001
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posted
Sustainability is a market concept. Anything is sustainable if you are willing to pay ever increasing prices. Sustainability is determined by the price people are willing to pay. Shale Oil was dismissed as too expensive 20 years ago.
True sustainability is determined by the will of the people. Of course, laws subvert the free market. Oil is not indefinitely sustainable but it is far cheaper than the current options on the table. When oil becomes more expensive than electricity, people will buy plug in cars with inefficient batteries.
Electric cars aren't sustainable either....we'll run out of lithium. There's more oil than lithium on this planet.
Nothing is sustainable, but let the free market decide. A free market is the purest democracy.
Posts: 1495 | Registered: Mar 2009
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Not when you throw marketing into the mix. In the end you can't have a free market where the "best" product wins as the less oversight you have the more of a chance that business will "win the game" and then you're in a pickle to say the least. Not to mention the very idea of a completely free market is just as impossible as indefinite sustainability or perpetual motion.
Posts: 1753 | Registered: May 2001
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posted
I agree with Al Gore. An oil-based economy is unsustainable. Life on Earth is unsustainable, eventually the sun will become a red giant. Congress thinks it can legislate away the laws of physics.
"Every object in a state of uniform motion tends to remain in that state of motion unless an external force is applied to it"
Why complain about doom's day scenario's without oil when the market will adjust smoothly, without oil? When oil starts to run out, other sources of energy will become more attractive. Of course the the government can "force" an action prematurely.
I believe in the free market. What if the government was put in charge of designing a cell phone?
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posted
How did you get from Al Gore to Congress denying the laws of physics to the government designing a cell phone?
Posts: 21898 | Registered: Nov 2004
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quote:Originally posted by Black Fox: Not when you throw marketing into the mix. In the end you can't have a free market where the "best" product wins as the less oversight you have the more of a chance that business will "win the game" and then you're in a pickle to say the least. Not to mention the very idea of a completely free market is just as impossible as indefinite sustainability or perpetual motion.
Nothing is sustainable, including perpetual motion. The only thing "perpetual" about a free market is innovation. Last year's, last decade's and last century's necessities mean nothing to a free market. Free markets look at what is best today...what is cheapest today. The free market is perpetual. Free people will always have needs to be met as cheaply as possible.
You can either stand in line for government provided toilet paper or tolerate a wealthy capitalists who sells you good butt wipe at a cheap price. Your choice....history is undeniable.
From a legitimate Nobel winner..."A society that puts equality before freedom will get neither. A society that puts freedom before equality will get a high degree of both.".....Friedman.
Posts: 1495 | Registered: Mar 2009
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The problem is that the last century of smooth sustainable "free market" activity was anything BUT free. Not to mention this era of a free market activity that "benefited" everyone was built on the backs of high government spending ( here and abroad ). That and most economists will tell you that the free market has no way to deal with externalities and that you need something to make up for that, unless of course you don't mind paying the cost. An entirely free market might work if you could somehow build the real cost of a product into its purchase price, but the reality is that you can't. Not unless you start predicting the future.
That and when you look at these you have the problem that most people have in that you only see the extremes of the definition. It has to be government provided toilet paper or wealthy capitalists etc. You have no middle ground, which is completely unrealistic. There are more than two choices in life. The law of bivalence only goes so far as to describe truth values.
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It's less and less free and more and more dictated by lobbyists. We've strayed from a true free market for nearly a century. The powerful companies are "too big to fail" and the the one's bailed out by the government are exempted from "Financial Reform Legislation" and things like the Durbin Interchange Amendment.
If Bush was an oil man with Cheney, Obama is a financial man with Geitner. Obama has recieved more money from all these "evil" organizations than anyone else. Maybe they realized he was brought up in Chicago politics.
I'm really looking forward to the Blago subpoena's.
Posts: 1495 | Registered: Mar 2009
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posted
Yes, but the era of "free market" activity before the last century was extremely unethical and immoral. This was the era when you lived in a company house etc. etc. Talk about freedom huh ; ) All I'm saying is, don't try and simply mark things as one way or the other, but look at the gray. Don't get me wrong, people from both aisles have it. I have a passion for hating Progessives as much as I hate Conservatives as they tend to fall into the same traps of thought.
To be honest, no one does well with decisions regarding scarcity and choice. The fact is that we all tend to pass the buck, and as sad as it is to say, I'm sure that my generation will do the same.
