Sustainable Development: National Aspirations, Local Implementation

Alan Terry, Jennifer Hill

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317047889
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Local & Regional Planning Public Policy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

Using case studies from Africa, South America, Asia and the Caribbean, this book examines the progress made in uniting national aspirations of sustainable development strategies with their local implementation. Comparing the situation on the ground with formal national environmental action plans, the book compares progress, or the lack of progress, between different sectors, cultures, regions and resources throughout the developing world. It examines whether local knowledge and actions are undermining national aspirations or whether they are being ignored at the national level with detrimental consequences to sustainable development. The measurement of sustainable development, the role of formal and informal education in sustainable development and the significance of diverse voices in the practice of sustainable development are considered. The book draws lessons from those cases which appear to be experiencing positive moves towards sustainability and examines whether common frameworks exist which suggest that good practice may be transferable from one milieu to another.

Chapter 1

Uniting National Aspirations and Local Implementation in Sustainable Development: An Introduction

Alan Terry, Jennifer Hill and Wendy Woodland

Background

In 1992, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), the ‘Earth Summit’, was held at Rio de Janeiro. The primary output was the Agenda 21 document which delineated a global programme of action for sustainable development into the twenty-first century (UNCED, 1992). It resulted in governments making commitments to adopt national strategies for sustainable development. These National Environmental Action Plans (NEAPs) were envisaged as a way to integrate environmental considerations into a nation’s overall economic and social development; to ‘… harmonize the various sectoral, economic, social and environmental policies and plans that are operating in the country’ (UNCED, 1992: Chapter 8, paragraph 8.7). The key to successful implementation was believed to be that each country would choose its own solutions to the problems that needed to be overcome in order to move successfully to a more sustainable path of development. There was an acknowledgment that ‘… strategies which have departed from the original model and express true national identity have tended to be the most successful’ (Carew-Reid et al., 1994: 42). The ability to be flexible was further emphasized by Dalal-Clayton & Bass (2002: 30) who stressed the need for ‘… a continuing participatory approach, with monitoring, learning and continuous improvement’.

The Millennium Development Goals, emanating from the Millenium Summit of 2000, emphasized the integration of sustainable development into country policies and the need to reverse the loss of environmental resources. Similarly, the 2002 World Summit for Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg urged, in its Plan of Implementation, that states should take immediate steps to progress with the elaboration of their national strategies for sustainable development and to begin their implementation by 2005. Despite this rhetoric, there have been few examples that demonstrate real improvements in sustainable outputs that arise from the plans. Middleton & O’Keefe (2003) set out the post-Rio situation clearly and they show how the dominant neo-liberal political climate has succeeded in diluting progress towards sustainability, a situation that still exists in the post-Johannesburg era.

In the period since the Earth Summit, a body of research has emerged which challenges many of the simple neo-Malthusian assumptions that lay behind early development strategies, whether they be multi- or single-sector. With reference to the quality of environmental data, Ives & Messerli (1989), Leach & Mearns (1996), Fairhead & Leach (1996) and Tiffen et al. (1994) have all illustrated the extent to which deeply entrenched received wisdoms invoke neo-Malthusian crisis narratives that emphasize the negative impact of indigenous groups on the environment in the developing world. These views are particularly prevalent amongst the institutions and individuals who have been at the forefront of developing sustainable development strategies. Common mistakes include: a misreading of recent environmental history; false assumptions or black-boxing of uncertainties; the failure to engage with local voices; the failure to use locally available archives, such as early records of travellers and photographic evidence; the misinterpretation of evidence such as air photographs; errors in data sets; extrapolating information from one scale to another inappropriately and dependence upon measurements that distort natural processes. The extent to which such views have influenced environmental policy-making in Africa has been discussed by Keely & Scoones (2003) and in the Himalaya region by Blaikie & Muldavin (2004). The institutionalization of supposedly objectively gathered scientific evidence on which policies are made is therefore shown to be heavily compromised. The whole process has been deeply politicized, itself a long-term legacy of European colonial impacts on their former colonies and spheres of influence. Because of a lack of political representation of the majority of the population in the colonies, it was relatively easy for colonial administrators to perpetuate many environmental ‘myths’. No effective opposition existed that could advocate for indigenous knowledge and environmental management practices.

