Sustainable development is a wide spread concept. This is
because it deals with almost each and every aspect of life. Different public
and private organizations, socialists and environmentalists presented their
views about the Sustainable development and defined this concept in different
ways. Sustainable development is an integrated approach that includes economy,
environment and society. All of these three elements should be kept in balance
but it is difficult to manage them in equality.
"Three
Sectors: Economy, Environment, and Society" is the first and most basic
view. This model divides sustainable development into economy, environment and
society. These are three interconnected rings and where these intersect each other;
sustainable development takes place. It is the most simple model and mutually
exclusive as well. It means that there is a trade-off between these three
elements. Economic growth can destroy environment or society and vice versa.
Also there is an issue of compartmentalization; it means the economist will
focus on economy, environmentalist will work for environment, and socialist
will give priority to society. This trade-off causes separation between them. The
approach of weak sustainable was raised by capitalists; it says that the
natural capital can be substituted by manufacture capital. But in my point of
view no one can ever substitute the feeling of a fresh breath while sitting in
the middle of a jungle or park after a morning walk with anything else. This
approach towards sustainable development emphasizes more on technical fixes,
and it does not address the deep-rooted implications like unemployment,
illiteracy, poverty or cultural issues etc.
"Political
Reality: Prioritizing the Economy" is the second view. It describes
the reality of today's priorities. The will power of government authorities and
other large organizations is majorly depends on economy and its growth. For
example, British government defined sustainable development as a high level of
economic growth. That clarifies the lack of integration in the three key
elements of sustainable development. The economic growth only provides an
average growth rate and here the inequality rises among intra-generations. By
seeing the average growth, political authorities defines their governance level
but there should be more of an equitable approach. They believe that trickledown
theory will satisfy the needs of poor also, but that is not happening. In
India, only 1% of the elite class earns 60% of the total income. Inequity in three
elements is the major drawback in this view towards sustainable development. In
the critics, environmentalists raises questions like; can we pay the loss of
any animal's life in monetary terms? Capitalists count everything in monetary
terms but they cannot reverse the impact of CFC's on ozone layer by paying
money to the government as carbon taxes. These taxes can reduce the impact on
environment but they cannot save or preserve environment from human interventions.
"Material
Reality: Nesting Economy in Society and Environment" is the third view
and fulfills the limitation of the three integrated circle model. It says
economy is a subset of society and environment. Social interactions and economy
are human activities that are incurred within the environment. Human cannot
survive without social interactions and economics as well in the today’s world,
which is why human activities are the part of human life and are not separate from
environment. Human is extract materials from environment to form clothes,
shelter, food, energy and all the other modern consumer goods and the waste produced
is also left in the environment to meet human needs. Economic activities are
the monetary activities which include transfer of commodities with cash but
there are other non-monetary activities as well that are the part of human
life. For example, mother works in her house but not gets paid and the
indigenous knowledge about the pharmaceuticals and herbs are not gained by
investing in education. These non-monetary activities are because of the social
interactions of humans. This is the reason why the economy lies in and is a
part of social interactions.
"Multi-Layered
and Multi-Faceted" is a fourth view and presented a major drawback of
three sector model including. That model defines each element as a unified
entity. But that is not the case. Environment, economy, and society have
different scales in different areas and also in same area. All the forests and
deserts in the world have different and unique temperature and rainfall
patterns. Like desert in Pakistan is fertile but the desert in Middle East have
no fertility in its soil and almost shrubs does not grow. Even in a single
tree, environment can be different. Societal norms and values are different for
different areas. In western world there is a culture of individualism and in
east there is a culture of collectivism. It is also seen that the poor have
strong society structure and social values as compare to the rich. Economic
condition and growth is different for different areas. Even in a single town,
some of the areas might be developed economically and some might be
under-developed. This model defines that all three elements are not constant,
these varies with time, place, and even they can vary at the same place. These
are diverse elements but the capitalism destroys the diversity for monetary
benefits and put the humanity and environment on risk. Three sector model was
simple and ignored the richness in three elements of sustainable development.
"Change of Viewpoints: Breaking Down the Boundaries"
is the fifth view and points out a major drawback of previous studies. There was
a bold boundary in all the previous studies between economy, environment and
society. In reality there are no boundaries in-between them. Economists talk
about the activities that can be counted in monetary terms only. But in real
world, there are activities that cannot be counted in monetary terms, like a
mother does all the house jobs without getting paid. Human needs are not
satisfied by economic activities only. By combining all the activities that
happened as economic activities and social interaction, we combine them as a single
term called human activities and well being. These human activities take place
in the environment continuously. Humans cannot survive without environment and
continuously human is taking out resources from the environment and the waste
produced in the production process is also left in the environment. So, this
model eliminates the boundaries and makes a dotted line between the three elements
of sustainable development.
"Principles of Sustainable Development"
defines the ethical values or guidelines that clarify the priorities in
decision making process towards sustainable development. It provides main
principles toward the solution of issues related to all three elements of
sustainable development individually or issues that incur in a mix of all these
elements.
(i) Inter-generational equity - Futurity
(ii) Intra-generational equity - Social justice
(iii) Geographical equity - Trans-frontier responsibility
(iv) Procedural equity - People treated openly and fairly
and the right of participation
(v) Inter-species equity - Importance of biodiversity
According to the definition of sustainable development by
brundtland commission: fulfill the needs of current generation without effecting
or destroying the resources left for the future generations to meet their needs,
the first principle focuses on the equity for current generation. Previous
models do not talk about the equity in distribution of resources. Second
principle says; maintain equity in the distribution of resources among the
current and future generations. Third principle says that the resources must be
distributed equitably among different geographical places. Today there is a big
discrimination between the developed, developing, and under-developed
countries. Procedural equity is the fourth principle and it talks about the
right of participation for people in politics and socio-economic activities.
Democracy should be assured in every aspect of life for the general public.
Fifth principle provides a priority of conserving the biological diversity.
Human in the name of so called industrialization and development destroyed and continuously
destroying biodiversity day by day. This principle defines a clear guideline
for the protection of animals and plants species as well for sustainable
development, because human is a part of environment and nature. The destruction
of biodiversity can lead the human life towards distinction.
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