Reading Materials: 

4.1 The Relationship between Human Society and the Environment

There is an intellectual and pragmatic change going in many areas of the world that seeks a connected and basic ecological approach to human development, recognizing the importance of a transdisciplinary approach to understanding and acting in the environment.

Following the 1992 Rio Summit, sustainable development was frequently graphically represented as three interlocking circles representing the economy, society, and the environment, and, despite much critical debate about economic growth, environmental limits, and eco-efficiency, the language of economics continues to influence much of the sustainability debate.

There is now frequent reference to various ‘capitals’ – natural capital, economic capital,financial capital, human capital, cultural capital, symbolic capital and social capital.For many, the environment (natural capital) means the natural world of forests, fields, animals, rivers, atmosphere, wilderness, and so on. This relatively uncomplicated understanding leads to quite serious implications for individuals, social organizations and local-to-global political arrangements.

The first thing to recognize is that the natural world has been shaped for literally thousands of years by the knowledge, capabilities and skills of human beings (human capital). Our fields and woodlands are the result of agricultural transformations. Many of the world’s deserts have been produced as a consequence of human activity. Our air quality is often the result of changing modes and sites of industrial production, old and new technology (economic capital), and investment flows and processes (fifinancial capital).

Even the non-human animal world has physically changed shape as a result of selective breeding techniques and, more recently, genetic modification — activities pioneered by humans fully changing their intellectual resources.Towns, cities, and super cities are clearly human constructions, as is the quality of life inside them, which is increased or diminished by networks of trust, as well as governmental arrangements (social capital).The look of the surrounding countryside is largely the product of our interactive social relationships with each other and the ‘natural’ world.    

Consequently, what many sustainability practitioners argue is that as citizens we must start taking responsibility for our actions as they impact on the wider environment, which will moderate our behaviour and changing our ideas accordingly.

4.2 Human Social Behavior Affecting the Environment

1. Human behaviour has had frequently bad, effects on our natural capital and the ecosystem services upon which our economies and lives depend:

(1) We are using up many resources which cannot be replaced, and destroying renewable ones, upon which our economy, our standard of living and our quality of life depend.

(2) Many production processes create waste, much of it toxic, causing serious pollution of rivers, land and the air we breathe. Increased CO2 (carbon dioxide ) in the atmosphere, the consequence of burning fossil fuels is a cause of global warming (the greenhouse effect), leading to unpredictable weather patterns, sea- level rises, floods, heatwaves, freezes, and so on.

(3) Modern methods of industrial production and technological innovation have given rise to a new range of risks, which affect people in their everyday lives, but which cannot be fully known, understood or even anticipated. Thanks to the depletion of the ozone layer, sunbathing is now recognized as a direct cause of skin cancer. New “more efficient” farming techniques have led to animal diseases that have jumped the species barrier and bring fears over food security.

(4) Species extinction and habitat destruction have relentlessly increased as economic development has meant more roads, more towns and more material consumption.

(5) Genetic modification of plants, animals and indeed of human beings exposes us to potential future harms (and benefits) which we have little understanding of and perhaps even less control over.

Nowadays, more and more people reflect the consequences of environmental degradation and begin to understand the significance of sustainable development at the level of realistic social organization. This understanding contributes to a better climate of understanding on environment and to government initiatives to advance sustainable development.

4.3  Connecting Social with Environmental Justice

Clean and healthy environment is essential for human health and well-being. It is only just and is as such a human right. The ecologist Garrett Hardin has ever said : “Ruin is the destination toward which all men rush, each pursuing his own best .Freedom is the recognition of necessity, complexity, rights and responsibilities.”

It is also the key to understanding the importance of social capital in the sustainable development process:it is in the long-term interest of everyone to cooperate and work to care for ‘the commons’ and to share its benefits.”

Extending this insight in his discussion of the sustainability framework, The Natural Step, David Cook reflects on the direct connections between the social and the ecological, and the various consequences that may ensue: On the one hand, social sustainability’s dependence on wider ecological sustainability is becoming more evident.

As we continue to undermine nature’s capacity to provide humans with services (such as clean water and air) and resources (such as food and raw materials), both individuals and the social relations between them will be subjected to growing amounts of pressure.

Conflict will grow and public health, personal safety and other negative social factors will increase in the face of ecological threats and decreased access to nature’s services and resources.

