Sustainability, Social Learning and the Democratic Imperative: Lessons from the Australian Landcare Movement

Drawing on the experience of community based land conservation in Australia, this chapter examines the deeper structural and institutional causes of the unsustainability of modern industrialised society. Social learning is presented as a potential paradigm for engaging with these broader institutional dilemmas. Such a perspective locates the concept of social learning at the heart of current debates about the tensions between sustainable development, democracy and free market ideology. The chapter introduces the themes of risk society and reflexive modernisation as a perspective that can help explain why modern institutions are structurally biased against the ideals of sustainable development. This provides a brief political economic context for then outlining a perspective on social learning that gives particular attention to questions of how to facilitate the design of institutions more supportive of sustainable development.

[1]  赫尓徳,et al.  民主的模式 = Models of democracy , 1986 .

[2]  N. Maxwell.  What Kind of Inquiry Can Best Help Us Create a Good World? , 1992 .

[3]  A. Giddens.  The consequences of modernity , 1990 .

[4]  S. Dovers.  Sustainability: Demands on Policy , 1996, Journal of Public Policy.

[5]  A. Kellerman,et al.  The Constitution of Society : Outline of the Theory of Structuration , 2015 .

[6]  H. Maturana,et al.  The Tree of Knowledge: The Biological Roots of Human Understanding , 2007 .

[7]  Social Theory And The Environment , 1996 .

[8]  A. Irwin.  Citizen Science: A Study of People, Expertise and Sustainable Development , 1995 .

[9]  J. Dryzek.  Democracy In Capitalist Times , 1996 .

[10]  Ian Scoones,et al.  A trainer's guide for participatory learning and action , 1995 .

[11]  Kai N. Lee.  Compass and Gyroscope: Integrating Science and Politics for the Environment, Kai N. Lee. 1993. Island Press, Washington, DC. 290 pages. ISBN: 1-59963-197-X. $25.00 , 1993 .

[12]  C. S. Holling,et al.  Barriers and bridges to the renewal of ecosystems and institutions , 1997 .

[13]  A. Dale,et al.  Achieving Sustainable Development , 2002 .

[14]  A. Weale.  The new politics of pollution , 1991 .

[15]  A. Giddens.  The Third Way: The Renewal of Social Democracy , 1999 .

[16]  N. Klomp,et al.  Frontiers in ecology : building the links , 1997 .

[17]  Ulrich Beck,et al.  The reinvention of politics : rethinking modernity in the global social order , 1999 .

[18]  J. Friedmann,et al.  Empowerment: The Politics of Alternative Development , 1994 .

[19]  Alan S. Miller,et al.  Technological thinking: Its impact on environmental management , 1985 .

[20]  B. Wynne,et al.  Risk Society: Towards a New Modernity. , 1994 .

[21]  A. Giddens.  The Constitution of Society , 1985 .

[22]  John S. Dryzek,et al.  Complexity and Rationality in Public Life , 1987 .

[23]  P. Senge.  The fifth discipline : the art and practice of the learning organization/ Peter M. Senge , 1991 .

[24]  Systemic praxis in the education of the agricultural systems practitioner , 1998 .

[25]  L. Milbrath,et al.  Envisioning a sustainable society : learning our way out , 1989 .

[26]  F. Capra.  THE WEB OF LIFE : A New Synthesis of Mind and Matter , 1996 .

[27]  John S. Dryzek,et al.  Discursive Democracy: Politics, Policy, and Political Science , 1992 .

[28]  Mozaffar Qizilbash,et al.  Capabilities, well‐being and human development: A survey , 1996 .

[29]  J. Dryzek.  The Politics of the Earth , 2021 .

[30]  A. Giddens,et al.  Reflexive Modernization: Politics, Tradition and Aesthetics in the Modern Social Order , 1994 .

[31]  Ortrun Zuber-Skerritt,et al.  Action Research for Change and Development , 2021 .

[32]  W. Hutton.  The State We're In , 1995 .

[33]  J. Peek,et al.  COMPASS AND GYROSCOPE : INTEGRATING SCIENCE AND POLITICS , 1995 .

[34]  John S. Dryzek,et al.  Ecology and discursive democracy: Beyond liberal capitalism and the administrative state∗ , 1992 .

[35]  Robert M. Christie,et al.  Economic and Social Development: A Process of Social Learning. , 1972 .

[36]  Robert E. Goodin,et al.  The Theory of Institutional Design: Institutions and Their Design , 1996 .

[37]  Edgar S. Dunn,et al.  Economic and social development : a process of social learning , 1974 .

[38]  N. Röling,et al.  Facilitating Sustainable Agriculture: Participatory Learning and Adaptive Management in Times of Environmental Uncertainty , 1999 .

[39]  S. Funtowicz,et al.  Science for the Post-Normal Age , 1993, Commonplace.

[40]  N. Röling,et al.  Wheelbarrows full of frogs: social learning in rural resource management : international research and reflections , 2002 .

[41]  I. Scoones,et al.  Participatory Learning and Action: A trainer's guide , 1995 .

[42]  Natasa Rupcic,et al.  The fifth discipline-the art and practice of the learning organisation , 2002 .

[43]  A. Giddens.  Beyond Left and Right: The Future of Radical Politics , 1994 .

[44]  John Friedmann,et al.  Planning as Social Learning , 1981 .

[45]  W. Hutton.  The State To Come , 1997 .

[46]  N. Maxwell.  Science, reason, knowledge, and wisdom: A critique of Specialism , 1980 .