island syndrome underscores the local-place need for socially responsible,
environmentally compatible, and economically balanced conservancy with
development.Within the academy
Those who aspire to educate and communicate with those others who in turn
aspire to bring about progressive change should know their existing development
and conservancy legal framework, comprehend the sustainability ethic, appreci-
ate the theory basis for planned change, and cleave to the ideal of vertical and
horizontal integration. In short, humbly, yet with no false modesty, fall in with
the philosophy and reasoning which involves ‘tipping the balance’ toward the
conservation with development paradigm shift.
For the richer regions of the larger OECD nations and the smaller nations in
that club, for most of the middle-order economies tied into global trading, and for
the resource-rich regions among the poorer nations, ‘growth’ has always outvoted
‘sustainability’; that is until either or jointly the economic and ecological bubbles
burst. It is in the smaller intermediate economies, the poorer nations, and in the
poorer regions of the wealthy nations, that the sustainability logic wells up in
response to two forces. First, the ‘force of argument’ for clearly there is never going
to be, for these transfixed contexts, a rapid growth quick-fix. Second, there is the
‘force of disaster’ arising out of grotesque economic, ecological, nuclear and
ethical conflict.274 PracticeBox 6.1 Easter Island – Earth Island
(Population late sixteenth century: 7,000. Population late
nineteenth century: 110)
Easter Island has an area of 64 square miles. It is situated
in the south-eastern Pacific Ocean, on the equatorial side
of the Tropic of Capricorn, 1,400 miles from the next hab-
itable landfall. Earth is 12,756 kilometres in diameter and
moves on an orbit separated from other solar system
planets, but they are of course uninhabitable.
In both instances, at either end of a normal human scale
of comprehension, the incumbents – were (Easter Island),
or are (Earth Island) – unable to leave their place of
habitat. The outcome for Easter Island (despoilation,
degradation, de-population, social disintegration, geno-
cide) is a path the global system shows some inclination
to replicate, wiping out forests and minerals, exploiting
plants and animals to extinction.
On Easter Island the feller of the last tree knew it would
lead ultimately to disaster for subsequent generations, but
went ahead and swung the axe. This is what is so worry-
ing. Humankind’s covetousness is boundless. Selfishness
appears to be genetically inborn. Selfishness has the allu-
sion of leading to survival. The selfish gene wins. But in a
limited ecosystem, selfishness leads to increasing popula-
tion imbalance, population crash, and ultimately popula-
tion extinction.
If the lesson of Easter Island’s tragic mistake is not
enough, it is difficult to ascertain what would constitute a
wake-up call. It would seem nothing has been installed to
alter earth’s crash course with disaster. That is, until rela-
tively recently, with the introduction of the sustainability
concept.Source: From Auckland University ‘Planning School’
student essays: Richard Turner, Craig Magee,Angela Davey.
Source book: Clive Ponting,A Green History of the World,
1991.