Tourism, Development and the Environment - Tourism and Development: Concepts and Issues - page 272

Thus, uncoupling the hollow sustainable development meta-narrative from
the essential building blocks of a more appropriate notion of environmental
sustainability may contribute to a more practical foundation for environmen-
tal policy and management, and provide insights into the essential determi-
nants of sustainability for developing world tourism. As Sneddon (2000: 524)
argues, it is pertinent to examine the concept of sustainability in isolation from
its 'problematic partner' of sustainable development, adding that 'the discus-
sion [on sustainable development] rarely transcends abstract notions of “needs”,
“generations” and “global environment” to confront more intractable, untidy
questions at the intersection of ecological degradation and social justice'. So, let
us consider the two essential elements of a potentially more relevant and
appropriate connotation of sustainability, one which may offer a clearer basis
from which to approach tourism, environment and development.
Environmental governance and sustainability
Central to the concept of sustainability is the issue of appropriate gover-
nance or 'the structures and processes of power and authority, co-operation
and conflict that govern decision-making and dispute resolution' (Hulme &
Woodhouse, 2001: 215). What, then, are the principles of environmental gov-
ernance as enshrined within the sustainable development discourse ?
The evolution of sustainable development has served to institutionalise
'top-down' solutions to socio-environmental problems, regarding local insti-
tutional arrangements as necessary components of fundamentally govern-
ment-driven sustainable development planning (Adams, 1992). As a result,
questions of appropriate local governance structures have received little
attention. However, by opening our minds to the cultural differences which
exist and how they translate into different definitions of 'development' and
'needs', 'we immediately open up the exciting possibility that sustainable
development might be defined by people themselves, to represent an ongoing
process of self-realisation and empowerment' (Redclift, 1992: 397). Therefore,
people must be the 'architects' and 'engineers' of sustainable development,
rather than mere recipients of a model of sustainable development created in
the industrialised world. Indeed, the notion that governance must be essen-
tially state-managed and based upon the lines of 'an idealised notion of west-
ern democracy allied to a Weberian bureaucracy' (Hulme & Woodhouse,
2001: 215) has been largely rejected by development theorists.
Within development studies literature, great advances have been made in
understanding the value of institutional diversity and local participation in
resource management decision-making. In his seminal work Development
Projects Observed , Hirschman (1968) drew attention to the tendency for devel-
opment planners to simplify the world's inherent social and political com-
plexity. When environmental considerations become part of the planning
equation, an entirely separate (though comparable) source of uncertainty and