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Sustainability: Living with the Imperfections
Author(s) -
EHRENFELD DAVID
Publication year - 2005
Publication title -
conservation biology
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.2
H-Index - 222
eISSN - 1523-1739
pISSN - 0888-8892
DOI - 10.1111/j.1523-1739.2005.0456a.x
Subject(s) - conservation biology , library science , sustainability , citation , humanism , political science , environmental ethics , computer science , law , philosophy , ecology , biology
Newton and Freyfogle (2005, this issue) do a fine job of pointing out the origins of the term sustainability and its serious defects when used as a goal for conser- vation. Among those defects is the arrogant presumption inherent in the implication that it is up to us to manage and sustain the planet and that we are capable of doing the job. This presumptuousness lends a self-contradictory tone to sustainability because the idea that we can and should manage everything is what has helped get us and the earth in so much trouble in the first place (Ehrenfeld 1981, 2000). This self-contradiction is particularly notice- able in the oxymoronic phrase sustainable development. The managerial implications of sustainability are real and should be explored, but because so many good conserva- tionists use the term, I think it is also worth some effort to try to find its redeeming values as well. Nowhere are the issues raised by Newton and Freyfogle more dramatically illustrated than in the current debate about how to cope with the growing shortage of cheap energy. The demonstration and details of this shortage are beyond the scope of this paper; elsewhere I have documented the overwhelming evidence that cheap en- ergy is disappearing rapidly (Ehrenfeld 2005), a view put fort hb ypetroleum geologists and environmental scien- tists alike. Sustainability is often invoked in discussions of energy. Almost always, however, energy sustainability is seen as coming about through technological change— from the development of new energy sources and im- provements in the efficiency of energy generation and use—not by moral exertion and change in world view. Rarely do we hear or read about a need for voluntary (or mandatory) reduction in the frivolous use of energy that is so widespread in globalized industrial society. There are exceptions, however. In one of the best and most author- itative contemporary books on energy production and consumption, Vaclav Smil (2003) calls for energy conser- vation as "part of much broader appeals for moderation (if sacrifice may seem too strong a term), frugality, and