Stevenson, H. (2015) Contemporary Discourses of Green Political Economy: A Q Method Analysis. Journal of Environmental Policy and Planning. ISSN 1523-908X
Abstract
For over two decades, the concept of sustainable development has been salient in political discourse. But its promise of reconciling economic development, social welfare, and environmental sustainability has proven rather elusive. In recent years, we've seen numerous competing concepts emerge in debates about sustainable economic development. While many advance ideas of a green economy and green growth, others talk about wellbeing, gross national happiness, inclusive wealth, harmony with nature, de-growth, steady-state economy, and buenvivir (living well). This rhetorical diversity shows that there is no single vision for reconciling environmental sustainability and economic development. But the varied terminology itself obscures actual points of agreement and disagreement. This article reports on a bilingual ‘Q study’ of international debates about sustainable economic development. It reveals that three discourses underpin these debates: Radical Transformationism; Cooperative Reformism; and Statist Progressivism. The article dissects these discourses and contextualizes their key points of contention in wider sustainability debates over the past two decades.
Metadata
Item Type: | Article |
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Authors/Creators: |
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Copyright, Publisher and Additional Information: | © 2015 The Author. Published by Taylor & Francis. This is an Open Access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (http://creativecommons.org/Licenses/by/4.0/), which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited. Permission is granted subject to the terms of the License under which the work was published. Please check the License conditions for the work which you wish to reuse. Full and appropriate attribution must be given. This permission does not cover any third party copyrighted material which may appear in the work requested. |
Keywords: | Sustainable economy; Green political economy; Sustainable development; Q method; Discourse |
Dates: |
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Institution: | The University of Sheffield |
Academic Units: | The University of Sheffield > Faculty of Social Sciences (Sheffield) > Department of Politics and International Relations (Sheffield) |
Depositing User: | Symplectic Sheffield |
Date Deposited: | 30 Nov 2015 15:07 |
Last Modified: | 23 Feb 2016 11:53 |
Published Version: | http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/1523908X.2015.1118681 |
Status: | Published |
Publisher: | Taylor & Francis |
Refereed: | Yes |
Identification Number: | 10.1080/1523908X.2015.1118681 |
Open Archives Initiative ID (OAI ID): | oai:eprints.whiterose.ac.uk:91463 |