In terms of the Exploitation and Discard reasoning it is apparent that it is not
realistically possible (in other words it is not readily within the capacity of any
nation’s collective and democratic conscience) to simply de-accelerate consump-
tion and to reduce in this way the impact of finite resource extraction and the rates
of pollution discard. This is from David Korten (1995: 98):
Markets don’t tell people with substantial incomes to consume no
more than their rightful share of ecosystem resources. They don’t
tell retailers not to sell guns to children. They don’t tell producers
that their wastes must be recycled. They don’t give priority in the
allocation of scarce resources to the basic needs of those with little
or no money before providing luxuries for those who have great
wealth. Indeed in each instance, they generally do exactly the
opposite.What is called for in order to avert the previously detailed twin-
tragedy and twin-dynamic syndromes is a socially acceptable
alternative to the growth-on-growth mantra, represented here as
neomodernism: a style of added-to modernity which both ‘takes
out of’ and ‘puts back into’ the environment, the economy and the
community. This environmentally neutral, socially improving par-
adigm, styled as conservation withdevelopment, is easy to com-
prehend even if, ecologically, it is challenging to effectively act out.
The core to a neomodern drive for sustainable conserv-
ationwithdevelopment is widespread education and empow-
erment toward a steady state in which the consumer uptake
of resources, and the discharge of waste outputs, are pulled
into balance. There is a need to manage the resource pro-
duction capacities, and the absorptive capabilities of the eco-
environmental setting on an all-costs-considered basis.
Current levels of low-density urban sprawl, and production-
consumption-discard output, exceeds known utility supply
capabilities and pollution-absorptive capacities, and accumu-
lates as future economic environmental and social costs. It is
thisunsustainable style of modern resource exploitation, along
with under-employment and pollution discard, which high-
lights the neomodernist challenge.
The settler-European populations of the larger towns and cities
find it difficult to comprehend that it is they, the urban citi-
zenry, who constitute the mass of consumers and the bulk of
within-nation polluters. Additionally, there is a lack of under-
standing about the converse reality: that it is the surrounding
countryside and the fresh water and saline water masses and
the atmosphere, all acting as waste ‘sinks’, which receives
everything the urban populations disown and discard as waste
(consult Wackernagel and Rees 1996).
Charter for Conservation with Development 89A GOOD URBAN
ENVIRONMENT IS A:- nuisance-free
environment - healthful
environment - recreational
opportunity
environment - housing
opportunity
environment - health opportunity
environment - job opportunity
environment - school opportunity
environment - modern amenity
environment. - [Plus an all-
accessible
environment]
K.R. Cox, Man Location
and Behaviour, 1972
Global directives and
state sovereignty are
pitched one against the
other. There are
enormous practical
difficulties to overcome
in bringing nations under
the umbrella of globally
enforced legal
instruments, particularly
when more than half of
them, comprising much
of the recently
independent Third
World, are fiercely
defensive of their hard-
won sovereign rights.