Agenda, Journal of the Institute of Welsh Affairs, in press
PARADOXES OF SUSTAINABILITY
Peter Harper
The progress of a nation is often measured by its GDP, and on this basis Wales seems to be doing all right. Most
of the content of Agenda is dedicated directly or indirectly to raising GDP, on the assumption that it must be a
good thing. It was fascinating then to read in the last issue Peter Midmore's application to Wales of another
composite indicator, the Index of Sustainable Economic Welfare or ISEW. In common with other OECD
countries, the ISEW values for Wales have been steadily declining since the 1970s. So if the ISEW is a measure
of sustainability, the one thing GDP growth is not delivering is sustainability.
How odd. But sustainability is full of such paradoxes, and until we sort them out we will never achieve the
consistent policies regarding sustainability to which we are supposed to be committed. It could of course be
argued that the concept of 'sustainability' is useful precisely because it is so vague, glueing together a wide range
of otherwise conflicting interests. It works as a rallying cry so long as people don't ask too many awkward
questions. But this approach is itself unsustainable. Sooner or later when we have to translate the rhetoric into
real policies the inconsistencies will come home to roost.
It seems to me that we have to unpack the concept, evaluate the n different dimensions, and decide whether they
can in fact be re-assembled in a logically coherent way. If they cannot (and I suspect this will turn out to be the
case) the contents will have to repackaged in smaller parcels, with better labels, so at least we'll be calling a
spade a spade. One of the best ways to reveal inconsistencies is to look at points of conflict and try to work out
why they arise. An example might be a dispute between the development of a high-tech business park and
wildlife campaigners. Another would be a battle between a wind-farm developer and a National Park authority.
All are swearing by 'sustainability' but drawing on different values, assumptions and models of the world and
having diametrically opposed policies.
Let me give some examples of different models of sustainability -- or at least some aspects of it -- and how
different policies might flow from them. These models will be symbolised by simple graphs to make the
argument more explicit, but the graphs should not be interpreted too literally.
On the grandest scale, one of the most important assumptions we make about sustainability is the relationship
between economic growth and environmental impact. You might think this is susceptible to measurement and
that by now we should know the answers. But the issue is still unresolved. At the extremes we have two
radically different models. The first assumes that growth and environment are, or can be, entirely decoupled, and
that economic growth can continue indefinitely without affecting environmental impact. This notion is
symbolised by Figure 1, where as far as economic growth is concerned, the sky's the limit, generating plenty of
resources for mitigating environmental impact. This is a model of economic sustainability which also claims to
deliver environmental sustainability. We could say it is the mainstream view, since outside radical green circles
there is no discussion of the possibility of non-growing economies, or even ones whose growth rate is
deliberately controlled: we all know the game is simply to grow as fast as you can.
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Figure 1: Default Establishment View
Test your own reaction to this notion of limitless growth. Do you feel good about it? Do you simply accept it as
almost a law of nature? Do you have vague misgivings but are basically confident that if there are problems
'something with turn up'? Do you feel perhaps that it must slow down sooner or later but (please Lord) not yet?
Do you have a thinly-veiled contempt for this kind of abstract issue, really of concern only to academics? Any
of these underlying views and attitudes might bring you into conflict with other conceptions of sustainability,
notably the….
…classical green view, typified and made famous by the influential Limits to Growth study in 1972. This view
supposes that economic growth and environmental impact cannot be decoupled to more than a limited extent.
The nightmare vision, represented by Figure 2, is that heedless economic growth will trigger environmental
catastrophes that cause whole economies to collapse, leading to a state of chaotic instability and irreversible
changes. This is the implicit model that lies at the back of many of the minds most actively involved in the
sustainability debates. It is as well to know this.
