The sustainability revolution: A societal paradigm shift

Sustainability

Volumn 4, Issue 6, 2012, Pages 1118-1134

  Burns, Tom R ^a,b  

^a UPPSALA UNIVERSITY   (Sweden)

^b STANFORD UNIVERSITY   (United States)

Author keywords

Global environmental change; Paradigm shift; Revolution; Sustainability; Transformation

Indexed keywords

EID: 84864331639     PISSN: 20711050     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.3390/su4061118     Document Type: Article

References (40)

1. Earlier versions of this article were presented at Plenary Sessions of the International Sociological Association's Forum of Sociology, Barcelona, September 2008, and The International Sociological Association's World Congress, Gothenburg, July 2010. During the preparations of this article, Burns has been a Visiting Scholar at the Woods Institute for the Environment, Stanford University; he has also been partially funded by CERES21 at the Center for Development and Environment (SUM), University of Oslo, Norway.
2. Rosa, E.; Diekmann, A.; Dietz, T.; Jaeger, C. Human Footprints on the Global Environment: Threats to Sustainability; MIT Press: Cambridge, MA, USA, 2010; pp. 1-45.
3. The Greenhouse effect is transforming global and local weather patterns, 100 year floods become frequent events, as do the frequency of powerful hurricanes, continental forest fires, and other disasters; all of these draw down the reserves of insurance companies and the emergency funds of even the most prosperous states. The poor states suffer their fates or receive some relief through international aid.
4. Edwards, A.R. The Sustainability Revolution: Portrait of a Paradigm Shift; New Society Publishers: Gabriola Island, Canada, 2005.
5. Burns, T.R.; Flam, H. The Shaping of Social Organization: Social Rule System Theory With Applications; Sage Publications: London, UK, 1987.
6. Carson, M.; Burns, T.R.; Gomez Calvo, D. Public Policy Paradigms: The Theory and Practice of Paradigm Shifts in the EU; Peter Lang Publishers: Frankfurt and Berlin, Germany and New York, NY, USA, 2009.
7. Burns, T.R.; Hall, P. The Meta-Power Paradigm: Causalities, Mechanisms, & Constructions; Peter Lang: Frankfurt and Berlin, Germany and Oxford, UK, 2012.
8. Burns, T.R.; Dietz, T. Revolution: An evolutionary perspective. Int. Sociol. 2001, 16, 531-555.
9. Baker, S. The Evolution of EU Environmental Policy: From Growth to Sustainable Development. In The Politics of Sustainable Development: Theory, Policy and Practice Within the European Union; Baker, S., Kousis, M., Richardson, D., Young, S.C., Eds.; Routledge: London, UK, 1996.
10. Baker, S. Between Commitment and Implementation: Tensions in Sustainable Development Policy of the European Union. In The International Handbook of Environmental Sociology; Redclift, M., Woodgate, G., Eds.; Edward Elgar: Cheltenham, UK, 1997.
11. Capra, F. The Turning Point: Science, Society, and the Rising Culture; Simon and Schuster: New York, NY, USA, 1982.
12. Burns, T.R.; Stöhr, C. Power, knowledge, and conflict in the shaping of commons governance: The case of EU baltic fisheries. Int. J. Commons 2011, 5, 233-258.
13. Burns, T.R.; Stohr, C. The architecture and transformation of governance systems: Power, knowledge, and conflict. Hum. Syst. Manag. 2011, 30, 173-194.
14. Steffen, W.; Sanderson, R.A.; Tyson, P.; Jäger, J.; Matson, P.; Moore, B., III; Oldfield, F.; Richardson, K.; Schellnhuber, H.J.; Turner, B.; Wasson, R. Global Change and the Earth System: A Planet under Pressure; Springer-Verlag: Heidelberg, Germnay, 2004.
15. Burns, T.R.; Carson, M. Actors, Paradigms and Institutional Dynamics. In Advancing Socio-Economics: An Institutionalist Perspective; Hollingsworth, R., Muller, K.H., Hollingsworth, E.J., Eds.; Rowman and Littlefield: Oxford, UK, 2002.
16. Burns, T.R. System Theories. In The Blackwell Encyclopedia of Sociology; Blackwell Publishing: Oxford, UK, 2006.
17. Burns, T.R. DeVille, P. Dynamic Systems Theory. In The Handbook of 21st Century Sociology; Bryant, C., Peck, D., Eds.; Sage Publications: Thousand Oaks, CA, USA, 2007.
18. The domination may be based on administrative power, coercion, wealth, charismatic authority, etc. Of course, the resources and control activities differ significantly with the different modalities of power. Their limitations and vulnerabilities to erosion or collapse differ as well.
