ABSTRACT
The notion of sustainability has been informed by different epistemologies. Contemporary views are based on economic and technocratic approaches or stress environmental and holistic goals. While diverse perspectives, actors and scales may incite inclusive interactions, the conceptual ambiguity and incongruence of the term also allows for political instrumentalisation and complicates local planning and practice. This chapter examines the rationales of sustainability developed by UN International Agendas over the past four decades – particularly the Earth Summit Declarations of 1972, 1992, 2002 and 2012 and the role attributed to local planning and practice in a global scenario. An economic and pro-growth view committed to the epistemology of progress and a socio-ecological view committed to a relational epistemology are identified and examined. It is argued that these two opposing approaches to sustainability lead to different understandings of local sustainability practice, but also maximise ambiguities that end up distorting agendas. Socio-ecologically effective and appropriate sustainability practices will thus be proposed and illustrated.
