What is sustainability? Philip Sutton Director, Strategy, Green Innovations Philip.Sutton@green-innovations.asn.au http://www.green-innovations.asn.au/ 1 July 2004 Written for Eingana, the journal of the Victorian Association for Environmental Education. Introduction A search on the web reveals hundreds of definitions of sustainability and sustainable development1. And Tony Douglas of Essential Media Communications2 has found that the community at large finds the term sustainability confusing but they are very clear about what unsustainable means. How can we deal with the immense diversity of opinion and with the confusion that some people feel? Is there a correct definition of sustainability or sustainable development? The meanings of words gain their legitimacy from shared use so in the final analysis there is no ‘correct’ meaning3. But words also help shape our understandings so the key question needs to be not “what is the correct definition?” but “what do we want sustainability to mean?” The origin of the word sustain ‘Sustain’ has been in the language for thousands of years. It comes from the Latin sustenare meaning "to hold up" ie. to support. From there it evolved long ago to mean to keep something going or extend its duration, with an overtone of providing the support or necessities that made the extended duration possible eg. a sustaining meal. These days, for commonest non-specialised use of the word the closest synonym is ‘maintain’. Sustain and its derivatives (eg. sustainability, sustainable, sustaining) were first used in a micro or personal context. However several hundreds of years ago the Swiss and Germans invented a form of forestry designed to keep the forest going as productive systems over the very long term and this was called, in the English speaking world, sustainable forestry. This idea was then extended to sustainable fisheries. For example see Susan Murcott’s list – a web link is in the references. http://www.essentialmedia.com.au/ 3 Sometimes the meaning of words can evolve into almost their opposite. For example ‘terrific’ used to mean ‘to cause extreme terror’ now it most often means ‘extraordinarily good’. The linking meaning was probably ‘exciting’ eg. ‘the roller coaster ride was terrific”. 1 2 2 From there it was not such a big step for the term to be applied, during the 1960s and 70s, in the macro context of environmental issues where there was a need to sustain the whole environment and human society. This usage was established by the time of the 1972 UN Conference on the Human Environment held in Stockholm. The drifts in meaning Having reached a macro level of application sustainability was most often talked about in terms of ‘sustainable development’. The 1980 World Conservation Strategy produced by IUCN put forward the concept of ‘sustainable development’ meaning development that would allow ecosystem services and biodiversity to be sustained. The 1987 Brundtland Report shifted the meaning of sustainable development to mean “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. Then the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) in Rio set in train processes such as Agenda 21 and Local Agenda 21 that resulted in many people coming to the view that sustainability equals the integration or balancing of environmental, social and economic issues or simultaneous progress in the environmental, social and economic domains, often in the context of strong programs of consultation and participation. Many people however felt uneasy with the notion of ‘development’ as it is often associated with the destruction of environmental and social attributes that they value, so they felt better talking about ‘sustainability’ rather than ‘sustainable development’. So, over time ‘sustainability’ and ‘sustainable development’ came to be treated by many people as synonyms. This trend was reinforced because some people found the term sustainable development to be a bit of a mouthful and they used ‘sustainability’ as a convenient (if inaccurate) shorthand. As the scale of the task of achieving a sustainable environment and society has become apparent many people have tried to insulate themselves from the enormity of the challenge by retreating into small incremental changes. So some people have started to say that sustainability is a process of change and not an end state, and that it’s the journey that counts, not the destination. As the terms sustainability and sustainable development have been used more and more in government and corporate circles, because of increasing discussion of environment and development, the business world has started using the terms more and more for its own purposes. Curiously in this context ‘sustainable’ has quickly reverted to its earlier simple meaning of ‘able to be maintained’. So sustainable profits, or sustainable competitive advantage mean profits or competitive advantage that can be maintained for the longer term. A typology of definitions The huge diversity of definitions of sustainability, sustainable development and other related terms can be understood better if they are grouped using the following typology: 3 1. definitions based on the essence (‘x’ is/means ‘y’; eg. ‘sustainability’ is/means the ‘ability to sustain something’, ‘sustainable development’ is ‘development that can be maintained’, ‘sustaining4 development’ is ‘development that sustains something’) 2. definitions based on strategies for achieving the thing being defined (the achievement of ‘x’ requires eg. ‘y’; the achievement of sustainability requires, for example, the integration of environmental, social and economic issues) 3. definitions based on the outcomes of the thing being defined (‘x’ results in ‘y’; eg. sustainable development results in the meeting of needs of the present generation without compromising the needs of future generations) 4. definitions based on what a movement with that label tries to achieve (‘X’ is what the ‘X’ movement strives for, ie. ‘X’ encompasses ‘y’; eg. sustainability is what the Sustainability movement strives for ie. Sustainability encompasses the protection of the environment and people, peace, and end to poverty, the meeting of human needs, enhancement of human wellbeing, promotion of happiness, etc., etc. etc.) Furthermore any of these types of definitions can be framed in a more general or a narrower context eg. applied