Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
Political ecology can act as a frame for good governance because it explicitly
recognizes the multi-scaled factors that influence communities, places, local environ-
ments and human agency. It examines the human social influences on ecosystems,
vulnerability to environmental hazards and scarcity, and shows how political reforms
may affect human use of the land, natural resources and the overall physical landscape
(Batterbury, 2006). Good governance, in needing to be inclusive, also needs to be
decentralized and linked to local context. With global issues such as climate change
this has led to a recognition that, in addition to the high-level international conferences,
treaties and protocols, and state-based prescriptions, there have recently emerged
hybrid locally focused institutional and voluntary initiatives. Thus, polycentric diversity
and a dispersion of governing authority is beginning to characterize climate change
governance at all scales - neighbourhood, city, federal, state, international and global
- with processes combining elements of the bottom-up with the top-down (Paavola,
2011). Hoggett (2001), discussing governance and eco-welfare, sees human capacities
as essentially relational, expressive, spiritual and practical-intellectual, developed
through the experience of difference, conflict, participation, accommodation and
transformation. Indeed, the quality of social relations depends on social conviviality
and the democratization of everyday life. Hoggett argues that an eco-welfare model
of society requires good governance to be green, and so differs from a consumerist
or state welfare model in that:
Green welfare would promote the utmost respect for human dependency and
would champion the development of a new generation of human-scale institutions
and integrated, community-based models of support in which holistic models of
health, social care and education would flourish. We do not have to engage in
abstract thought experiments: such an approach is already prefigured in some
third-sector innovations throughout Europe and the UK, many of which are
outlined in the recent ten-country European Foundation Report (Pillinger, 2000).
Many such projects are experimenting with user- and worker-based cooperatives,
emphasizing both user involvement and the development of a mutually respectful
relationship between workers and users.
(Hoggett, 2001: 615)
Governance should not be confused with government, which refers to the act and
process of governing, and the organization or functional machinery through which
power and authority are exercised in a political unit such as a nation-state. Too
often governments work within self-enclosed silos and associated mindsets (Dale,
2001), and for many years political commentators have been arguing for more holistic
government (Perri 6, 1997), which would facilitate greater effectiveness, intergovern-
mental communication, and understanding of issues and challenges that can no longer
be administratively confined within a single departmental boundary or understood
clearly by a single discipline. Joined-up government, if implemented sensitively, could
empower communities by offering opportunities for meaningful participation and
empowerment (Wilkinson and Appelbee, 1999). Sustainable development policies
have many stakeholders and are hard to monitor and evaluate by conventional
governmental methods. The risks of failing to communicate clearly to, and within,
different autonomous government departments and organizational cultures increases
with the complexity of the policy and approach. Writing specifically on the UK