On the other hand, overall ecological sustainability has become dependent on social sustainability.If a growing number of people are living within a social system that systematically constrains their capacity to meet their needs, then participation and investment in that system will break down. The end result of such socially unsustainable development is rising violence, and anger.

People will place no trust at all in nature once social trust collapses and various modes of barbarism develop. Conflict, poverty and other forms of social stress will result in more environmental degradation.

Social capital is a term we can use to denote those relationships by which groups and individuals communicate, network, build trust, enter into dialogue, resolve conflicts, identify and solve problems, and realize collective and individual potential as agents of sustainable development.

Just as we talk about ecological carrying capacity, perhaps there is a need to speak about and nurture our ‘social caring capacity’. Social networking is part of this and is a key element in effective sustainable community development.

Although a sense of place remain important in fostering community identity and belonging, social networks extend well beyond one specific geographical location.The formation of communities based on interest is a means of collectively powerless groups, particularly those associated with gender, disability, ethnicity, age and sexual orientation.

Additionally, people who experience relatively high degrees of social interaction with others often exhibit higher degrees of contentment than those who do not. The essence of community, then, is to be found in the nature and qualities of relationships as much as the qualities of a particular place.

Communities, networking has become a core competence, not least because one of the most important functions of networks is their capacity to share ideas and values, and develop trusting  relationships  and  methods  of  cooperation.

Networks also frequently serve to have reflection and critical social dialogues, the sharing and accumulation of collective knowledge and understanding, and social and community learning, creating ways in which common ideas and purposes can be recognized and expressed. And because cultural diversity frequently challenges prejudice, community cohesion often emerges through complex social articulations that celebrate ethnic and other difference.

For diversity to be celebrated, there need to be trusted public and/or private spaces (and places) that create accommodative environments. Such spaces can be created or customized by community members themselves through project activity, community artwork, social events and gatherings.

4.4 The Role of New Digital Media on Environmental Justice

The practice of community participation, democratic engagement, social communication and social relationships will undoubtedly be affected by the great changes in information and communication technology, which are changing the nature of civic networks, education, urban management, leisure, politics, the labour process and social inclusivity.

Nowadays, community and social capital are not limited to the actual space and place, but turn to virtual communities.And good existing levels of social capital in a real-world community tend to positively mediate the impact of Internet access on individual volunteering and collective community action.

Digital technologies clearly enhance users’ capacity to organize and control their lives, providing additional opportunities for professional contact, security, emotional bonding through informal chat, gathering information and entertainment.

It may stimulate more connectivity between people who already know each other and may stimulate new connections between people who have something in common.Furthermore, people who lack the skills to use the new technologies or simply cannot afford to own or access them, may remain excluded, as will those whose interests and values simply do not fit.A sustainable community cannot be built if this occurs, since sustainability requires a learning culture, mutual respect and trust.

New emerging media technologies affect possibilities for community development, lifelong learning, social capital, civic engagement, political activism and support for localized actions.New digital technologies were quickly and readily incorporated into everyday life, because the computer’s capacity to facilitate data management, writing and, most significantly, email communication served to ‘lock in’ a person’s position and commitment to the green movement networks.

New media technologies enabled these green activists to connect easily on green issues such as the more sustainable use, reuse and recycling of what is actually a fairly environmentally unfriendly computer technology itself, through a computer ‘swap shop’.

New media and communication technology has an important role to play in breaching barriers that have previously maintained and reinforced social disconnection.

The technology lends itself to implementing environmental monitoring, supporting environmental justice campaigning, and enhancing communication and networking opportunities among civil society groups, and offers possibilities for discovering and engaging with local–global issues.

New media technologies may not be in themselves sustainable, but they can be made to work towards that goal. The technologies undoubtedly can cut both ways.

4.5 Environmental Justice and Sustainable Development

Environmental justice is based on the principle that all people have a right to be protected from environmental pollution and enjoy a clean and healthy environment.

Environmental justice is the equal protection and meaningful involvement of all people with respect to the development, implementation and enforcement of environmental laws, regulations , policies and the distribution of environmental benefits.

As the American environmental movement emerged in the 1970s, it was soon evident that few people of colour had participated in the various campaigns and actions of that period.It was also noted that, as some polluted areas were cleaned up, little action was taken to ensure that the neighborhoods of ethnic minorities were improved.