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America has been following the European path for too long. We need to return to our founders who rejected Europe.
I find it laughable that America is considered a young nation when our government has lasted longer than most of the rest of the world.
Obama and Pelosi's promises can never be fulfilled. That's why Pelosi was heckled by code pink and most socalist European governments only last about 50 years.
The United States is one of the oldest nations in the world. I consider myself fortunate to not have to deal with European Socialist Turmoil.
Posts: 1495 | Registered: Mar 2009
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posted
Our founders did not reject Europe! If anything they embraced the modern European thought of John Locke and Rousseau. Ours was a revolution lead by elites who thought of themselves as English citizens and for this reason thought that men of property, elites, should have the right of voting in elections, running for Parliament, and simply being a high member of society. They were extremely conscious of their position in society, and didn't want to be the low man on the totem pole anymore, as they wanted those to be other citizens in their own country.
And most socialist European governments only last about 50 years? You should really go talk to some Scandinavians, or even Germans. As all though they have had some obvious regime changes, have been socialist since the Prussian Days. Even Otto Von Bismarck, not exactly who we would think of as a nice guy, thought that social institutions were a good thing.
That and all though we have had the same "government" since the Revolution we have had some rather obvious changes. From property based voting in the early days, to suffrage for all white males, to then suffrage for all men, and then finally to universal suffrage. That is just one are. Senators used to be chosen by state legislatures. Not to mention without the 14th amendment and "judicial activism" we wouldn't actually GET most of the rights assured us by the Constitution as they were only on the federal level and state governments simply ignored them unless they were in their own state constitutions. So, am I proud that America has a proud Democratic tradition, oh hell yeah. Am I sick of the fact that they teach American children crap for social studies, doubly so!
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posted
America was founded upon the best concepts from Europe. The American political system has lasted longer than most European nations. In that sense, America is one of the oldest nations in the world. If you want to judge longevity on residence, still....there were Native Americans here 10k years ago. Of course, there were neanderthals in France.
Does that make France the oldest nation in the world? Not really, they came from Africa. Is Africa the oldest nation in the world? Maybe we should follow Africa's lead.
America has a longer standing government than most of Europe. Europe has had one socialistic failure after another.....from Hitler and his National Socialistic Party to Greece in 2010.
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Sustainability to The Obvious Hitler Failure of Hitler Europe Hitler in six posts, thanks mal!
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posted
Government does not equal nation and neither does nation equal government. Look at the Kurds, Basque, etc.
Posts: 1753 | Registered: May 2001
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
quote:Originally posted by malanthrop: America was founded upon the best concepts from Europe. The American political system has lasted longer than most European nations. In that sense, America is one of the oldest nations in the world. If you want to judge longevity on residence, still....there were Native Americans here 10k years ago. Of course, there were neanderthals in France.
Does that make France the oldest nation in the world? Not really, they came from Africa. Is Africa the oldest nation in the world? Maybe we should follow Africa's lead.
America has a longer standing government than most of Europe. Europe has had one socialistic failure after another.....from Hitler and his National Socialistic Party to Greece in 2010.
The Chinese would disagree with you.
On another note economically it is impossible to have sustainable economic growth without population growth as well.
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Most economic growth, by far, is due to technological advancement. Both of you seem to be asserting that either 1) that isn't true or 2) that technological advancement has some sort of limit.
If you'd like to have a discussion about it, you might start with which you mean.
Posts: 15770 | Registered: Dec 2001
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I actually think as long as you're probably talking about developed countries anyway, population control isn't as necessary a thing to worry about, since the actual birth rates aren't that high anyway. It's the amount of resources those people consume that's the issue, which is probably what your discussion would end up focusing on anyway.
Posts: 4136 | Registered: Aug 2008
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Blayne Bradley
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quote:Originally posted by fugu13: Most economic growth, by far, is due to technological advancement. Both of you seem to be asserting that either 1) that isn't true or 2) that technological advancement has some sort of limit.
If you'd like to have a discussion about it, you might start with which you mean.
Economic growth is driven by the productivity of the populace, in essence you gain growth by doing things, making things, creating things and by doing them more efficiently technology in this sense acts as a force multiplier that increases GDP as A) a matter of efficiency) and B) through adding new exploitable markets through revolutionizing them in someway.
ie by eventing the printing press I stimulated economic growth by making book making more efficient that allows the population to become better educated and more literate that in turns helps allow more economic growth because a more educated workforce is also a more productive one, etc.
