Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
community empowerment through participation (Friedmann, 1992) and a political
literacy married to a set of political skills encompassing communication, argument,
political action and 'politicking' (Flyvbjerg, 1998). The incorporation by professional
planners of social with environmental impact analyses now encompasses an under-
standing of the hidden spheres of everyday life - for example, the domestic, 'women's'
worlds of child-rearing, caring, and so on. This is particularly so in processes of
collaborative and neighbourhood planning, where unless the voices and insights
of marginal groups, including ethnic minorities, are recognized, community develop-
ment programmes are likely to flounder by generating opposition, fear and conflict
(Healey, 1997; Mills, 1998). Only an inclusive sense of community and belonging
can nurture social cohesion, participation, trust and neighbourliness (Putnam, 2007).
Ecological citizenship
The sociologist Bryan S. Turner (1993: 2) defines citizenship as 'that set of practices
(juridical, political, economic and cultural) which define a person as a competent
member of society, and which as a consequence shape the flow of resources to persons
and social groups'. The word 'practice' is important, because it encompasses the
experience of everyday life, of social structure and inequality, of action and agency,
and of power, social relationships, and the distribution of resources within societies
and between them. Modifying Turner's argument slightly, citizenship may be said
to address the following issues:
•
the nature of rights, responsibilities and obligations;
•
the form or type of such rights, responsibilities and obligations;
•
the social and political forces that produce practices of various sorts; and
•
the arrangements whereby benefits (or otherwise) are distributed among people
or between peoples, or between peoples and the non-human world.
We tend to value things either weakly or strongly. Environmental activists argue
that if we do not value the environment, safe food or clean air strongly, we may
become lesser beings as a result. Individuals have rights, but so does the planet,
which has a real claim on me to act wisely, prudently and sensibly. Unfortunately,
much environmental legislation, particularly in relation to the requirement to
undertake environmental impact assessments, is often based on the economic costs
or benefits of specific developments - for example, a new motorway - and not on
any principle of rights. It is utility or usefulness to 'society' or to the 'economy' that
counts. However, underpinning the idea of ecological citizenship is active citizenship,
social inclusion, deliberation, civic virtue, ecological welfare, information and political
participation (Saiz, 2005). For Barry, citizenship and democratic deliberation involve
social learning, perspective transformation and the internalization of others' interests
- those of non-human animals, future generations, and political and environmental
refugees. Ecological citizenship is democratic and is able to inform the voluntary
creation and maintenance of an ecologically rational society because communicative
and instrumental rationality characterizes ecological rationality (Barry, 1999: 230).
For Dobson (2003b), ecological citizenship encompasses the private as well as the
public realms, is more about obligations than rights, and is international and inter-
generational, incorporating notions of ecological footprinting and ecological debt.
