GlobalEnvironmenlol

Change.Vol. 6, No. 2. pp. 81-85. 1996

Copyright 0 1996 Elsevier Science Ltd
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Viewpoint

Post-modernism and
global environmental
change
Piers M Blaikie

Post-modernism has been invading narratives’ which tend to be highly

Post-modernism presently challenges
and invigorating the social sciences teleological and assume the validity of
our interpretations of science, social
over the past twenty years or more, their underlying assumptions and their
science and specifically how we
and now engages with the foundations claims. These meta-narratives include
understand and study global and
of the natural sciences, policy making all religions, liberal democracy,
environmental change (GEC).
and development studies. In the open- modern science and ‘development’ to
Irritating and absurd to some,
ing words of Pauline Rosenau’s book, mention a few, and it treats all their
liberating and fascinating to others,
‘post-modernism haunts social science claims with incredulity. Thus, the role
all of us are having to respond one
today’. It has moved like the incoming of environmental scientists in policy
way or another. The role of science
tide across an estuary it has changed making as ‘talking truth to power’
and alternative ways of under-
whole landscapes deceptively fast, and as the only rational and legitimate
standing GEC, the state and how
initially overlaying familiar terrains brokers between the ‘real’ environment
policy is made - all of these are
with a shallow new surface. The and the rest of us, is rejected. Instead,
being increasingly questioned by a
pacey, glitzy style with a mass of new scientific truth may be seen to be
post-modern approach. The article
jargon may seem merely a new fashion, socially negotiated, rather than univer-
suggests grounds for resisting the
and one which does not substantially sal and invariably reproduced under
post-modern advance and re-
occupy intellectual space to any depth. the same experimental conditions and
asserting a modernist agenda and
But with time the post-modern agenda assumptions, whoever carries them
other grounds on which post-
has been elaborated, gained depth and out. Different people, scientists and
modernism offers exciting new
swept onto new areas. Global environ- non-scientists alike, claim different
opportunities, which should be
mental change, which spans natural truths about the environment. Michael
grasped. Copyright 0 1996 Elsevier
sciences, policy and development Thompson’s aphorism. when describ-
Science Ltd
studies, is currently experiencing its ing the degrees of scientific uncertainty
first waves. Perhaps it is time to recog- about the state of the environment in
nize that already some people are the Himalayan region, ‘the institutions
getting their feet wet. On what criteria are the facts’ may unsettle some, while
should one decide to retreat to higher others may shrug and say ‘what’s
ground. stick it out unmoved until the new? We always knew that our scienti-
tide turns, or learn to swim? fic so-called truths were provisional
At the risk of seeming hasty and and socially determined. just like
shallow myself, I will try in a few para- those claimed by anyone else’. But an
graphs to suggest some of the major inclination either way is not proof
ways post-modernism challenges the against some further haunting
modern project of understanding thoughts.
Piers M Blaikie is a professor at the
global environmental change and Second, and related to the first
School of Development Studies,
University of East Anglia, Norwich. His
doing something about it when it point, the concern in post-modernism
research interests focus on developing causes problems. First, it challenges with the way in which different knowl-
countries. all embracing world views or ‘meta- edge(s) is/are constructed and