But if I invent the Internet I just added a whole new industry that allows a new higher "ceiling" of growth essentially allows for the "higher leap" of growth like when Japan went from Feudalism to Westernized Nation-State and again when it went from bombed out ruins to a maritime, industrious trading state.
However barring the second kind of technological advancement there is always going to be a ceiling to which you will only get diminishing returns from trying to make your workforce more productive or efficient, thus the only way to make it more efficient once you have tapped out all availiable human resources is to get MORE human resources through breeding.
Thus if we don't rely upon or assume some miraculous next leap in human ingenuity population growth would be an absolute minimum requirement for further economic growth otherwise you achieve stagnation which could result in economic recession and eventually a collapse as it would be impossible to have a young enough population without growth.
Thus the compromise theory would be to hedge bets and buy time in the hopes some kind of great leap will eventually happen by in the meantime having some growth to insure sustainability while at the same time maxing out efficiency.
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A lot of what you are saying is true, but also the same sort of thing that many people have consistently thought across history and been wrong about. I am very tired and have not slept for two days so I will keep it really short.
a) More people does not necessarily mean more economic product
b) People don't handcraft things anymore, they man machinery.
c) We don't even need half the worlds population to feed and clothe the entirity of the world.
d) For this very reason most of humanity has no real economic value except for what we make up of it. They are mainly just resource consumers so all the factory workers have a reason to work.
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I believe it's an old old wooden ship used in the civil war era.
Posts: 856 | Registered: Jun 2007
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
quote:Originally posted by Black Fox: A lot of what you are saying is true, but also the same sort of thing that many people have consistently thought across history and been wrong about. I am very tired and have not slept for two days so I will keep it really short.
a) More people does not necessarily mean more economic product
b) People don't handcraft things anymore, they man machinery.
c) We don't even need half the worlds population to feed and clothe the entirity of the world.
d) For this very reason most of humanity has no real economic value except for what we make up of it. They are mainly just resource consumers so all the factory workers have a reason to work.
I don't think you've read my post or have anywhere near the casual knowledge to make such broad categorizations with such confidence.
A) Wrong; More people unless they are doing absolutely nothing and I mean in a coma literally nothing always add more to your economic growth either through consumption, savings or contribution. The amount they can contribute will of vary but mostly as a matter of education, national focus, and infrastructure.
B) This has what to do with my post in what way? To quote Yahtzee "I believe you have missed the point where you have aimed in a completely different direction and the point is in a different country altogether."
C) What form of insane troll logic is this, its like saying we don't need to half half a house to be half a house! It adds nothing to the conversation! There's no substantiation! No thought process! No argument! Just a catch all statement and then nuttin'!
We're discussing what we can define as sustainable growth not whether we humans are worth that growth etc. Yes alot of our economy is geared towards people working so they can have a high standard of living either for themselves or others and then themselves again indirectly and yes its very much a cycle but it is irrelevant, I like my computer and comfy chair and I like the hundreds of poor chinese urban workers who are paying their way through school fabricating them so they can raise their own standard of living and one day live like us.
It is our intrinsic moral and ethical right and obligation to make ourselves as a PEOPLE more comfortable thus economic growth! The question is, is our current growth sustainable or should we dial it in so that everyone still equally gains a share of the pie and not end up starving through the commons failing.
Alot of the argument seems to boil down to population control which I kinda agree with but also not agree with, as the natural process of industrialization already makes it so that people have less children so the goal should be to bring africa and india to our level of development to push down the strain on their resources and to push up efficency and growth to more sustainable levels across the globe.
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quote:Originally posted by Blayne Bradley: ... More people unless they are doing absolutely nothing and I mean in a coma literally nothing always add more to your economic growth either through consumption, savings or contribution ...
Not necessarily. Imagine our society if it suddenly lost birth control and family planning. Couples would in many cases have children earlier, unexpectedly have to abort education or even careers in order to take care of children.
This may very well lead to a lower GDP without the new people doing absolutely nothing.