Whilst many of the chapters in this book provide evidence that supports the need to engage proactively with indigenous groups, others are more circumspect, particularly in outlining the contradictions that exist between the goals of sustainability for the many within communities and the tendency for the few to retain power over key resources. Thus, unless questions of power are addressed, it would appear that the goal of attaining a more sustainable development path as measured, for example, by the reduction in poverty amongst the most marginalized, will be unsuccessful (Carney & Watts, 1990; Rocheleau et al., 1996). Centralized power tends to favour the status quo and this, in turn, represents a significant challenge for the role of education in sustainable development. In most cases, the education system is dependent upon state finances and it thereby follows the will of its paymasters.

A further challenge to those charged with plotting sustainable development strategies has been the reappraisal of fundamental concepts that underpin the established understanding of how natural systems function. Ecological sustainability is tied closely to the concepts of equilibrium and balance and there is little evidence that theories and empirical data which challenge these core ideas have been incorporated into sustainable development strategies. Non-equilibrium or ‘new ecology’ (Botkin, 1990) developed from a growing realization by some ecologists that empirical evidence failed to support equilibrium models of ecosystems (Schaffer, 1985; Holling, 1986). This led to questions regarding what was a ‘normal’ state for ecosystems (Sprugel, 1991). The new ecology replaced assumptions of equilibrium, predictability and permanence with instability, disequilibria, flexibility and dynamism (Sullivan, 1996; Sullivan & Rohde, 2002; Neumann, 2005). This necessitated a new metalanguage for ecologists, which was more accepting of change (Stott, 1998). There are serious implications for those whose job it is to attempt to maintain some ideal state of the environment. Many of the assumptions on which they base their management strategies are undermined by these new models and the task of achieving sustainable development of any given part of the biosphere is infinitely more difficult if there is uncertainty as to what that state should be. However, although Stott (1997) argues that the concept of equilibrium in nature should be abandoned, it has not been so entirely, even by those who initially drew attention to the problems of environmental equilibrium (Holling, 1986). Whittaker (2000) argues that a variety of states of nature prevail, from dynamic equilibrium to static non-equilibrium.

Aim of the book

This book examines the discontinuities that exist between national aspirations and local implementation of sustainable development strategies. It compares what is happening on the ground with formal national environmental action plans, sectoral plans or less formalized policies that are supposed to steer individual countries onto a more sustainable path. It examines whether local knowledge, aspirations and actions are undermining national aspirations or whether they are being ignored at the national level with detrimental consequences to sustainable development. A range of case studies provides opportunities to compare progress, or lack of progress, between different sectors, cultures, regions and resources within the developing world. The book attempts to situate the case studies within a global context, but it is concerned more with a national and sub-national scale of analysis than was the case for Middleton & O’Keefe (2003). The overall aim is to draw lessons from those cases which appear to be experiencing positive moves towards sustainability and then to see whether common frameworks exist which point to the possibility that good practice may be transferable from one milieu to another.

Structure of the book

Although the case studies are eclectic in terms of subject matter and location, three themes can be identified. Issues surrounding the measurement of sustainable development are considered in Chapters 2 to 5; the role of formal and informal education in sustainable development is considered in Chapters 6 to 8, whilst Chapters 9 to 14 deal with the significance of diverse voices in the practice of sustainable development.