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Post-modernism and global environmental change: P M Blaikie
promoted has questioned the privi- theory and in some areas (such as
leged status of scientific knowledge rangeland ecology) a retreat from
and tended to talk up those of other formal modelling has echoed narra-
less powerful groups, particularly the tives from local resource users from
local, indigenous and others less able within scientific methodology itself.
to make their own knowledge claims For many the retreat from clear
heard. This tendency is more predictive modelling based upon quan-
pronounced in areas of global environ- titative methodologies may seem more
mental change where the local hands- likely in the future (see Behnke et al’
on experience of the environment of on new developments in range ecol-
farmers, pastoralists and forest dwell- ogy), but the uncertain and infinitely
ers of the South has challenged scienti- complicated terrain behind their backs
fic views ~ on land degradation, may seem even less safe.
desertification and biodiversity (to Fourth, post-modernism calls for
choose three major foci in Agenda 21). the ‘death of the author’ and an end
It is less in evidence in such areas as to the polite and docile acceptance of
ozone depletion and climate change, her/his narrative into which subjects
where for obvious reasons a folk or are inserted into an unexamined and
alternative set of views hardly exists. I totalizing set of assumptions and
shall return to this later. values - ones which readers are not
Third, what may be called the post- invited to take a part in and shape for
structural aspects of post-modernism themselves. In part, the question
has turned modernist epistemology posed is ‘is it the right of the author
and methodology inside out. The to represent the subject, rather than
familiar structural approach to reality the latter to represent themselves, tell
- as being empirically verifiable by their own authentic stories and let
observing phenomena as objective them be heard above and outside the
facts ~ is being challenged by another master narrative of the author?’ For
which holds that reality is socially example, a rural family living at the
constructed. An epistemology which interface between the humid tropical
builds models of society and environ- forest and agricultural land may find
ment with causal connections is chal- itself inserted into a meta-narrative
lenged by one which is constituted as about biodiversity conservation,
a series of descriptive accounts accord- national parks, and exclusive legal
ing to different actors’ perceptions. instruments which rob it of its liveli-
Instead of models, hypotheses of hood (‘green imperialism’, as some
limited application, and instead of might call it, as in Richard Grove’s
explanations of human behaviour new book of that title). So, how are
based on determining structural vari- international environmental agendas
ables (eg gender, wealth, status, educa- promoted and whose story should be
tional attainment), an infinitely told?
variable and subjective set of accounts I have constructed a post-modernist
from actors who reflect upon and try pastiche for environmental issues,
and make sense of their worlds. Under whether it concerns deforestation, soil
what circumstances should difference conservation, national parks, over-
be reconciled and empirical testing be fishing or biodiversity to illustrate
the arbiter of whose narrative is right some of these points. It goes something
or correct ~ or even credible‘? All this like this:-
has profound implications for how
people make decisions about resource Biodiversity/soil conservation/global
use at the local level, which in aggre- warming is the latest environmental
gate is the stuff of global environmen- icon to cast its aura of respect and
tal change. All this throws a new set mystery across entire terrains, both
of bright and confusing patterns like a semiotic and material. It has pro-
constantly shaken kaleidoscope upon vided significant scaffolding for mas-
‘R H Behnke Jr, I Scoones and C Kerven the contests over the meaning of ter discourses about the environment
(eds) Range Ecology at Disequilibrium.
‘environment’. ‘resources’. values and involving both policy and practice.
New Mode/s of Natural Variability and
Pastoral Adaptation in African Savannas. normative notions about what should The globalization of such environ-
ODI, London, 1993 be done. The application of chaos mental discourses has involved the

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 Post-modemim and global environmental change: P M Bliakie
successful privileging of particular power and representation have tended
scientific configurations of nature to lead researchers from diverse
over others (objectifications of nat- terrains by convergent paths to rather
ure, mappings, taxonomies, classifi- similar conclusions. Most of these
cations), and created new forms of challenge the modernist possibilities of
institutional and legislative interven- progress in identifying global environ-
tions at global, national and local mental change in a scientific and
levels. All these have been conjured rational manner and bringing about
from the professional and cultural measures to combat what are
repertoires of international scientists perceived as its most serious problems.
and environmental lawyers which Some writers have recognized that
themselves have been selectively pur- there remains a political and practical
chased and shaped to fit the acquisi- vacuum because few of this genre
tive strategies of international have suggested how diverse accounts
pharmaceutical/timber/mining com- of the world can be negotiated or
panies. Alter-native constructions of reconciled to provide feasible paths
nature, embedded bio-regional nar- for action. While some cautiously fill
ratives have at times been either the vacuum with their own normative
expunged at the end of the barrel of development or environmentalist
a gun (eg from the tropical forests agenda, for most critique and decon-
of East Timor), devalued and discre- struction remain their objectives. Care
dited. or merely buried in silence. At in his book Po.\t-nlorir~rnisnl ~utl thr
other times they have been appro- EnviwrmwntuI c‘risi.s reminds us of
priated as decoration. as fig leaf, as Maclntyre’s suggestion that to answer
wholesale disguise in the name of the question ‘What am I to do’!‘. it is
indigenous knowledge, participation necessary to answer the prior question
and co-management. Case studies ‘Of what storv or stories do I find
are enframed and boxed in text as myself a part?” Therefore. it would be
reified ‘success stories’ in World to miss the point of these analyses of
Bank documents while business environment and development entirely
continues. dismally and destruc- to seek in some way their ‘policy rele-
tively. as usual. However. local resis- vance’. None the less, the challenge
tance from marginalized and remains to be able to ask and get
subaltern groups exists and must be answers to both Maclntyre’s questions
recognized. For this reason environ- to be aware of the post-modern
mental discourses are important concern about the stories of which we
because they open up political are a part. but also to take a view on
spaces for these groups as the only what should be done about them.
authentic voice for the local recov- The one paradigm of environmental
ery of nature. management and conservation which
has put down roots in this unmapped
There is plenty of diversity, creativity area (whose story? what to do?) is
and innovation within this formula neo-populist developmentalism. which
and it has already had a profound in many ways shares the fundamental
impact upon the more earnest, unques- assumptions of the post-modern expo-
tioning and unquestioned environmen- sition of environment and develop-
tal and development paradigms, based ment discourses. For example,
upon notions of progress and the Pimbert and Pretty’ effectively
application of science to produce a contrasts the modernist approach to
singular and authoritative version of biodiversity conservation (expert led.
‘A E Gare, Postmodernism and the Envir- truth. I for one, am learning to swim centralized, rational authoritative and
onmental Crisis. Routledge, London, 1995
on the tide, but there are many serious science led) to the ‘process’ led
3M P Pimbert and J N Pretty, Participation,
People, and the Management of National questions, which are only just being approach (indigenous knowledge led,
Parks and Protected Areas: Past Failures asked. let alone answered. decentralized. subjective, holistic and
and Future Promises. Discussion Paper, For all the diversity and invention of empowering). Chambers” has effec-
UNRISD, IIED, WWF, 1994 many writers about environment and tively critiqued what he calls ‘normal
% Chambers, ChaNenging the Profes-
development from this broad professionalism’ in which development
sions: Frontiers for Rural Devetopment,
Intermediate Technology Publications, approach, the overarching post- professionals fail to adapt their institu-
London, 1993 modern assumptions regarding truth. tionally imprinted attitudes to the