Posts: 7593 | Registered: Sep 2006
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posted
I agree that "sustainable growth" is an oxymoron but the same is not necessarily true of "sustainable development". Development and growth don't necessarily mean the same thing synonyms. "Sustainable growth" implies you will be able to keep growing forever, which is obviously fallacious. But "sustainable development" doesn't necessarily mean continued development, it can mean things like building sustainable infrastructure, replacing old non-sustainable industries with new sustainable industries and so on. Claiming that sustainable development is an oxymoron is in effect arguing that we can not possible change from unsustainable to sustainable ways of living. If that's true, we are doomed.
Posts: 12591 | Registered: Jan 2000
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posted
Sorry about earlier, I should have clarified what I was trying to say in the first place, mainly that I shouldn't be posting when I've been up for 48 hours, gooo work. Anyhow, Mainly it isn't impossible to have "sustainable" economic growth without population growth. If you steadily improve technology (production per capita ) and the rate of consumption per capita you can continue to have growth even while a population becomes smaller. Then there is the question if you want sustainable real growth or simple growth to match inflation. That is, if the economy grows at 2% and that is the rate of inflation then you really aren't growing. Real growth is still feasibly sustainable withoug population growth.
Population growth is simply one generally sure proof method of increasing consumption, although one could possibly increase the population while actually decreasing consumption, its just unlikely. Other than consumption, the greatest impact that people tend to have on an economy are through production, which also includes innovation within production etc. Since most people are no longer actually needed or are unsuited for these tasks, the greatest contribution they have on the economy is by consuming. It isn't bad, simply what they do.
This being the case, you could feasibly take out half the worlds population, as long as double the rate of consumption of the half you still have and not drop the amount of product you are producing. You could also have an increase in population and have a drop in consumption if consumption per capita goes down. Even in terms of savings, if across the whole net savings decreases it does not matter if you have more savers. Its not a matter of morality, simply one of mathematics. Since both of these are completely feasible, it is not impossible. Historically, population growth has been the driver of consumption, but in today's world it is not the case. Not that having a billion cheap laborers doesn't help.
Also, industrialization does not kill population growth. It is simply any environment that makes children a negative economic entity, simply that they cost money to have and don't make money. In most "developed" nations this is the case, and for this very reason many of them are having negative population growth across the board, especially within the upper classes of those countries. That only happens when regulate child industry etc. and have a spike of inflation, generally through low unemployment. Hence, in the 1800s the Western world went through a population explosion while they were becoming inudstrialized.
However, I would say that unfettered population growth just doesn't work. There is a reason why Malthus was thinking this just a couple of hundred years ago. The question is, how do you keep from creating 20 billion people and not running out of everything. That and if you have 5 billion people on the planet consuming at the rate of Americans or other developed countries that have low population growth you end consuming on a level of a planet with 20 billion. The fact is that living "comfortable" in the manner that you may or may not be thinking just does not match up with our resources on the planet.
[ June 16, 2010, 11:39 AM: Message edited by: Black Fox ]
Posts: 1753 | Registered: May 2001
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posted
Blayne, you are more coherent these days, but make no more sense.
BF isn;t a troll, and that was hardly troll logic. I had no issue understanding the thrust of his points, and they all applied to what you were saying. I may not agree with all of them, but they were phrased respectfully and made sense.
Two things you still seem to have trouble with at times.
And quoting a stupid generic trope is not intelligence. In this or any other argument.
posted
Black Fox is going out of his way to present his case tactfully and straightforwardly and Blayne just drops straight to calling him a troll.
Like, you could get no starker example of this process.
Posts: 15421 | Registered: Aug 2005
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Blayne Bradley
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posted
I didn't call him a troll, as you'll note Insane Troll Logic is in of itself a trope. One that while is usd my trolls can be used by normal people who come up with an incoherant statement.
In the way similar would say "stop acting like an idiot" isn't saying "you're an idiot". Which isn't to say that is what I am saying but a fairly close example, essentially InsaneTrollLogic in the usage I am using it is simply saying something that doesn't logically add together despite being passed as such.
Apologies if that was the impression I gave.
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This may be off topic but this workshop is going great so far. I have several good, robust definitions. I'll share them on Friday, when they get more finalized.
Posts: 1711 | Registered: Jun 2004
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Blayne Bradley
unregistered
posted
quote:Originally posted by The White Whale: This may be off topic but this workshop is going great so far. I have several good, robust definitions. I'll share them on Friday, when they get more finalized.
Out of curiosity which contributions are you thinking of using?
