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LECTURE GEOG 270 Fall 2007 December 5, 2007 Joe Hannah, PhD Department of Geography

LECTURE GEOG 270 Fall 2007 December 5, 2007 Joe Hannah, PhD Department of Geography University of Washington. Development and Environmental Change. Development, Sustainability, and our Personal Response. Today: Course wrap-up. Development, Sustainability, and Sustainable Development

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LECTURE GEOG 270 Fall 2007 December 5, 2007 Joe Hannah, PhD Department of Geography

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  1. LECTURE GEOG 270 Fall 2007 December 5, 2007 Joe Hannah, PhD Department of Geography University of Washington

  2. Development and Environmental Change Development, Sustainability, and our Personal Response

  3. Today: Course wrap-up • Development, Sustainability, and Sustainable Development • Our Personal Response

  4. I. Development, Sustainability, and Sustainable Development

  5. “What is Development” Revisited • The Third World is hard to define in a manner that all can agree upon. • Development is also difficult, if not impossible, to define satisfactorily • But we know it has to do with change, with improving people’s lives.

  6. “Environmentalism” Discourse Metaphors for survival

  7. Sustainability: an “Integrative Term” • The term “sustainability” it has become useful precisely because it promotes both • growth/prosperity/poverty reductionAND • reduced impacts on the environment i.e., it integrates the two discourses of Development and Environment

  8. But is sustainability really an Integrative Paradigm? Adams: “The one language of sustainability has hidden the separation of two cultures [of thought and priorities] ... “Environmentalists and social scientists speak different languages.” The definition of sustainability is also contested.

  9. Political Contestation • Third World, Development, Sustainability: difficult, if not impossible, to define. Dryzek: “Does this variety of meanings mean that we should dismiss sustainable development as an empty vessel that can be filled with whatever one likes? Not at all. For it is not unusual for important concepts to be contested politically.”

  10. Applying Theory • “…a system of assumptions, accepted principles, and rules of procedure devised to analyze, predict or otherwise explain the nature or behavior of a specified set of phenomena.” ( American Heritage Dictionary) • A foundation upon which we base our beliefs and actions

  11. Theory (Continued) • Even when we do not recognize or acknowledge it, we are acting (speaking, writing, mapping) under some form of theory. Therefore we need to be aware of theory as it underpins and constructs the meanings of these terms for various actors and subjects of development

  12. Examples of theories • Modernization • Cornucopian Theory

  13. II. Our Personal Response A Challenge

  14. This class has been aboutproblems and debates • Population and consumption • Global warming • GMO agriculture Where you stand and how you perceive these problems and debates says much about your own personal values and world view – the theoretical bases from which you think and act.

  15. Power of a Personal Response • It starts with your values, your approaches to life and to the world. • What will you do with your life? Will the world be a better place for your having been here? • What is your sense of the interconnectedness of things in the world? • Where does your responsibility lie?

  16. 1. Individual response • Sustainability, starts with each of us transforming our own lives and our own way of thinking • All other change – community, national, or global -- is predicated on our personal transformation • e.g., changing consumption YES!! Riding your bicycle is a political act!

  17. 2. Community/Group Response • Individual responses are necessary but not sufficient… (e.g., Maniates’ “individuization”) • Examples in the Third World • Promoting efficient cook stoves • Clean water projects • Organic farming methods (e.g., Shiva) • Examples of things we can do?

  18. 3. Governmental Responses • Global problems require large-scale interventions as well as individual responses • We have to hold our gov’t’s feet to the fire

  19. e.g., governmental responses • Examples: • Increased gas mileage regulations • Mass transit • Iceland’s geothermal plants – New England, too! • Bali Conference on Global Warming – could this be an example of successful public pressure?

  20. There is much to be done… A balance-sheet of development and human well-being shows achievements and deficits. Power and poverty are polarized at the extremes, with a global overclass and a global underclass… …opportunities exist to make a difference for the better. The challenge is personal, professional and institutional, to frame a practical paradigm for knowing and acting, and changing how we know and act, in a flux of uncertainty and change. Chambers, Whose Reality Counts?, p.1.

  21. The Challenge:What will you do next? (I mean, after finals.)

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