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Human Development and Strong Sustainability: A Mutual Dialogue

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Sustainability, Capabilities and Human Security

Abstract

Pelenc and Dubois offer a much needed discussion on how to integrate an ecological dimension within the capability approach for embedding human development in a ‘strong’ conception of sustainability. The chapter also aims to bring strong sustainability, along with its core notion of critical natural capital (and ecosystem services), into line with human development requirements. The authors demonstrate how this mutual dialogue helps overcome certain limitations in both approaches and build an integrated framework for the assessment of the interactions between human well-being and natural environment from the perspective of intra and intergenerational justice. They conclude by highlighting the crucial role public deliberation has to play, if we really want to embed human development in a strong conception of sustainability.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    For instance, the paper that Anand and Sen published in 2000 refers to Robert Solow’s seminal contribution on weak sustainability. However, in other parts of this paper and other writings (Sen 2009, pp. 248–252), Sen seems to defend strong sustainability.

  2. 2.

    • Manufactured capital refers to the physical means of production (tools, factories, machineries, etc.) and infrastructure.

    • Human capital covers knowledge and skills, experience and know-how.

    • Social capital refers to the set of formal and informal social relationships entered into by an individual, group or organisation.

    • Natural capital is described in this section

    See Ekins et al. 2003 for details about the term ‘capital’, and see Dietz and Neumayer 2007, for details about the ‘capital approach’.

  3. 3.

    Authors writing about CNC refer mainly to the ecological functions provided by natural capital and the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment refers to ecosystem services. Ekins et al. (2003) distinguish between the function ‘of’ natural capital and the function ‘for’ human beings. The concept of the ‘supporting service’ used in the MEA clearly reflects the function ‘of’ natural capital, and the concept of ‘direct services’ popularised by MEA directly echoes the function ‘for’ humans. For the sake of simplicity, we will not go any further into the distinction between functions and services here, and will only refer to ecosystem services.

  4. 4.

    Of course we acknowledge that human development should also respect social, cultural and political constraints. There is no space here to develop this point but Crabtree (2013) advances the idea that increases in freedom are legitimate if they cannot be reasonably rejected and not just regarding impacts on the environment.

  5. 5.

    The nine boundaries are: climate change, ocean acidification, stratospheric ozone, the biogeochemical nitrogen cycle, the phosphorus cycle, land system change, the rate at which biological diversity is lost, chemical pollution and atmospheric aerosol loading.

  6. 6.

    These services include fresh water, capture fisheries, air and water purification, and the regulation of regional and local climate, natural hazards and pests.

  7. 7.

    It should be pointed out that while the effects of environmental degradation have an impact at the individual level, they are created at the aggregate level (Schultz et al. 2013).

  8. 8.

    We set up a specific category for ecosystem services in the along the lines of strong sustainability to differentiate them from substitutable goods and services that are traditionally designated by the word ‘resources’. However, it is important to note that, in our conception of the CA, ‘entitlement’ applies to ‘ecosystem services’.

  9. 9.

    Schultz et al. (2013) suggest that three kinds of information are required to determine the sustainability of a functioning. These three types of information are: identification of the potential impact of a functioning on natural capital, the qualification of the impacts as positive or negative and the determination of legitimate constraints on functioning.

  10. 10.

    It is necessary to point out that here we are referring to ‘conservation’ which allows for the sustainable use of natural capital, and not to ‘protection’ which generally excludes the use of natural capital.

  11. 11.

    We are not saying that aggregate ecological indicators are not useful, but that they are not sufficient in themselves. They have to be complemented by contextual approaches.

  12. 12.

    According to Fischer and Eastwood (2016), knowledge of plant species, of history and customs allow individuals to make use of the forest in ways that might have been invisible and inaccessible to someone without this knowledge. They also highlight the role of past experiences and upbringing regarding the possibility to use the forest to derive ecosystem services.

  13. 13.

    Fischer and Eastwood (2016) report, in their qualitative study on the co-production of ecosystem services, that many interviewees recognized that the opportunities to interact with the forest depended on one’s age and mobility.

  14. 14.

    Even if it has been demonstrated by many scholars that nature encourages the use of outdoor spaces, and increases social integration and positive social interaction among neighbours. These are important social and psychological benefits, which may be more important to the ‘urban poor’, who have limited environmental alternatives available to them (Chiesura and de Groot 2003).

  15. 15.

    “The objective of analyzing capability structures is therefore to achieve a better description of the possible choices an individual has, by considering the combination of constraints and opportunities that confront him/her” (Ballet et al. 2011 p.1832).

  16. 16.

    We acknowledge that other authors have suggested different concepts to limit some capabilities. Breena Holland (2008, 2014) advances the idea of establishing « capability ceilings » to limit the impact of certain functionings on the well-being of others and Peeters et al. (2015b) advance the similar idea of « functionings constraints ». However, these two approaches are not directly connected with the concept of ecosystem services and are rather conceptualized at a macro level. In addition, the question of who should set up the thresholds still remains. Crabtree (2013) suggests a different perspective. Building on Scalon, he develops the idea of legitimate freedoms which are the freedoms or the increase in freedoms that cannot be reasonably rejected. This perspective is more in line with social deliberation.

  17. 17.

    This issue is related to social choice theory. We will not develop this aspect further; for additional information see Sen 1999, p. 253 and chapter 11.

  18. 18.

    For additional information see Sen (2009, pp. 324–327).

  19. 19.

    Deliberative democracy emphasizes the deliberative or discursive aspects of democratic decision-making rather than institutionalized norms (e.g. electoral systems, branches of government, parliamentary arrangements, bureaucratic functions) that are frequently defined as being the essence of democracy (Sneddon et al. 2006). It draws largely on Habermas’ Discourse Ethics and Communicative Action (Habermas 1984) and is embodied in the assumption that individuals can change their mind during deliberative processes (Zografos and Howarth 2010).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Toulouse 2, UMR LISST, Toulouse, France

    Jérôme Pelenc

  2. French Research Institute for Sustainable Development, UMI Resiliences, Bondy, France

    Jean-Luc Dubois

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  1. Jérôme Pelenc
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  2. Jean-Luc Dubois
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  1. Copenhagen Business School, Frederiksberg, Denmark

    Andrew Crabtree

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Pelenc, J., Dubois, JL. (2020). Human Development and Strong Sustainability: A Mutual Dialogue. In: Crabtree, A. (eds) Sustainability, Capabilities and Human Security. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-38905-5_2

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