In response to this, the environmental justice movement emerged in the 1980s, comprising Latinos, Native Americans, Asians and African Americans.

This changed the social and political complexion of the environmental movement, shifting its center away from the primary white middle-class concerns of wildlife, wilderness and the ecologies of the ‘natural world’.

‘Justice’ became the defining principle for this new movement, which addressed linked issues of class, ethnicity, race, gender, socioeconomic inequality, and the discrimination clearly evident in the distribution of environmental impacts and their costs.

Environmental justice campaigners are concerned with distributive actions, taking a system-wide view.Such an approach has helped rearticulate the meaning of the term ‘environmental’, with homelessness, poverty, bad working conditions, health and safety at work and in the surrounding communities, gender inequality, and so on being significant elements of the expanded ‘environmental’ worldview, bringing it closer to the notion of sustainability.

Women of colour have played an important role in the development of the environmental justice movement, helping to open up many environmental debates and dialogues, if not always in practice moving much.

The energetic and increasingly well-documented political struggles against pollution and dumping have required, maybe forced, an inclusivity consciousness that has so often eluded many environmentalist philosophies and worldviews in the past.

The struggles of indigenous peoples over their ancient land rights, urban minorities fighting against prejudice and discrimination, and victims of natural disasters perceiving racism as a factor behind the slowness of government relief have all contributed to this development.

Therefore, sustainability cannot be simply a ‘green’ or ‘environmental’ concern, important though ‘environmental’ aspects of sustainability are. A truly sustainable society is one where wider questions of social needs and welfare, and economic opportunity, are related to environmental limits imposed by supporting ecosystems.

4.6 The Idea of “the commons” in Social Capital

Environmental justice is also about reconnecting.Changes to the environmental protection paradigm have been due to campaigning activities of a loose alliance of grassroots and national environmental and civil rights activists, but, as many observers have argued, the real problems are deeply rooted in the racism that has characterized the history of land-use policy. Zoning has enabled dirty industries to go into established communities. Environmental regulations have been either evaded or weakly enforced.

A number of indicators of environmental inequality can include:

• Widespread unequal protection and enforcement against the facility siting in poor neighborhoods and communities of colour;

• disproportionate impact of occupational hazards on the poor and workers of colour;

• the abrogation of treaties with native populations, particularly with regard to mining, waste dumping and military weapons testing;

• unsafe and segregated housing;

• discriminatory transportation systems and zoning laws;

•  the exclusion of the poor and people of colour from environmental decision making;

  the neglect of human health and social justice issues by the established environmental movement.

In fact, industrial production and consumption is a never-ending ‘treadmill’ fired by the ideology of economic growth and real conflict between groups whose interests frequently vary and are often opposed. This is related to the “the commons” directly. If it is not dealt with, the government cannot use social capital to do the sustainable development.

In order to understand how the idea of “the commons” is together with the importance of social capital, we can borrow Detroit’s case to illustrate .

It is well known that since the 1950s, Detroit’s population has halved to today’s somewhat under one million people. Crime, substance abuse, poverty and lack of education are widespread.

The Council filled for bankruptcy in July 2013--- the largest municipality to do so in US history. However, Detroit’s urban farmers and community gardeners have perhaps captured the popular imagination in other ways with concepts such as ‘food deserts’ and ‘food justice’ penetrating the public policy discourse on social health and urban development.

Urban Roots, the 2012 documentary shows how Detroit’s plight is motivating increasing numbers of people to grow and share their often organically grown fresh fruit and vegetables.

Abandoned lands are being turned over to horticulture, polluted land is gradually decontaminated and small communities are slowly regaining a sense of purpose. As a number of people remarked in the film, there is a real sense of satisfaction and achievement in being responsible for creating a garden and growing one’s own food.

The product of one’s labour is not appropriated by ‘the company’, as would have been the case on the production line, but clearly and distinctly remains that of the individual or community to eat, to give away or to sell.Working the land involves learning new skills’ cultural identity. Urban farming also means improving diets and enjoying the open air, too.

There is also a social dimension, as for many residents Detroit is a food desert – that is, access to fresh fruit and vegetables can be very limited both financially and geographically.