Measuring sustainable development

Any debate concerning environmental response to human impact, whether it follows a more or less sustainable path, requires some ability to measure and understand past, present and future states of that environment. In Chapter 2, Elliot et al. consider such issues within the contested topic of land resettlement in Zimbabwe. The land reform and resettlement programme in this country has experienced a dramatic and controversial expansion in recent years, characterized by relatively haphazard and rapid invasion of former commercial farmlands. In contrast, the first twenty years of land resettlement in the country was based on the controlled movement of settlers according to a small number of planned resettlement models. From the outset of the programme in 1980, issues of sustainability were highlighted within both political and popular debate. In short, concern centred on the resource-plentiful conditions of the scheme areas and the possible replication of communal area conditions through the sub-division and transfer of large-scale commercial farms to small-scale indigenous farmers. These debates were revitalized in 2000 with the move to the so-called ‘fast track’ approach to land reform. Elliot et al. present data based on sequential air photo analysis covering five resettlement scheme areas in three agro-ecological zones over a period in excess of twenty years. Key patterns of land cover change are explored and the difficulties of assessing and/or asserting sustainability of resettlement are illustrated through an examination of the multi-directional and spatially complex patterns of woodland change. Additionally, the authors effect a critical analysis of some of the predominant ‘received narratives’ on environmental change (Leach & Mearns, 1996) within the small-scale farming sector. The chapter highlights how evaluation of the impact of resettlement has been impeded by a lack of good environmental baseline data and a lack of funds to enable continuous monitoring of resettled areas. Thus, government officials have to work in an environment where the data received are distorted by short or medium term variability in the physical and politico-regional environment, as well as being incomplete in temporal and spatial terms. The chapter also demonstrates how questions of sustainability, and of who defines it, are closely tied to politics.

In Chapter 3, Dougill and Reed examine how development of community-based rangeland sustainability indicators is an attempt to democratize the environmental debate in Botswana. The chapter provides a critical analysis of ‘bottom-up’ sustainability as envisaged by Agenda 21 and, more pertinently for this chapter, the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (UNCCD). The authors present a methodological framework being developed in collaboration with the Botswanan Ministry of Agriculture which focuses on participatory identification of rangeland degradation indicators for three contrasting physical and socioe-conomic environments in the Kalahari rangelands. Using a Sustainable Livelihoods Approach, the attempt is to identify how long-term rangeland degradation and short term events such as drought undermine livelihoods of pastoralists and to identify key natural indicators used by these groups which can be used to monitor the degree and direction of the quality of grazing. The methodology is therefore grounded in the belief that indigenous knowledge has a crucial role to play in understanding the dynamics that underpin the relationship between local management systems and the physical systems on which they depend. Dougill and Reed discuss the practical problems and opportunities that working at the local scale presents to researchers and national policy makers. Of crucial importance is the training of extension workers to be able to work in a participatory framework, requiring them to recognize that the transfer of knowledge is not one way, namely from top to bottom, but often requires a fundamental re-education of such workers to be able to recognize the merits of locally developed knowledge in the form of indicators. As such, emphasis in the chapter is placed on moving from the local to the regional and national, in a case study where the process is supported by global and national agreements and policy statements. The process of scaling up requires transparent aggregation of indicators that would provide a rapid summary of the state of the environment. These could become the basis of a more scientific analysis using a complementary range of technologies and methods.

In contrast to Dougill and Reed’s analysis of community-led indicators, Atkinson (Chapter 4) is concerned with an economic analysis of sustainability indicators that have been identified by outside experts. This chapter investigates how Peru and India might green their national accounts in order to reflect the sustainability of activities that (permanently) clear land of tropical forest. Typically, past studies have focused upon the value of timber lost when land is deforested. However, forested land provides a great many additional benefits and these must be taken into account in order to obtain a clearer picture of the sustainability of forest land clearance, acknowledging the full social costs and benefits of such changes. The examples illustrate the complexities involved in identifying and applying a financial cost to the loss of tropical forest. This is further complicated by the impact of population growth. The chapter raises the issues of the scale at which such accounts are best used, whether regional, national or global, and, perhaps of greater importance for those charged with managing such resources in a sustainable manner, the notion of critical thresholds (Ekins et al., 2003) below which forest resources may fail to deliver all their social benefits.

