Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
abstract or non-human interest. In consequence,
as is developed in Chapter 18 on stakeholder
engagement, deciding who can claim to be a stake-
holder in the decision, and what powers they can
be allowed to exert to influence the outcome,
raises moral questions centred on justice.
insurance, retailing, health insurance and so
forth). These became widespread so that by the
end of the 19th century at least a third of the
working population was a member of some mu-
tual society (Gorsky 1998).
These were organizations to promote the self-
interest of their members, but increasingly there
emerged mass movements to promote the inter-
ests of others. Perhaps the earliest in the UK was
the Anti-Slaverymovement (Colley 1992), and the
19th century was full of non-governmental
organizations (NGOs) seeking improvements in
conditions (Walvin 1987), be these the extension
of voting rights (e.g. the Chartists); the extension
of education; the sanitarian reforms (notably
Chadwick) seeking improvements in public
health and living conditions; the Settlement
Movement; the Allotment movement; and the
improvement of working conditions, particularly
for children and women. These were followed by
more heritage-based NGOs such as the National
Trust. Now, NGOs might be broadly classified as
those concerned with human rights, or the allevi-
ation of poverty or environmental issues. Whilst
the concept of 'community' has eluded any more
functional definition than its recognition as a
symbolic system to define who is included and
who is excluded (Cohen 1985), such communities
of interest are as important as the traditional
communities of place.
All these different groups are broadly classed as
'civic society' (Seckinelgin 2002); what all share is
a single, if often broad, interest. This makes con-
structing collective action arguablymore difficult.
It also raises questions of howmuchweight should
given to each interest if this is to be more than
a reflection of the current amounts of relative
power that each can muster. Again, whilst com-
munities of self-interest have a clear line of ac-
countability to their members, the accountability
of NGOs, which set out to promote the interest of
others or other species or wider abstract concepts,
is more difficult to establish (Lloyd 2005). In turn,
legitimacy in a democracy is established by the
participation, usually through voting, of themem-
bers of that body. This is obviously not possible
when an organization seeks to represent an
What Must Governance Do?
Functionally, governance must match the task to
the context in which that task is set. There are
three key aspects to the task: to match the overall
context (itself a synthesis of social, cultural and
physical components) secondly, since one func-
tion of governance is to allow the effective use of
a technology, governance and technology must be
compatible; and finally the governance process
must be sensitive to the decisions that are needed
(or, the reasons why choices have to be made).
Context
The formof governancemustmatch the context in
which it is set and from which it emerges. The
nature of the water management problem, includ-
ing the flood risk aspect, varies dramatically from
country to country, and region to region. In par-
ticular, rainfall varies both over the year and
between years, in total amount, and in intensity.
Similarly, floods are only one part of the water
cycle and should not be managed in isolation lest
that management worsen other aspects such as
water resource availability.
In England, the density of population and the
intensity of land use are both high; flood risk
management interventions require both space and
place and have to be fitted in within the existing
development fabric. Flood risk management must
also take account of the development process as
a whole; the largest mass migration in human
history is taking place in the developing world,
withurbanization occurring far faster than it did in
Europe or North America.
Cultural factors are also critical. In the UK,
traditionally, the stated objective in public policy
has been to determine the national or public