Few if any grocery stores exist in many districts, for the only places that sell food are convenience stores and petrol stations. The Detroit Black Community Food Security Network, started in 2006, is a non-profit grassroots community organization that has been instrumental in creating Detroit’s Food Policy Council and runs Food Buying Cooperative where members are able to purchase healthy foods and household items at discount prices.

In fact, a loosely networked food justice movement is emerging across the United States and beyond.Urban gardeners, horticulturalists and farmers therefore recognize that developing and tending a plot for the production of local food is as much about securing social, environmental and food justice as anything else.

The story in Detroit can show the benefits of urban agriculture are significant socially, environmentally and economically.As a matter of the fact, small urban farming either by individuals or groups is not the only story in Detroit. Therefore, the commons can reconnect people with the land, the source of their food and taste of naturally grown produce.

Local food growing connects people with each other, too, activities that help nurture social capital and community development.What’s more,climate change is having different gender impacts, and in many cases is intensifying the constraints that already place women who are reliant on agriculture for their livelihoods at a disadvantage.

Women’s insecure position rights mean they are sometimes forced to work on less productive land and are excluded from agricultural training.Less predictable rainfall, more frequent floods and more crop failures mean that greater investments are needed in technology or other resources to which women have less access than men.

Agricultural extension services have become even more important for helping farmers adapt to climate change and develop more climate resilient practices, but they have a poor track record of reaching women.As agricultural work becomes more labour-intensive, the burden of additional work falls to women, in many cases.

Climate-related health risks further add to women’s unpaid work, as the main carers for their families.This has an impact on women’s health and well-being and reduces the time they are able to devote to other income-generating activities.

With fewer assets to fall back on and limited access to more sources of income, the impacts of climate change on the most food-insecure populations, and on women in particular, are negative, making it more difficult to escape the traps of low productivity work, poverty and food insecurity.

4.7 Critique on Achievement of the Environmental Justice Movement

A major achievement of the environmental justice movement, particularly at the policy level, has been a practice-based critique of expert-led processes of risk assessment, research and action.

Many experts pointed that the consequences of bio-accumulation and the cumulative risk suffered by many communities of colour have been invisible to environmental professionals and scientists, who are often seen as being representatives of political and economic power structures that have caused the injustice in the first place.

In other words, sustainability can only be achieved if citizens – ‘ordinary people’– are able to work effectively with the experts in designing and implementing proper  actions. Therefore, we need to call for effective reparations, the designation of environmental preservation districts, insistence on clean production technologies, and so on to start righting historical wrongs, restore ecosystems.

Although absolutely central to most environmental justice campaigns, health issues have not figure in many debates on sustainable development, despite the word ‘healthy’ often being used to characterize a sustainable community, society or economy.

Socioeconomic inequality, pollution, poverty, occupation, age, social exclusion, class and region all cause the inequitable social and spatial distribution of ill health and health risks. Research shows that rich countries will remain dysfunctional, violent and sick if economic inequality increases beyond a certain level. Being poor and socially excluded is a cause of ill health, depression and premature death. More socially equal societies and regions have higher levels of trust and social capital than unequal ones, which have higher crime rates and poorer health.

What’s more, economic growth and material may improve the material standard of life but does little or nothing for the quality of our lives. In this way, it is reasonable to equate social well-being and social welfare with sustainable economic and community development, but not necessarily, as we shall see, with economic growth.

In fact, the recent growth in social and economic inequality in many nations is highly detrimental to social and personal well-being and as such acts to restrain progress on achieving environmental sustainability.

A major task is finding the best way to right these wrongs.There are a number of valuable environmental justice policy tools,including the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives’ milestone process and the concept of ‘environmental space’ first developed by Friends of the Earth in Europe.

Environmental space does not aggregate resources into a single land-area based index but allows the environmental space targets for specific countries to be calculated by dividing the global environmental space for a given resource by the world’s total population.

In this way, each individual has a ‘fair share’ – if people do not have the basic means and capabilities to support themselves in a dignified manner, their fundamental rights as human beings are not being met. For many of the world’s people, it is basic rights and capabilities for subsistence – health, housing and nourishment – that are of immediate and great importance.

Without access to ecological resources and systems, many of which are threatened by urbanization, international trading regulations, climate change and human development cannot be sustainable or just. Environmental space therefore operationalizes the notion of environmental limits in measurable terms, articulating concepts of intergenerational and environmental justice.The environmental space framework provides a benchmark for addressing the historic environmental justice or ecological debt issues which campaigners in the developing world see existing between the rich and poor nations of the world.