19. The paradigm(s) of modernization has been imposed selectively-a recurrent pattern of social transformation since the Industrial Revolution: Among others, the Meiji revolution in Japan (1868), Haile Selassie's transformation of Ethiopia (1930-1974), Pahlavis Shahs (1925-1979) restructuring of Iran, and Gorbachev's initiatives launching glasnost (opening) and perestroika (restructuring). Transformations characterized by re-orientation of a ruling elite entail then processes of learning, conversion, and entrepreneurship. Under the direction of the elite adhering to a new paradigm, a new institutional order is launched and unfolds. A major structural feature of such transformations is the more or less intact domination by a ruling elite, at least initially (unintended developments take place, including erosion of elite power as an unintended consequence of some promising innovations).
20. Stinchombe, A. Constructing Social Theories; Harcourt, Brace & World: New York, NY, USA, 1968.
21. Coleman, W.E. From protected development to market liberalism: Paradigm change in agriculture. J. Eur. Public Policy 1998, 5, 632-651.
22. Nikoloyuk, J.; Burns, T.R.; de Man, R. The promise and limitations of partnered governance: The case of sustainable palm oil. Corp. Gov. 2010, 10, 59-72.
23. Industrialization became a "development" concept which was more than a description. It became as well a metaphor of progress and advancement and a powerful normative idea (to be "developed", "industrialized" was good, to be undeveloped or underdeveloped was backward, a failure).
24. The USA's greatest dam-builder, Floyd E. Dominy, was involved in many of the initiatives in the Western U.S. that led to 472 dams. He aptly represented the "spirit of the times". In 1966, he called a Colorado River without dams "useless to anyone... I've seen all the wild rivers I ever want to see". (cited in New York Times (NYT) Obituary. F.E. Dominy, who harnessed water in the American West, is dead at 100. Page B 13, April 29, 2010).
25. Carson, R. The Silent Spring;Houghton Mifflin: Boston, Mass, 1962
26. The World Commision on Enviornment and Development. Our Common Future; Oxford University Press, London, UK, 1989.
27. Another important outcome of this conference was the agreement to create a new programme for global environmental protection under the United Nations: Then United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP)
28. This Convention concerned the Protection of the Marine Environment of the North-East Atlantic (from Gilbraltar to northern Norway and Russia)
29. Lind, G. REACH: The Only Planet Guide to the Secrets of Chemicals Policy in the EU; Affarstryckeriet: Norrtalje, Sweden, 2004.
30. There has been growing and widespread concern with conservation, environmental pollution and degradation long before there emerged a "sustainability" concept, as suggested above
31. Lafferty, W.M. The Implementation of Sustainable Development in the European Union. In Contemporary Political Studies. Proceedings of the Political Studies Association; Lovenduski, J., Stanyer, J., Eds.; Political Studies Association: Belfast, UK, 1995.
32. Mitchell, R.B. International Environmental Agreements Database Project (Version 2007.1). 2002-2009. Available online: http://iea.uoregon.edu/ (accessed on 7 August 2009).
33. Baumgartner, T.; Burns, T.R. Transitions to Alternative Energy Systems: Entrepreneurs, Strategies and Social Change; Westview Press: Boulder, CO, USA, 1984.
34. Woodward, A.; Ellig, J.; Burns, T.R. Municipal Entrepreneurship and Energy Policy: A Five Nation Study of Politics, Innovation, and Social Change; Gordon and Breach: New York, NY, USA, 1994.
35. A subsequent article will specify and analyze several of the key mechanisms in organic transformation such as innovation, imitation processes, influence mechanisms, collective learning, and communication processes and their technologies
36. But the ongoing sustainability revolution is much more than a "Third Industrial Revolution" to which Jeremy Rifkin refers in a book (The Third Industrial Revolution: How Lateral Power Is Transforming Energy, the Economy, and the World) that has recently (2011) appeared. But significantly Rifkin recognizes the organic character of the transformative processes.
37. The Earth System Governance (ESG) Project (http://www.earthsystemgovernance.org/) is the largest social science research network in the area of governance and global environmental change. It is a core project of the International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Change (IHDP).
38. Stockholm Memorandum 2011. Tipping the scales toward sustainability. Available online: http://globalsymposium2011.org/wp-content/uploads/2011/07/memorandum-signed.pdf (accessed on 23 May 2012).
39. Diamond, J. Collapse: How Societies Choose to Fail or Succeed; Viking-Penguin: New York, NY, USA, 2005.
40. The reference list does not do justice to the many researchers whose work has contributed to the theoretical and empirical underpinnings of this article. This will be accomplished in a book to appear in 2013.