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Quite honestly, the only one that I thought was worth including was Samp's seven generation one.
I agree with Rabbit's differentiation of sustainable growth vs. sustainable development, and I have several other definitions that go along with them.
I've gotten nearly a dozen responses from the people in the workshop. Sorry for not sharing them yet, I'm crazy busy and they are all kind of thrown together so far. But I promise...I'll post them soon!
Posts: 1711 | Registered: Jun 2004
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I quite liked Glenn Arnold's definition, the one about the rate at which a given resource is being used up compared to the rate at which it's being replenished. That makes the most sense to me.
And Black Fox is absolutely right that it's impossible for everyone on the planet to live the way we (Westerners/industrialized nations) do. Heck, even we aren't going to get to live the way we do for much longer; as fossil fuels become depleted, we're all going to be working a whole lot harder for a much lower standard of living.
Posts: 957 | Registered: Aug 2002
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Here are some of the more straightforward definitions. I have 11 pages of them, if anyone in interested in them you can email me and I'll send you the full list.
quote:“Sustainability: the ability to be sustained; the capacity to endure.”
- Wiktionary
quote:“Sustainability is the possibility that humans and other life will flourish on Earth forever. Reducing unsustainability, although critical, will not create sustainability.”
- John Ehrenfeld
quote:“Sustainability means staying in business forever, whatever your business is.”
- Auden Schendler, “Getting Green Done: Hard Truths from the Front Line of the Sustainability Revolution.”
quote:“…The privilege of possessing the earth entails the responsibility of passing it on, the better for our use, not only to immediate posterity, but to the Unknown future, the nature of which is not given to us now.”
- Aldo Leopold, “Some Fundamentals of Conservation in the Southwest” (1923)
quote:“Our leaders were instructed to be men of vision and to make every decision on behalf of the seventh generation to come; to have compassion and love for those generations yet unborn.”
- Oren Lyons, Haudenosaunee Faithkeeper, "The Year of the Indigenous Peoples", 1993
quote:“…[Sustainability is] the maximum amount that could be spent on consumption in one period without reducing…real consumption expenditures in future periods.”
- Broadway and Bruce, 1984, 9
quote:“Here we take sustainability to mean that intertemporal social welfare Vt must not decrease over time. Thus, we will say that the sustainability criterion is satisfied at time t if d(Vt)/dt ≥ 0.”
- Arrow et al., Are We Consuming Too Much? 2004.
quote:Sustainability is the Triple Bottom Line [i.e. People, Planet, Profit], which “focuses corporations not just on the economic value they add, but also the environmental and social value they add – and destroy.”
- Joanna Dickson Holmes, “Sustainability and the Triple Bottom Line,” ecoOpportunities
quote:"Teach your children what we have taught ours: that the earth is our mother. Whatever befalls the earth befalls the sons of the earth. The earth does not belong to man; man belongs to the earth. Man did not weave the web of life; he is merely a strand in it. We do not inherit the earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children."
- Native American Suquamish Tribe, Chief Seattle
quote:A sustainable society [is] “one that is far-seeing enough, flexible enough and wise enough not to undermine either its physical or its social systems of support”
- Donella Meadows
quote:“Sustainability: The likelihood an existing system of resource use will persist indefinitely without a decline in the resource base or in the social welfare it delivers.”
- Brian Walker and David Salt, “Resilience Thinking,” glossary
quote:"Sustainability is a set of environmental, economic, and social conditions in which all of society has the capacity and the opportunity to maintain and improve its quality of life indefinitely -- that is, without degrading the quantity, quality, or the availability of natural resources and ecosystems."
- American Society of Civil Engineers
quote:“Sustainable Development is development that meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
- Brundtland Report, WCED “Our Common Future,” 1987
quote:“Sustainable Development encompasses economic and social development. It takes full account of the environmental and social consequences of economic activity and is based on the use of resources that can be replaced or renewed, meeting the needs and improving the quality of life of current generations without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own environmental, social, and economic needs. Sustainable development practices do now allow for “externalities” that exist in “economic development.” Sustainable development broadens the accounting system to include green accounting, equity, and intergenerational issues. Its goal is not maximum economic growth, but more balanced development of environmental, social, political, and economic resources.”
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but this workshop is going great so far. I have several good, robust definitions. I'll share them on Friday, when they get more finalized.
