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From Analysis to Deliberation
Within a sustainability framework, any strategic assessment needs to make reference to two sets of principles—‘‘systems integrity’’ and ‘‘ethical integrity’’. The systems integrity concern can be translated, in general terms, as the principle of maintenance of the ‘‘four capitals’’. A necessary complement is added by considerations along ethical planes, namely the application of a principle of respect for multiple classes of community. This ‘‘social dimension’’ of sustain- ability performance assessment is given operational definition through a sort of ‘‘ethical appropriateness’’ test, epitomised by expressions such as ‘‘save the whales’’ or ‘‘you don’t sell your own grandmother’’—declarations that point to something other than a purely economic/utilitarian motive for the respect of systems integrity, whether in the environmental or social domain. But principles of respect are not panaceas. On the contrary, there arise, in every sustainability policy domain, difficult questions of fairness in the distribution of opportunities, benefits, costs and risks within each community of interest. This suggests a two-tiered framework for the articulation of performance goals or criteria with reference to diverse stakeholder communities.
The primary level of analysis would specify obligations of respect for the stakeholder classes or communities given standing—in other words, identification of the classes of community meriting respect and of the forms or norms for expression of that respect. (Given the ‘monopoly’ presence of the present generation, it is up to today’s policymakers and citizens to affirm duties towards – or, by proxy, the ’entitlements’ of – future generations, endangered species and ecosystems, vulnerable peoples, etc.)
The second level of analysis would address fairness or unfairness in access to services, distribution of opportunities, vulnerability, stresses and risks (etc.) within each class.
Questions of which principles, values or classes of community are to be sustained, or of what criterion of fairness or justice to apply, are often controversial and difficult to resolve. Social and environmental dimensions of evaluation analysis are always interlinked, because there are always asymmetries of need and of access to environ mental benefits (and of exposure to harms or risks) between different classes of stakeholders. Very often, a plurality of reasonable considerations can be put forward, which cannot all simultaneously be respected.
In some situations, qualitative considerations such as non-violence and poverty alleviation can provide benchmarks for respect of specific classes of system or community, or sectors within any given community. Indicators may be selected that signal when a community (human or non-human) is endanger, and directions to move away from danger (viz., reduce the community’s vulnerability). But, very often, there is not a societal consensus on the distribution of sustainability.
In such conditions of controversy, more information (in the systems science and even social science modes) does not necessarily lead closer to resolution of ‘‘what should be done?’’. On the contrary, sustainability policy must often address situations characterised by complexity, which, for our purposes, can be evoked through three considerations that reinforce and interfere with each other:
- Scientific knowledge advising of irreducible uncertainties and/or irreversibilities associated with courses of action.
- Plurality of value systems, political and moral convictions, and justification criteria within society.
- High decision stakes including economic interests and strategic security concerns for nations or ethnic minorities(etc.), and also consequences of environmental change for public health, organism integrity and future economic possibilities.
These features – characteristic of what Funtowicz and Ravetz call ‘‘post-normal’’ situations, or what Rittel and others have termed ‘‘wicked problems’’, of what O’Connor refers to as ‘‘impossible’’ social choice dilemmas – make it difficult to formulate and justify simple rules of action. Apparently simple desiderata such as ‘‘maximum net benefit’’ (with monetary cost-benefit analysis) or ‘‘avoid risks’’ (with the precautionary principle) fall down because, either they do not adequately address the decision issues (viz., they do not furnish a clear ‘‘counsel’’ about what to do), or the way that they do this does not have plausibility or acceptability to key stakeholders. There is no clear bridge between knowledge and right action. This does not mean that a reasoned use of a scientific knowledge base for policy is impossible. What it means is that, if reasoned basis for action is to be established for ‘‘post-normal’’, ‘‘wicked’’ or ‘‘impossible’’ problems, then knowledge and reasoning must be employed in a deliberative way.
In the Four Spheres model, a deliberative political process is very fundamentally necessary as the process of exploring and building a future together. Sustainability politics are about mobilising resources in perspectives of respect and reconciliation across several axes and over the long term. In addressing the multiple bottom lines, the challenge is to work with a permanent ‘‘argumentation’’ between the several contradictory positions. In the words of Rittel, an analyst needs to be like a ‘‘midwife of problems’’, helping to raise into visibility, ‘‘questions and issues towards which you can assume different positions, and with the evidence gathered and arguments built for and against these different positions’’. Collective action is like the decision to build a boat in order, as Rittel puts it, to ‘‘embark on the risk together’’. By accepting the dilemmas of evaluating performance against multiple bottom lines of systems integrity and ethical engagement, explored across economic, social and environmental spheres that are coevolving through time, we admit the complexities – both scientific and moral – of sustainability questions, at the same time as defining clear roles for science, human science, economics, and political process.