4.8 Evaluation on Migration in Sustainable Development

Population movement can occur for a number of reasons and frequently relates to issues to do with poverty, conflict, injustice, economic opportunity, political and social instability, and, increasingly, the environment, especially changes occurring as a result of climate change which are creating higher levels of risk.

Undoubtedly, migration is an important feature of the twenty-first century, but historically the phenomenon is nothing new and importantly has key, often positive implications, for such sustainable development issues as health, work, education, gender equality and urban growth.And migrants to the more developed economies often send money back to their families in their countries of origin and these investments can initiate new development opportunities.

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which was adopted in 2015 and includes migration in its global development framework such as:

1. By 2020 substantially expanding the number of higher education scholarships in developed and other developing countries available to certain least developed countries, small island developing states and African countries.

2. Eliminate all forms of violence to women and girls in public and private spheres.

3. End modern slavery and human trafficking and other forms of exploitation.

4. Protect labour rights and promote safe working environments for migrant workers.

5. By 2030 reduce to less than 3 per cent the transaction costs of migrant remittances.

6. By 2020 enhance capacity-building strategies for developing countries.

Thus, migration and sustainable development are, or at least can be, mutually compatible and complementary, but for this to occur the appropriate political and legal framework needs to be developed.

Mainstreaming migration and development issues into country level planning frameworks is the most systematic and appropriate way to harness migration’s benefits and to mitigate its potentially negative consequences.

Mainstreaming aims to ensure that migration and development concerns are addressed in legislation, policies and programs at all levels in sectors such as employment, social protection, health services,  financial services and integrated into all stages of development planning, including design, implementation, and monitoring and evaluation.

This would allow migration to be embedded in a broader development strategy, ‘fostering a coherent approach rather than piecemeal, uncoordinated actions’, and help facilitate funding and technical assistance for migration-related activities.

It is of extreme importance and a great deal will rest on how ultimately political discussions and decision making on implementation pan out. This goes for international migration and internal migration with nation states.

One result has been the emergence of mega-cities with populations in excess of 10 million people and problems associated with rapid and often unplanned, sometimes unanticipated, population increase.

Stress on health, housing, economic and transportation infrastructures has often been severe, with issues relating to job creation and social protection being particularly significant.

4.9 Ecological Debt and Human Development

As previously discussed, the activities of international financial and trade organizations, and developed countries in general, are often held responsible for the accompanying global inequalities, economic distortions, and social disruptions.

Human development indicators’ were introduced in 1990 in the first Human Development Report (HDR) produced by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP).

They assessed the state of human development according to a variety of indicators, including life expectancy, adult literacy, enrollment at the primary, secondary and tertiary education levels, and income.

In 2010, the Multidimensional Poverty Index, was introduced and applied by the UNDP to 109 countries. It measures serious deficits in living standards, health, education and environmental factors such as cooking fuel, clean water and basic sanitation, and importantly focuses specifically on the intensity of these and other deprivations experienced by certain groups of people.

In developing countries, roughly 60 per cent of people experience one of these deprivations and 40 per cent two or more (UNDP, 2011). Environmental deprivations are especially acute among the multidimensional poor and although life expectancy has generally increased globally.

For a large share of the world’s people in developing countries, climate change projections point to less secure livelihoods, greater vulnerability to hunger and poverty, worsening social inequalities, and more environmental degradation’ .Issues relating to climate and gender justice are often tightly entwined and this is  not just because of women’s relatively more limited access to resources and resulting  poverty compared with men. Women are often related to social and cultural norms, influencing gendered divisions of labour and physical mobility, and the capability or opportunity to participate in local decision-making processes.

The relationship between human rights and human development, corporate power and environmental justice, global poverty and citizen action, suggest that responsible global citizenship is an inescapable element of what may at first glance seem to be simply matters of personal consumer or moral choice. To remedy this, more attention needs to be paid to ensure that human beings can pursue the life and values they wish.

To do this, two types of freedoms, understood as capabilities, need to be enlarged – namely: freedom of well-being, represented by functionings and capabilities; and freedom of agency, referring to voice and autonomy. Economic growth is important to this, but it is not an end in itself; but given that human development is attainable by everyone, universalism and sustainability are.