Figure 2: Deep Greens' Nightmare
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What policy implications follow from this model? In its most extreme form it is to freeze economic growth, as
symbolised by Figure 3, which assumes progressive but modest ‘decoupling’. The difficulty with this, usually
unacknowledged by its protagonists, is that if all national economies do miraculously freeze in place now, they
do so with enormous disparities of wealth and welfare. We then run into equity questions which cannot be
avoided in any sustainability debate that adopts a global perspective. On what basis are the earth's resources
shared? By lottery? By right of customary standards? By markets? By per nation shares? By per capita shares?
Across generations? How many generations? These are all possible standards, but how should we choose among
them? The politically correct view (adopted, interestingly enough, by the recent report of the Royal Commission
on Environmental Pollution) is equal per capita entitlement of the present world population to any truly global
resource. On this principle, a world freeze on economic growth would entail substantial and deliberate
contraction of the UK economy to perhaps one quarter its present size. In any ordinary policymaking context this
is unthinkable, but some deep green theorists are unfazed by the implication. They might point out for example
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that the ISEW score for Wales was much higher in the seventies when the economy was half its present size:
apparently we were poorer but happier. What would you say in reply?
Figure 3: Zero Growth View
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The oddity here is that if, in some areas, the logic of sustainability appears to run counter to prevailing
aspirations and what we might call 'the modern project', it is not really possible to espouse that logic without
appearing eccentric or ideologically naïve. It is, frankly, embarrassing. One unfortunate effect of the sheer
strangeness of sustainability is to shift it into a kind of limbo where it has only a hypothetical force. We might
pay lip service to it but when the chips are down it will be brutally tossed aside.
Notice in the foregoing example how shifting the scale from the regional/national to the global, changes the
calculus and the appropriate local policies. Is equity part of the sustainability package? Who is the population
under consideration? Should we just try to do what seems right for us, or make policy by trying the second-guess
the future of the rest of the planet? What would Wales have to say about that? All such questions have to be
painstakingly sifted to achieve a consistent working definition of sustainability.
Maintaining for a moment the global perspective, let us look at a fourth view which recognises that changes in
present trends cannot happen overnight. Figure 4 suggests a default scenario of what might happen in the 21 st
century if historic patterns in the development of national economies continue to apply. Like the other figures it
is symbolic rather than quantitative. This model makes a clear distinction between the relatively developed
'North' (OECD + former Soviet Union + top tigers) and the erratically-developed 'South', simply because the
dynamics of their respective demographies, economies and environmental impacts are so radically different.
Basically the model postulates continued economic growth, but slower in the North and faster in the South, so
that there is rough convergence by the end of the century, an important goal of UN policy and other development
agencies. (If you think this convergence is an unlikely assumption, ask yourself whether you assume the roughly
7:1 disparity in wealth between the North and South is itself sustainable in the long term: hardly). There is one
other standard assumption here, that the environmental impact of the collective North will steadily decline, in
line with (for example) the Montreal Protocol, the various Kyoto commitments and stated UK policy on carbon
emissions. This reflects the mainstream 'decoupling' view rather than the pessimistic green view.
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Figure 4: Managed Transition Model
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North Economic rowth
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The most striking feature of this model is the dramatic pulse of environmental impact in the South. This is not a
wild apocalyptic speculation. It is simply a mathematical consequence of rapid economic growth, doubling
population and the energy-and-materials-intensive infrastructure-building phase of early modernisation -combined with the historically robust fact that in early-modern societies environmental factors are given a low
priority. After this all-but-inevitable peak, we can reasonably expect that the normal post-modern processes of
dematerialisation, plus active environmental policies, will bring an eventual convergence. For many societies it
might take longer but since modernisation-cycles historically seem to take roughly 100 years, this seems a
plausible 'photofit' construction.