to whole systems eg. society and the environment or just to specific contexts eg. ‘the environment’ or a particular species, or to specific human communities or a particular economy. If a type 2, 3 or 4 definition is written so that it sounds like a type 1 definition, that is, ‘x’ is/means ‘y’, then it will be very misleading. Unfortunately a great many definitions of sustainability or sustainable development violate this principle, for example, the famous Brundtland definition of sustainable development. The Brundtland definition is a type 3 definition. How the Brundtland definition is most often paraphrased: “Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” How it was actually written in the 1987 Brundtland report: “Humanity has the ability to make development sustainable - to ensure that it meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”. (definition quoted from p.8 of the Report) How the Brundtland definition could be more accurately paraphrased: “Sustainable development is development that results in the needs of the present being met without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” What do we want sustainability and sustainable development to mean? It’s now time to return to the question asked at the start of this article: “what do we want sustainability to mean? And what do we want all the other words derived from ‘sustain’ to mean? It would be desirable for preferred definitions: 4 Where sustaining is used as an adjective (not as a verb). 4 to build on and not confuse the core meanings of ‘sustain’ and its derived words as they exist in the common language provide the clearest and most solid basis for effective action. As Tony Douglas has found, people know very clearly when they see cases of unsustainability. Unsustainability can be identified when people see something being eroded or faced with the risk of being wiped out or made extinct. People recognise these situations whether they apply to people, their society, the economy or nature. But for some reason people at the moment tend to find the definition of sustainability confusing. This could be for several reasons: because people tend to jump to type 2 definitions (ie. defining a concept in terms of the strategies needed to bring it about) and they are not sure in practical terms what needs to be done to achieve sustainability because the commonly used definitions of sustainability are confusing: for example, type 2-4 definitions are very often disguised as type 1 definitions – so the essence of the concept is obscured because people have heard of more than one definition and they do not understand why there is so much diversity and they find it hard to choose the best definitions because some people try to make one term or family of terms mean everything: if people create a movement to try to achieve an all-round better society and world and they label that movement the Sustainability movement then they will tend to try to define sustainability as everything that is good and desirable, thus obscuring the core meaning of the word. In common usage there is no doubt that ‘sustain’ and its derivative words are based on the core meaning of ‘maintain’ or ‘extend in duration’. And it turns out that this meaning is critical for effective action. If something (an actual tangible thing, or an attribute of a tangible thing, or an understood and not outlandish potential5) is threatened with erosion or extinguishment then this threat to its sustainability needs to be kept in the centre of our mind, otherwise we may fail to craft actions that are equal to the problem in terms of the scale and urgency of action. This is even true when problems are to be solved through proactive efforts to create a long-term systems-based positive future6. So what would be useful type 1 definitions? The following are simple and powerful definitions: 5 The elimination of poverty is very often associated with sustainability programs. This is despite the fact that poverty has been associated with societies for thousands of years and there is little evidence that the presence of poverty is automatically and universally associated with the erosion of society or the environment. However what is clear is that poverty erodes the clearly evident human potential of every single person caught in its grip. So with poverty there is an issue of the sustainability of personal or community potential. 6 It is preferable to try to eliminate problems as a by-product of an effort to create a comprehensive, systems-based long-term positive future because in the absence of a positive program the problem solving effort can degenerate into a series of isolated and ultimately futile attempts to eliminate negative symptoms. 5 ‘sustain’ means ‘to maintain through time’7 ‘sustainability’ (noun) means ‘the ability or capability to maintain or sustain something’ ‘sustainability’ (adjective) means ‘having to do with maintenance or sustainability’ ‘sustainable’ means ‘durable or able to be maintained or sustained’ ‘sustaining’ (adjective) means ‘having the propensity to maintain or sustain’ ‘sustainment’8 means ‘the act of maintaining or sustaining something So, a ‘sustaining economy’ would be one that tends to sustain something of value. A ‘sustainable firm’ would be a company that was able to last for a long time. A ‘sustainability policy’ would be a policy that deals with sustainability issues whereas a ‘sustainable policy’ would be one that was able to persist through time. With these definitions, how do we know what is being sustained? We must look to the context of what is being talked about to find out. If the context does not provide a clear meaning then we must be alert to the fact that we don’t actually know what is being sustained and we must actively seek clarification. If we ourselves want to communicate clearly we should provide context to our language and make it clear whether we are talking about, say, ecological sustainability or social sustainability or economic sustainability or whether we are talking about holistic or triple bottom line sustainability (eg. covering the environmental, social and economic domains.) These days an interest in sustainability is highly acceptable, so many actions or programs are labelled as sustainability initiatives. But if the proponents of the action or program cannot tell you what it is that they are attempting