83
Post-modernism and global environmental change: P A4 Blaikie

creation of development knowledge to Further attention to the development

the social environments of the South. interface such as Beyond Farmer First
An enormous literature has developed and Battlefields qf Kno~Mge~ provide
out of earlier work in ethno-science interesting insights into the lifeworlds
and ethno-botany, which reifies and of development workers and their so-
idealizes indigenous knowledge as called beneficiaries, but the overall
being the true, authentic, relevant and message is that everything is very poli-
sustainable knowledge for environ- tical, very complicated, and that the
mental management. Article after arti- assumptions of rational policy making
cle recounts with surprise and being implemented in the way in
enthusiasm how local people know so which international institutions and
much about their own environment ~ national governments expect must be
which maybe should not seem all that jettisoned for ever. Absorbing though
remarkable. since they live there and many of these insights are. they do
earn a living from it on a daily basis. not help us out of the cul-de-sac. The
These messages about local knowledge central contradiction still remains for
are used to discredit the classic, top- the popular cry in global environmen-
down, centralized, science led develop- tal change ‘think global, act local‘.
ment model which grew out of the How does the global thinking get
colonial model and has been reshaped translated into local action without
into the eurocentric and technocentric facing contradictions at all levels, poli-
developmentalism so effectively tical, epistemological, methodological,
critiqued by Sachs,’ Edwards’ and and practical?
Chambers.’ So swim, move to higher ground
There are strong genealogical aft? or stick it out until the tide turns? I
nities between this current neo-popu- suggest the first two, but not the third
list fashion in conservation and post- option. Like this:-
modern social science. Neo-populist
developmentalism might be said to The ca.s~~/tir .r~Ymming. It is useful to
have created a new meta-narrative understand how environmental knowl-
from the deconstructed remains of the edge is constructed at the international
old. There remains crucial ambiguities. level. The politics and sociology of
First, what should be the role of non- environmental science and related
local, exogenous agendas, particularly policy studies is currently providing
those which are politically and ideolo- penetrating insights eg Redclift and
gically favoured by the vanguard of Benton’s edited book Social Theor?
progressive developmentalists in the and the Clohul Environment” and
north (eg poverty focus, justice, Hanningan’s Environmentul Soc~iol-
women and development, sustainable og~‘.‘” Much of the international finan-
crop yields etc)? What happens, and cial underwriting of such research
what .shoulri happen when a local and favours a highly centralized and
diverse politics lead to local ‘big men’ limited caucus of ‘centres of excel-
cornering the market for a local lence’. A diverse, even contradictory
resource, to the systematic exclusion but mutually communicating network
5W Sachs (ed) The Development Diction- of women from new livelihood oppor- of centres of research on issues of
ary, Zed Press, London, 1992 tunities, and to a fulfilled wish to cut global and local environmental change
6M Edwards, ‘The irrelevance of develop- down the remaining forest or to extir- is both richer and safer. It also
ment studies’, Third World Quarterly,
pate a rare species? Should expert, increases the chances of successful
Vol 2. No 1, pp 116-134
‘R Chambers, Rural Development: Putting scientific, professional, national and negotiation. particularly if a f2ir
the Last First, Longman, Harlow, 1983 global concerns be pressed and how’? number of these centres are from the
‘N Long and A Long, Battlefields of Knowl- The underlying problem with neo- south, since they can participate in the
edge. The lnterlocking of Theory and
populist developmentalism is that it is construction of knowledge about the
Practice in Social Science Research and
Development, Routledge, London, 1992 a modernist project in post-modern global environment and own it. The
‘M Redclift and T Benton (eds), Social clothing. It privileges alternative and high degree of centralization of
Theory and the Global Environment, Rou- local views over centralized and possi- computer intensive research on climate
tledge, London, 1994 bly eurocentric ones, but leaves the change has already been remarked
“J Hanningan, Environmental Sociology,
Routledge, London, 1995
role of science and exogenous institu- upon by in Redclift and Benton’s
“Redclift and Benton. op tit, Ref 9. chap- tions (eg the state, or the international edited book.” Secondly, the neo-
ter 8 secretariat of CITES) ambiguous. populist model for delivering the ‘act