This is one model among many (although it strikes me as the default scenario - the best combination of what we
want and what is likely). What influence could it have on Welsh sustainability policy?: If something of the kind
does emerge ( and we shall know by about 2020) it will mean that the contribution of small countries in the
North to global environmental impact is so small that even if we reduced our impacts to zero it would make little
difference because the action is all in the South. One policy implication might be to ignore global sustainability
problems and concentrate on regional ones. Another, quite different, might be to think of our activities as a kind
of demonstration -- showing the South how to 'leapfrog' traditional development patterns, vaulting rapidly into
postmodernity. To maximise our effect on global sustainability it might be rational to institute a vast programme
of extension/missionary/consultancy activity to directly help Southern countries with resource-efficient systems,
rather than invest in our own. Or equally, to host visiting policymakers and entrepreneurs on a grand scale. In
this case, the way Wales chooses to express its sustainability might be determined not by intrinsic improvements
(because they would count for little) but by dramatic demonstrations that could communicate with and change
the policies of 3 billion Asians. Odd again.
We have been talking about 'environmental impact' as if it is indeed something that can be measured. Can it? No
-- like sustainability itself it has to unpacked to reveal another assorted collection of orthogonal assumptions. The
energy debates bring this out clearly. Proposals for re-installing modern hydro sets on the sites of abandoned prewar installations are often opposed by the Environment Agency on wildlife grounds. Biomass schemes fall foul
of those who object to extra traffic Protesters against wind farms feel passionately about the impact on the
landscape, while proponents feel equally passionate about the need for renewable energy to mitigate climate
change. Opponents of nuclear power do so on grounds of human health, while promoters argue that nuclear has
the smallest physical presence, is carbon-free and has only minor effects on eco-systems. All are waving the
green flag, but who are the real environmentalists, and which should a sustainable Wales back?
A systematic consideration of these conflicts shows at least three quite distinct value systems which have no
logical connection, connected respectively with amenity and human culture; with health risks; and with
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wildlife and natural ecosystems. Climate change is a fourth category which might (or might not) affect the
other categories in unpredictable ways. Yet they are all lumped into the catch-all bin called 'environment' . To
make things worse,. since environment is lumped with other concepts into the catch-all bin called sustainability,
we have a recipe for endless confusion, misunderstandings and inconclusive debates. Which of course is what is
happening.
We need great improvements in semantic hygiene to discuss sustainability coherently. In referring to a
generalised 'environmental impact' in the Figures (albeit for rhetorical purposes) I was myself remiss. More
correctly we should specify a measurable proxy such as energy which tends to correlate with other
environmental impacts, or some kind of 'basket' of disparate components with explicit weightings. The ISEW,
mentioned previously, is just such a basket, with both environmental and other components. Assumptions have
to be made explicit or they cannot be criticised.
One useful tool, developed originally in the Netherlands, is the concept of 'environmental space'. This can be
used in various sectors to compare the measurable demand with some measurable limit in order to derive an
estimate of the sustainable level of use. For example fish catches and fish stocks, timber consumption and forest
resources, and most famously, greenhouse gases and the capacity of the atmosphere/ocean system to absorb
them. From these we can derive guidelines and targets for policy. For example the recent report f the Royal
Commission on Environmental Pollution has recommended a 60% cut in UK carbon emissions by 2025, and
80% by 2050. Wales could well adopt such targets and aim to exceed them.
Another tool, which attempts to conflate environmental impacts to a single number, is that of 'footprinting'. The
principle here is that human populations require a physical land area, either directly for buildings, roads,
recreation etc, or indirectly for food production, minerals extraction, the absorption of anthropogenic carbon etc.
These can all be added up to represent the area of land required to support the activities of a given population,
which in the case of say, a city, is far larger than its physical area. But it can be applied on any scale. The
exercise has recently been done for Oxfordshire, showing that its physical area is smaller than its environmental
'footprint'. The implication is fairly clear: that unless some other population has surplus land to provide for
Oxfordshire's shortfall, the county is living beyond its environmental means and is in this respect, unsustainable.
It would be interesting to try the same exercise for Wales, and I understand Professor Midmore is working on the
matter. The population density of Wales is low enough that we might have some capacity to spare. We need
some surplus to get Oxfordshire out of its hole, not to mention London. But is it ours to bestow? What would
Wales feel about that?
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