to sustain then the chances are that the action or program is in fact not about sustainability at all or at the very least is poorly framed to achieve the implicit sustainability goals! If you want to frame effective sustainability actions then the very first questions to ask are: what am I trying to sustain or what do I want society to sustain? for whose9 benefit is sustainability being pursued? what is the appropriate scale and urgency of action? Sustainable development It is extremely unhelpful to understanding if people use the terms ‘sustainability’ and ‘sustainable development’ interchangeably ie. as synonyms. Sustainability is about continuity and development is about change. Combining these produces, not necessarily an oxymoron, but a change process where some things are transformed while other things or attributes are maintained. Since there are many things about life 7 Where the thing to be maintained can be recreated if it is lost then the process of sustaining includes restoration of the thing. Even where the thing itself cannot be recreated, the process of sustaining includes the restoration of conditions that will favour the survival or continuity of the thing to be sustained. 8 There is such a word! 9 It could be for the benefit of people or other species of life or both. 6 that we want to change (exploitation, unhappiness, poverty, destructiveness, etc.) and there are many things we want to sustain, where they exist or can be recreated (the rest of nature, trust, tolerance, honesty, happiness, health, etc.) then the notion of sustainable development can be very valuable. Where people feel uncomfortable using the ‘D’ word (development) sustainable development can be defined so as to make it clearer what we mean by development by using the notion of genuine progress: ie. ‘sustainable development’ means ‘genuine progress that can be sustained because the underpinnings of the environment, society and the economy are maintained’. A more proactive form of this concept would be ‘sustaining development’ which would mean ‘a change process that delivers both genuine progress and the maintenance or sustainment of …. (whatever the society wants to sustain)’ The Race to Sustainability The definitions recommend above are very simple. But when we try to work out what needs to be done to sustain the environment and our communities globally the necessary action program inevitably becomes very complex indeed. So what should we make of the journey and destination concept? Which is more important? If we are concerned with sustainability because there are things in the environment or our society or the economy that are likely to be seriously eroded or that might cease to exist altogether, and if we depend on these things or we care about them for some reason10 then there is no doubt that the ‘destination’ matters critically. If we don’t get to the destination (ie. a condition of sustainability) then the things that we want to sustain are eroded or cease to exist. The ‘journey’ (the process of achieving sustainability) is of course vitally important. But only as a means of getting to the destination (the desired future state). In the race to sustainability, we fail in our primary purpose if we don’t get to the finishing line11. The ‘destination’ of sustainability is not a fixed place in the normal sense that we understand destination. Instead it is a set of characteristics of a future system. A useful clarifying analogy is to compare the achievement of sustainability with the achievement of personal health. Our lives or our quality of life are at risk is we fail to achieve the destination of health. But getting to the destination of health doesn’t mean that our lives become static. The number of ways that a person can live their life while being healthy is enormous and the options can change over time too. So too with sustainability. Achieving the ‘destination’ is the purpose of the journey but when we get there society and the environment will not be static. 10 Eg. our ethics or feelings lead us to care about them eg. other living things or our feelings make them important to us eg. natural beauty or aspects of our cultural heritage etc. 11 Green Innovations, the Sustainable Living Foundation, the Australia New Zealand Society for Ecological Economics and a number of other organisations are developing a formal program called the Race to Sustainability. The aim of the program is to turn the metaphor of the race into a literal race to achieve sustainability. See: http://www.green-innovations.asn.au/Race-to-Sustainability.htm 7 Conclusion Over the last two decades the meanings of sustainability and sustainable development have morphed in ways that are not helpful for clear understanding or effective action. Distinct concepts have been blurred ( sustainability and sustainable development are now often treated as synonyms) and often there has been a reversal of means for ends (eg. the means for achieving sustainability are substituted for the ends ie. many people say that sustainability means ‘the balancing12 or integration of environmental, social and economic issues’, rather than ‘the ability to maintain or sustain something of value’). It is time we reviewed our sustainability language and re-established simpler, more powerful meanings that tap into our common language and that empower us to take effective action to actually achieve the sustainability of the things we depend on and the things we love. References: Susan Murcott’s list of definitions of sustainable development http://www.sustainableliving.org/appen-a.htm Other papers on sustainability by Philip Sutton: Sustainability: getting orientated http://www.green-innovations.asn.au/sustainability-getting-orientated.htm Sustainability: Woolly, feel-good & unachievable? Or a vital goal for practical action? http://www.green-innovations.asn.au/sustainability-unachievable-or-practical.htm Sustainability: What does it mean? http://www.green-innovations.asn.au/sustblty.htm Ecological sustainability http://www.green-innovations.asn.au/ecolsust.htm 12 This definition might even lead to the trading off of one factor against another so that something that people ideally would like to see maintained is in fact not sustained at all. The achievement of sustainability (and genuine progress) depends on the application of a no major trade-offs approach.