Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
equity, and equality, whether it was in the form of participation, equal
rights, transparency and/or accountability, often have been related
to or even part of the agenda of environmental advocacy groups,
although the automatic linkages and relations between a 'green' and
a 'red/progressive' agenda have disappeared in the 1980s. Within the
conventional model of environmental protection democracy and equal-
ity were always strongly related to the state, with different theories and
interpretations on the emancipatory, neutral, or capitalist properties of
the 'environmental state'. A more democratic and egalitarian environ-
mental governance mode was to be developed through (pressuring) the
state. With informational governance the locus of power, democracy
and equality is no longer bound up with the state, and environmental-
ists have understood that quite well and timely. But does informational
governance provide for modes and forms of environmental governance
that are inherently more democratic and more egalitarian? No. Infor-
mational governance is neither inherently more, nor less, democratic or
egalitarian. Chadwick and May ( 2003 ) are perhaps most clear on this
in their assessment of the changing modes of governance in the age of
the Internet. Although in principle or in theory the Internet does pro-
vide possibilities for a more democratic mode of (e-)governance, they
show in detail how in fact three models of e-governance are emerging
and practiced (a managerial, a consultative and a participatory) with
highly different scores on democracy. This is in line with other research
on e-governance, all pointing at conclusions that I would summarise
as follows: under informational governance the rules of the game, the
institutional layout, the resources that matter - and, with all that,
power balances - are changing, but without any inherent conclusion
with respect to more or less democracy, equity and equality. The initial
sites, origins and sources of power are relocating, and state and non-
state environmental advocacies might profit from that. We have exten-
sively analysed throughout this volume how different actors strategi-
cally manoeuvre to obtain favourable positions in new power games,
also with respect to the environment. Although there is a relation with
the old sources of authoritative and economic power, as Paehlke ( 2003 )
has shown so strongly in his analysis of the democratic and environ-
mental dangers of 'electronic capitalism', informational power has its
own dynamics and resources. So, although informational governance
does not turn out to be inherently more democratic and egalitarian,
the lines between inclusion and exclusion, or powerful and powerless,
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