Tourism, Development and the Environment - Tourism and Development: Concepts and Issues - page 275

the conventional Western conception of ecological management be scruti-
nised. An emerging school of thought asserts that Western ecological princi-
ples and the long-established environmental management tools which they
inform have little relevance for complex socio-environmental systems. It may
be argued that rhetorical commitments to environmental conservation as cen-
tral to sustainable development discourse represent no more than a 'repackag-
ing' of development planning to present a green face to business-as-usual
exploitation of people and resources (Adams, 1992; Sneddon, 2000). The often
rhetorical commitment to the principles of environmental protection and
conservation are subordinated by the primacy of economic growth, forming
the ideological basis for mainstream sustainable development theory.
The concept of ecological sustainability has attracted attention, not least
because of the catalogue of disastrous development planning initiatives
implemented over the years in much of the developing world. As Sneddon
writes, 'ecological sustainability as a policy and management guideline . . . is
certainly preferable to a notion of “sustainable development” wherein eco-
logical concepts and their applications are mere afterthoughts' (Sneddon
2000: 532). Central to ecological sustainability lies a 'new' ecological under-
standing which calls into question traditional Western Clementian ideas of
ecological succession and the Western traditions of environmental manage-
rialism that are founded upon them. The new ecology stresses the principles
of non-linearity and dynamic equilibria, which contrast with the conven-
tional ecological principles founded upon homeostasis and rigid 'carrying
capacities'. As Munro (1995: 31) perceptibly remarks, '[w]e know the carry-
ing capacity of a field for cows is limited; it has objective reality, the factors
involved are relatively few and simple . . . But carrying capacity of the earth
for people is subject to a multitude of complex, interacting factors'. A central
strand to the new ecology is that environments are inherently dynamic, and
not moving towards a climax or equilibrium state, and the recognition that
'natural environments' have long been shaped by human activity.
New ecological theory promotes notions of adaptive management above
the rigid positivist models of development planning, emphasising the pre-
eminence of locally-specific knowledge over 'blueprint' solutions to envir-
onmental management problems. Ironically, it is in the context of African
semi-arid environments that the new ecological paradigm has particular refer-
ence (Scoones, 1995). Simplistic deterministic 'command and control' stra-
tegies of environmental management appear redundant in light of the approach.
Adaptive techniques, such as those advocated for a more sustainable app-
roach to pastoral development, are formulated on notions of both institu-
tional and ecological diversity (Adams, 1992). The logic of coupling diverse
management strategies with non-linear, unpredictable environmental condi-
tions is well captured by Scoones' (1995) edited text, Living With Uncertainty ,
which seeks to reconstitute the essential element of sustainability so evi-
dently absent from conventional rangeland development planning. The latter