The final chapter which addresses the measurement of sustainability (Chapter 5) is concerned with an evaluation of South Africa’s 1998 National Water Act. Water is acknowledged as a scarce and development-limiting resource in South Africa and it follows that achieving sustainable development requires appropriate strategies for this resource. Over the last decade, South Africa has transformed its approach to water management, tabling far-reaching policies and legislation to international acclaim. It is consequently opportune to examine whether these initiatives are achieving their stated objectives. Quinn and Marriott adopt two seminal works by Gleick (1998) and Dowdeswell (1998) to construct an eight point framework by which to measure the legislators’ ambitious social and ecological targets that are set out in the Act. The significance of this example is that, following the installation of the first democratic government in 1994, there has been a marked shift from a centralized, exclusive system of water management to one that places social equity and environmental sustainability at the heart of the management of this key resource. In many respects, therefore, South Africa can be considered as a model of how to develop a sustainable water management system and it is one of the few countries in the world where the right to water is enshrined with the concept of ecosystem rights within legislation. Encouragingly, Quinn and Marriott’s conclusions are optimistic for the majority of the eight criteria measured, although they acknowledge that evaluating the long-term impact of such a change in the law is still problematic. They also caution about the slow pace of change in terms of, for example, implementing new catchment management plans which require much greater coordination and agreement between multiple actors, many of whom have had little, if any, experience of engaging with such institutions in the past. Implicit in this analysis is the problem of scaling up from local to regional and national scales such that decisions taken at one location do not impact negatively in other locations.

The role of education in sustainable development

Chapters 6, 7, and 8 are concerned with the role of education in the move to a more sustainable future. As the concept of sustainable development is rooted in the idea of inter-generational equity, it is unsurprising that the international community has emphasized the role of children in relation to achieving sustainability. Environmental education has been recognized as a critical means of bringing about the attitudinal and behavioural changes necessary to foster respect for nature, to reduce the environmental destruction and degradation threatening nature and to ensure the survival of humans who depend upon its resources. The first two chapters in this section deal with the formal school systems in Jamaica and Lesotho, whilst the last chapter considers the role of the agricultural extension system in Namibia.

In Chapter 6, Ferguson and Thomas-Hope raise the issue of formal environmental education in Jamaica to ask two main questions. The first is whether national constructions of sustainable development in Jamaica and the global construction of sustainable development are competing or complementing narratives as they are articulated in current environmental education curricula. The second, based on this, is whether environmental education for sustainable development is fulfilling its intended role and can thus be viewed as an agent of change or, if it is not, then how it should be viewed as a subject of change. They conclude that, to be an effective vehicle for sustainable development, environmental education in Jamaica needs to undergo a critical shift in order to move beyond its lingering role as a reproducer of hegemonic environmental values. Local and individual knowledges need to be acknowledged and pedagogic practices need to be changed such that students become active thinkers and not passive recipients of other people’s knowledge. This will align more closely with the aims of sustainable development.

In Chapter 7, Ansell examines efforts to incorporate education for sustainable development into the curriculum in Lesotho, beginning with the adoption of ‘development studies’ as a curriculum s...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Dedication
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of Figures
• List of Tables
• List of Boxes
• List of Contributors
• 1 Uniting National Aspirations and Local Implementation in Sustainable Development: An Introduction
• 2 Gathering Evidence: The Challenge of Assessing Sustainability after a Resettlement Programme in Zimbabwe
• 3 Frameworks for Community-based Rangeland Sustainability Assessment: Lessons from the Kalahari, Botswana
• 4 Sustainability Indicators and Forest Wealth in the Developing World
• 5 Sustainable Water Resource Management in South Africa: A Decade of Progress?
• 6 Environmental Education and Constructions of Sustainable Development in Jamaica
• 7 Children, Education and Sustainable Development in Lesotho
• 8 Gender Responsive Approaches to Sustainable Agricultural Extension: The Case of Namibia
• 9 Sustainable Food for Sustainable Tourism in the Caribbean: Integrated Pest Management and Changes in the Participation of Women
• 10 Factors Affecting the Sustainability of Cotton Production: Changing Rural Livelihoods in the North-West Region in Zimbabwe
• 11 How Compatible is Customary Tenure with the Aims of the Swaziland Environmental Action Plan?
• 12 Water Management for Agriculture in Tunisia: Towards Environmentally Sustainable Development
• 13 Managing Indonesia’s Marine Resources: the Role of Indigenous Communities
• 14 Environmental Policies for Modern Agriculture?
• 15 Uniting National Aspirations and Local Implementation in Sustainable Development: Lessons Learnt and Ways Forward
• Index