The Bush Administration recently initiated a new project through the National Biological Information Infrastructure agency, a division of the US Geological Survey. The new endeavor is an Ejournal for Sustainability: Science, Practice & Policy. US tax dollars in partnership with private industry for the greater good of American citizens.
Sustainable Consumption Approaches in France
Volume 1 Issue 1 Spring 2005: “Sustainability: Science, Practice, & Policy is published as part of an ambitious government/private industry partnership between CSA and the NBII. The purpose of this project is to develop a Sustainability Science database that examines the countless interactions of all living entities, especially humans, with the Earth and its environment.”Since this is a project of the Bush Administration someone in the chain of command authorized the project budget and someone reviewed and approved the articles for the initial publication. In general the writings are lengthy works of scholarship, however, a mouthful is adequate to savor the flavor of the piece.
Sustainable Consumption Approaches in France
“Finally, from a more operational perspective, the French case highlights the need for better synergy between the institutional world of green policymaking and the more holistic approach defended by radical groups. … Here, as elsewhere in the environmental debate, progressive institutional forces (ecological modernizers) would gain from supplementing their typically “cold” technical style (eg., eco-labeling standards) with a more direct confrontation of the core ecological contradictions of the capitalist system.”Local Ecological Knowledge of Finland
“This paper is a study of the role of local ecological knowledge. To obtain data, planning officials, biologists, and representatives of resident and nature associations were interviewed in the Helsinki metropolitan area.”Dutch Policies Not Working: More Overt Policies Needed
“Existing policy styles and instruments have not reduced significantly the environmental impacts of consumption. An explanation for this inadequacy resides in the technocratic origins of environmental policymaking and the pronounced tendency to rely on the presumed rationality of producers situated on the supply side of production-consumption chains. A central issue, therefore, becomes the organization of an overt politics of sustainable consumption.”International Institutions and Reducing Consumerist Lifestyles
“International institutions over the past decade have begun to emphasize the need to reduce the environmental impacts of heavily consumerist lifestyles in affluent nations as a precondition for sustainable development.”The Feature Essay: What's Needed Beyond Science
“We have two big problems: blindness and addiction! Can we accept or acquiesce in denial of our “In Growth We Trust” addiction, an addiction that is delusional in its unwillingness to admit to limits in a finite world? Blindness and denial make impotent the body of scientific knowledge and block the use of helpful technologies.”Do we, American Homo sapiens deserve our money back?
“When asking these questions, I realize that the sciences and technologies in themselves are not enough, … willingness to accept policies that really address our needs is indispensable. For both the religious and those who feel no special connection to any religion, there is environmental ethics, and for me, in particular, the philosophy called Deep Ecology. … We can only accomplish our goal, to change the behavior that undermines a sustainable future, if we change what we collectively think and want. That is, we will have to change the dominant worldview. … Do we, Homo sapiens, have the wisdom to do that?”
