Discourse Discussion of Society/Nature Relationship and Ecosystem Services

Discourse Discussion of Society/Nature Relationship and Ecosystem Services

Today I intend to develop on my discussion of George Monbiot’s talk. Although I was critical of George Monbiot rejecting ecosystem services ideologically despite recognising some of its useful applications, he does allude to the key issue in development and political ecology. The concern of maintaining growth whilst still allowing conservation. This central regarding Water and Development in Africa, and is closely tied into views of nature, or environmental discourses.

The debates over the extent that it is possible to maintain biodiversity and continue achieving conservation objectives alongside development are closely linked to levels of resource extraction. These concerns are far from new, and have a historical basis, evidenced by Malthusian dilemmas (Black, 1997) and the Tragedy of the Commons  (Hardin, 1968). Although they significantly predate the concept, both essentially link declining ecosystem service outputs to over-exploitation and environmental degradation. These theorisations, and responses to them, are reliant on specific understandings of nature, with multiple conflicting views leading to a plethora of such ‘environmental discourses’ (Dryzek, 2013).

Dryzek splits these discourses into four groupings, determined by how far they reject industrialism. Industrialism is defined as the ‘overarching commitment to growth in the quantity of goods and services produced and to the material wellbeing that growth brings  (Dryzek, 2013). Discourses are reformist/radical based on whether align with this view, and prosaic/imaginative based on whether accepting frameworks set by industrialisation. This leads to the table below:

	Reformist	Radical
Prosaic	Problem Solving  -administrative rationalism  -democratic rationalism  -economic rationalism	Survivalism
Imaginative	Sustainability     -Sustainable Development     -Ecological Modernisation	Green Radicalism  -Green Romanticism  -Green Rationalism

It’s not necessary to go into detailed discussion of all of these here. Of these, most pertinent to this blog are those of Sustainability, which aims to ‘dissolve the conflicts between environmental and economic values that energize the discourses of problem solving and limits’. This places it as reformist and imaginative, seeking to function within the guidelines of industrialism but producing environmentally benign growth. This is contrasting with Monbiot’s view, which can be seen as falling within Green Radicalism, based on his talk I discuss in the previous blog. He rejects industrialism entirely, taking an idealistic stance in his discussion of the issues of any engagement with the ‘machinations of capitalism’.

I feel Ecosystem Services appear to fit into the category of sustainability as they aim to function within the confines of industrial capitalism. Although the notion of nature as a resource is admittedly unsettling, particularly to environmentalists, through research for this blog I have increasingly come to find this to be a necessary and pragmatic view.

Through ecosystem services the very perception of nature as a resource can help protect it, but only where we can move away from view of nature as ‘a fixed indestructible asset’ (Dasgupta, 2008), and instead aim for ‘environmentally benign growth’. In contrast to Monbiot, I feel even this is an important move, with many economists still seeing nature as a fixed, limitless resource despite the work of those such as Constanza valuing the natural world as worth minimally $18 trillion per annum as early as 1997 (Constanza, 1997). Ecosystem Services are key in this shift, with nature still part of the ‘machinations of Capitalism’, but a more nuanced view that helps to protect specific areas, and eventually the wider natural world as a whole.

This focus on continued but environmentally benign growth is particularly important in the developing world. Continued growth is integral to maintain standards of living, due to rapid population growth predicting global populations of 9.6 to 12.3 billion by 2100 (Gerland, 2014).

This highlights the import of carefully managed, sustainable utilisation of all resources, even before accounting for improving standards of living and climate change. However beyond this, it is even more so the case for water, as it is vital not only for economic development, but also health and well-being regardless of levels of growth. It has ‘inelastic’ minimum usage amounts (Tucker, et al., 2014). which when not met damage health and hygiene, withpoor households  most likely to fall below these.

From this, I feel the integral role of development can’t be denied. Maybe the arguments of Monbiot are true in the more economically developed world, but his ideological rejection of ES, and supporting discourse seems far-fetched when looked at in the context of the developing world. His criticism of the ‘machinations of capitalism’, could be seen as criticism of ‘machinations of poverty relief’ in developing world. Continued development is undeniably necessary, but it needs to be managed to prevent overexploitation, pollution and over conversion to cultivated land. Ecosystem services, such as through cost benefit analysis and payment for ecosystem services can help to find an equilibrium between the two. If widely accepted as a mechanism could aid major shift to more environmentally conscious society which utilises less environmentally detrimental technologies.