ABSTRACT
This conclusion presents some closing thoughts on the key concepts discussed in the preceding chapters of this book. The book examines developed ideas about the forms of organization for environmental management which are suited to the challenges posed by the pressing need for sustainable development. It argues that the challenges posed by environmental crises place severe constraints on long-established elements of political culture in industrial societies. The book explores that the emergence of global environmental problems poses profound challenges to the rationality that has dominated Western science and technology since the Enlightenment. It argues that innovative organizational forms for promoting environmental management and strategic planning for sustainability–action networks. The book examines the main institutional constraints on managing for sustainable development: the massive complexity of environmental problems; the difficulty in balancing 'top-down' and 'bottom-up' initiatives in environmental management and planning; and the great turbulence of the world as industrialism becomes a global condition.