84
 Post-modernism and global environmental change: P M Bliakie

local’ part of project, while suffering Amazon) and cutting of the forest is
from a central contradiction, is centred accelerating very fast. The Hyundai
upon notions of justice, respect and Corporation wants to log 300000 ha
rights. It should be recognized that of the Bikin River Basin in Russia,
global agendas that have been, and while Cltoh and Company and
will continue to be, formulated by Weyerhauser along with Norwegian
international environmental accords and Finnish logging companies have
and national policy will have to be all signed agreements to fell (and, if
promoted locally, and privileged over previous experience is a guide, to clear
some local interests. Sometimes these cut) very large areas of the Taiga in
global environmental agendas must be Karelia, the Botcha River basin and
negotiated and applied flexibly, some- along the coast of Khabarovsk. Why
times with agreed levels of compensa- was it that a French logging company
tion, and sometimes maybe better was able to win a concession of
modified and reduced drastically. 800000 ha in Cameroon, just a few
Notions of brokerage of global agen- months after the French government
das with careful attention to human agreed a bilateral loan in hard
rights and natural justice should currency which averted the certain
perhaps appear more prominently, defaulting in repayment of a World
rather than preoccupations with alter- Bank loan? These are events of such
native constructions of environmental significance but so commonplace. Yet,
(and other) types of knowledge. judging by their relative amount of
The case@ moving to higher ground. copy in journals. they simply are not
This means resisting the more extreme part of mainstream global environ-
and absurd claims of the sceptical mental discourse. All this is a far cry
post-modernists and retaining a from academic post-modern discourse,
modernist agenda and the central role but so important for understanding
of the scientist. This will happen the causes of environmental change.
anyway, but there are some vital areas The case ,for sticking it out until the
of research of a basic and simple kind tide turns. I do not think this is an
which focus on some of the major option. First, this course of (in)action
players in causing environmental would confirm some of the worst
change. and are a far remove from the aspects of the old and discredited devel-
post-modern talk of ‘contested opmentalism and environmental
terrains’ and struggles over meaning. management ~ normal professionalism,
They concern changes of great direct green imperialism, technocentric and
and incontrovertible impact on the top-down planning and most of the
global environment. For example, the other epithets of disapproval used in
circumstances in which multinational this article! Secondly. the tide has
corporations gain access to timber moved in too far and sticking means
concessions so large that their eventual drowning. There is no way that
impact dwarfs all the world’s partici- Agendu 21 or any other global environ-
patory neo-populist projects put mental initiative can move forward
together, are not published in learned without contested meanings, crises of
journals much, perhaps because they representation, and questioning of the
are not intellectually interesting. Take authority of facts. It is happening now
for example the case of Russian and with the processes of globalization
forests. It is estimated by Greenpeace and the teletronic revolution it will
that 130 million tonnes of carbon are continue. Finally, if and when the
stored in the boreal forests of Russia post-modern tide ever changes, the
(compared to an estimated 80 million landscape, both real and semiotic, will
tonnes in the vegetation of the have ceased to be recognizable anyway.

85