The purpose of this paper is to contribute towards moving the predominant situation of weak sustainable development (WSD) in the direction of strong sustainable development (SSD). More people – academics, politicians, bureaucrats and laymen alike – need to recognize SSD as an alternative to WSD. A joint discourse of WSD and SSD is suggested, called reflexive sustainable development. Here, advocates of WSD and SSD must argue for each specific case why their solution is better. This will expose, amongst other things, the ethical foundations which form part of resulting policy advice. Reflexive sustainable development is to be framed in discourse ethics, thereby remedying the power imbalance and allowing for substantial discussion. Reflexive sustainable development builds on a common theoretical base but will not lead to consensus in all matters. A family metaphor is introduced to inspire a discourse of both consensus and compromise.
Academics, politicians, bureaucrats, NGOs and journalists are continually making statements and giving opinions on which actions and policies will take us in a sustainable direction. But these statements are seldom contrasted against the backdrop of different or competing definitions of sustainable development. As a result, value foundations, implicit ontologies and paradigms are not challenged. This paper uses a reflexive approach to focus on the two most common definitions within economics, namely weak and strong sustainable development (WSD and SSD). The objective is to challenge the hegemonic position of WSD, through substantial discussions. This will bring to the forefront differences between WSD and SSD, but also their common features. A joint discourse called reflexive sustainable development is proposed, where the appropriateness of either WSD or SSD must be argued for and discussed with reference to each individual case in hand.
The paper is conceptual, but the increasingly severe situation of man-made climate change (Anderson and Bows, 2008 and House et al., 2008) is used as an example of a current issue where WSD and SSD are part of the debate. The last section offers some illustrations from official Norwegian documents on climate policy — related to both WSD and SSD. These examples build upon and acknowledge the scientific reports, mainly drawn from The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which provide highly reassuring evidence that the climate change we are now facing is mainly man-made (IPCC, 2001, IPCC, 2007a, IPCC, 2007b and IPCC, 2007c). The motivation of this paper is to provide a constructive input into discussions on mitigating climate change, as well as a more general contribution on cooperation between conflicting schools of thought.
Norway has dedicated itself to work for and to promote a new international agreement following the Kyoto Protocol. The official policy is that all individuals and levels in society have to contribute, but an international agreement is still important to succeed in mitigating climate change (White paper nb 1, 2007–2008). This section looks into how sustainable development is defined in three recent and principal Norwegian documents on climate change. The following citations show that sustainable development is either described indirectly, or by using both WSD and SSD. But WSD and SSD are not discussed in relation to each other.
White paper number 34, with the English summary ‘Norwegian climate policy’ (Norwegian Ministry of the Environment, 2006–2007 and White paper nb 34, 2006–2007) gives no exact definition of sustainable development. Instead, sustainable development is described indirectly through a description of the means of achieving sustainable development as illustrated in the following citation: “The concept of tolerance limits and precautionary principle are closely linked to the principle of sustainable development, which underlies all areas of Government's policy, and they can be regarded as means of putting sustainable development into practice.”(Norwegian Ministry of the Environment, 2006–2007, p. 9).
The report ‘Norwegian climate policy’ (Norwegian Ministry of the Environment, 2006–2007, p. 10) is another example of an indirect description of sustainable development. “The scale of greenhouse gas emissions and the rate at which they are rising constitute one of the clearest breaches of the principle of sustainable development today.”
In White paper nb 1 (2007–2008) there is a more specific description of sustainable development. The starting point is a reference to the Brundtland Commission which uses human welfare as a yardstick for sustainability (White paper nb 1, 2007–2008, chapter 7.2.1). It is then argued that all resources be seen as capital; real assets, human capital and environmental capital. In this regime it is the total amount of capital that determines the sustainability. This is WSD. In the same white paper it says that because of irreversible changes in nature, such as climate change, Norwegian environmental policy must be seen in relation to the threshold values of nature (White paper nb 1, 2007–2008, chapter 7.2.1). In the economic literature this is defined either as a modification of WSD, or as SSD. Either way, it is a limitation on substitution, i.e. the common base for WSD and SSD in this paper.
To describe sustainable development indirectly in policy papers does not bring to the forefront associated and different ethical foundations. To describe both WSD and SSD does not mean that both can be achieved simultaneously. Mutual features, contradictions and differences should be highlighted (Mouffe, 2005). The policy statements above are examples of an opportunity to discuss WSD in relation to SSD. Such an academic discussion will spell out more clearly the policy choices to hand, including the ethical dimensions of a given policy. To initiate or take part in such a discussion is an opportunity to influence and change policy, which is the intention of this paper. Reflexive sustainable development is a pathway towards SSD, compared to the practical policy of today.
