Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
of sustainability concerns. Paul Hawken (2007: 165) has gone a step further, suggesting
that 'the insanity of human destructiveness may be matched by an older grace and
intelligence that is fastening us together in ways we have never before seen or imagined'.
There is a 'movement of movements', informed by a broad spectrum of ideas and
values, underpinning countless citizen-based organizations, from the rich suburbs of
the developed world to the poor
favelas
and indigenous communities of the developing
world, which are constantly challenging political corruption and inertia, corporate
greed, environmental pillage, global poverty, preventable diseases and species extinction.
It is this 'blessed unrest', this human desire to change the world rather than simply
interpret it, that offers hope for a sustainable future. Globalization is a fact; and,
thanks particularly to new and emerging media technologies, we are all connected
now (Anderson, 2001) and doing something about it.
Strong democracy
For the political philosopher Benjamin Barber, strong democracy suggests that
politics is something done
by
citizens, rather than
to
them by elites, big companies,
bureaucrats or any other 'other' one can think of. Citizenship in this context is active
and transformative. It is also very public, in the sense that it is about creating or
building community, and modes and habits of participation, deciding on public
goods and public ends rather than reproducing isolated privatized lifestyles and
wants. A participatory citizen democracy cannot avoid the necessity of public choice
and judgement, or the interconnectedness of issues and events. Citizens think in
terms of
we
rather than
me
, and to be able to choose between courses of action,
recognizing the inequity of power structures and social conditions, requires the appli-
cation of a critical reason, or at least a
reasonableness
and imagination, in public
deliberation. As Barber writes:
Community grows out of participation and at the same time makes participa-
tion possible; civic activity educates individuals about how to think publicly as
citizens, even as citizenship informs civic activity with the required sense of
publicness and justice. Politics becomes its own university, citizenship its own
training ground and participation its own tutor. Freedom is what comes out of
this process, not what goes into it.
(1984: 152)
Strong democracy with active participatory citizenship has a close affinity with
practices of community development, community empowerment and community
action, all of which emphasize the importance of people having the capacity to be
agents of change, capable of refashioning their social worlds and themselves. The
core values informing this type of action have been identified as conviviality and
culture, critical and dynamic education, free access to information and communication
media, health and well-being, strong participatory involvement, economic equity,
opportunity and sustainability. Socio-economic inequality, uncertainty of public
purpose or vision, may consequently place serious limits on the efficacy of participatory
democracy. An adversarial approach to public discussion will also harm this form
of democratic process. Political or public 'talk', Barber suggests, leads to the invention
of alternative futures, the creation of mutual purposes, and the construction of
