Westman, L. orcid.org/0000-0003-4599-4996 and Huang, P. (2022) Ecological civilisation a historical perspective on environmental policy narratives in China. International Quarterly for Asian Studies, 53 (2). pp. 181-206. ISSN 2566-686X
Abstract
This paper engages with China’s currently most prominent environmental policy concept: ecological civilisation. As this concept is becoming a cornerstone of China’s strategy of socialist modernisation, we examine whether and how the term can enable ecological protection in China and beyond. We argue that ecological civilisation, while a recently emerged discourse, builds on established environmental governance practices in China that shape its manifestation in political action. To illustrate this argument, we explain how two philosophical principles central to ecological civilisation discourse, “holism” and “harmony”, have been expressed in environmental political practice in Communist China. Building on this analysis, we suggest that ecological civilisation discourse may have a profound impact in certain policy domains (e.g., resource conservation and ecological conservation redlines), but limited transformative capacity in others (e.g., environmental litigation and resource extraction).
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2022 The Authors. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License. https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-nd/4.0/ |
Keywords: | China; environmental policy; ecological civilisation; discourse; holism; harmony |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Research Institutes Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 15 Nov 2023 11:14 |
Last Modified: | 15 Nov 2023 11:15 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Arnold Bergstraesser Institute |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.11588/iqas.2022.2.13948 |
Related URLs: | |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:205371 |
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Filename: IQAS_Westman_Huang_Ecological Civilsation.pdf
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