CRITERIOS DE VALORACIÓN Y CARGA DE LA PRUEBA EN COLOMBIA.

How people are constructed in discourses of sustainability has implications for how people see themselves reflected in these discourses. What assumptions do

discourses of sustainability make about people and their ordinary lives? The following discussion presents evidence of two assumptions identified in discourses of

sustainability; firstly, that people are seen as consumers and secondly, that people are individuals.

People as consumers

Since the second half of the twentieth century, consumerism has been the predominant ideology of modern societies (Leis & Viola, 1995; Ophuls, 1977). Consumerism theoretically has origins in the work of economists, such as Adam Smith (1827), who claimed that “consumption is the sole end and purpose of all production” (p. 274). The practice of consumption was also popularised in the late 19th century as the means to which self-improvement and luxury can be achieved (Trentmann, 2016). People became valued and recognised for their contributions to the economy. Consequently, consumers has become the readily regarded term to describe people actively involved in markets – the buying and selling operations that lay at the heart of societies organised around economic growth (Norman, 2006).

Within economic understandings of consumerism, the people who consume are identified as ‘consumers’ and constructed as rational utility-maximising

individuals. The idea that consumers are ‘rational’ has been troubled across many disciplines, with scholars claiming that people are anything but rational in their consumption practices (Ourahmoune, 2015; Spaargaren, 1997). As noted by

(economics) and informing rational actors about the new green alternatives (social psychology), turn out to be insufficient” (p. 355). However, the normalised

assumptions regarding consumers inherited, for the most part, from the discipline of economics remain evident in discourses of sustainability.

For instance, neoliberal sustainability discourses have sought to theorise the ways that consumers contribute to problems of unsustainability and, at the same time, how they can be the solution. Yet predominantly, common understandings of ‘the consumer’ in discourses of sustainability tend to be static conceptions, that ignore more nuanced interpretations (Ourahmoune, 2015). For example, Spaargaren and Mol (2008) advocate identification of people as either consumer-citizens or citizen-

consumers. They consider these identity positions to be positive contributions toward global ‘consumership’ in the quest for eco-consumption practices.

Similarly, Clarke (2008) asserts that neoliberal sustainability discourses, such as eco-consumerism, remain invested in a consequentialist and teleological model of ethics that assume people will perform as active and aware consumers. Yet,

embedded in this assumption is the idea that people are in social positions that are afforded choice (Sanne, 2002). This choice is predicated on having the time available as a consumer to navigate confusing and at times contradictory information provided on products and services (Horne, 2009; Sanne, 2002).

Normalised assumptions of the consumer and consumerism are troubled in critical discourses of sustainability (Dryzek, 1997, 2013). The social sciences and humanities disciplines offer critical accounts of the individualist utilitarian model of the consumer posited by economists, yet, these accounts too tend to position

consumer identities as static and homologous categories (Trentmann, 1996, 2009, 2016). Recent explorations of consumer culture, consumer identities and

consumerism provide more nuanced accounts of what it means to be a consumer (Ourahmoune, 2015; Trentmann, 2009). Such accounts highlight the social and historical contexts and the fluidity of what it means to consume and how this

influences identity and knowledge formation (Ourahmoune, 2015; Trentmann, 2009). Consumerism and constructions of ‘the consumer’ are identified in critical discourses and as problems of unsustainability with solutions that equate with consuming less. Neoliberal sustainability discourses frame problems of unsustainability around forms of consumption, thereby equating the consumer as both problem and solution;

encouraging different practices of consumption rather than directing consumers to simply consume less.

Individualism

Following on from an assumption of people as consumers in neoliberal sustainability discourses, people are similarly painted as largely autonomous individuals whose ‘choices’ shape societies and economies. Spaargaren and Mol (2008), in agreement with Jackson (2008), claim that individualist models of change are outdated in sustainable consumption discourses. Middlemiss (2014) claims that, “…sustainable development scholars and practitioners need to consider a range of late-modern subjectivities, and be critically aware of how individualisation is potentially reproduced in policy and practice” (p. 930). Yet, individualist framings remain prevalent in discourses of sustainability. For example, Page-Hayes (2015) analysed article abstracts (n=487) published from 2011-2015 on ‘pro-environmental behaviour’ collected via internet search engines, Web of Science and Scopus. Her findings showed that over 70% of these articles concentrated on the individual and relatively apolitical activities such as recycling, private car use and electricity usage.

Arguably, discourses of sustainability have adopted assumptions that recognise people predominantly as individuals through consumption practices.

In consequence to the capitalist mode of production, people have arguably become more individualised (Abercrombie, Hill, & Turner, 2000). Individualism assumes that a person is unique and free to act (with certain limitations accorded with the law). This is also assumed to be a necessary element for societies structured by market relations (Abercrombie, Hill, & Turner, 2000); with people connected predominantly through buying and selling. Adding to this literature, Beck and Beck- Gernsheim (2002), among other sociologists, link individualisation to modernity (Giddens, 1991). They suggest that people’s identities are a constant project and are not just a ‘given’ based on the social, cultural and political context of the social location (Beck & Beck-Gernsheim, 2002; White & Wyn, 2013), which in turn encourages individuals to create their own biographies and to express themselves in career choice, fashion, material possessions and hobbies among other life practices. Other scholars talk about the creation of a life as a kind of artistic project (Bateson, 2001; Bauman, 2008).

Yet, some feminists have argued that the individualisation thesis is biased toward middle class male privilege and the scope for agency that this positioning affords (Adkins, 2002; Jackson, 2008; Skeggs, 2003). These critiques suggest that not all ‘individuals’ have the same opportunities for the agency assumed within

understandings of what has been called the reflexive project of the self (Giddens, 1991). While the equity of selfhood aligned with an individual’s social location remains contentious, constructions of individualism are increasingly popularised in modern societies. Such accounts of people as individuals are embedded in the assumptions of neoliberal sustainability discourses (Middlemiss, 2008).

In neoliberal sustainability discourses of sustainable consumption, for instance, it is assumed that people act autonomously, think autonomously and rationally, and that people are happy to accept personal responsibility for what are often thought of as ‘global problems’ such as child labour or deforestation (Clarke, 2008; Seyfang, 2006). Maniates (2001) labels these ideas in American

environmentalism as ‘individualisation of responsibility’.

In contrast, research and policy solutions to problems of unsustainability often include creating and establishing networks of people, such as in local food systems to promote eating and sharing local produce (Hendrikx, Dormans, Lagendijk, &

Thelwall, 2017; Wittman & Blesh, 2017), or carpool networks to reduce greenhouse emissions from single occupancy transportation (Bruck, Incerti, Iori, & Vignoli, 2017; Tahmasseby, Kattan & Barbour, 2015). Constructing people as individuals influences how problems of unsustainability and relative solutions are constructed and

conceptualised in the discourses.

Yet, how people are constructed in discourses influences how it is that ‘people’ relate to them. Can particular people see themselves reflected in what is being said? And if so, how do they see themselves reflected? Conrad (2012) terms this “the resonance ability of the frames presented” (p. 1). Sustainability literature suggests that if people cannot identify or connect with a discourse, then there is less likelihood of engagement with it (Conrad, 2012; Hajer, 1995, 2005). Critical

questions should be asked of how people are experiencing discourses of

sustainability. For instance, are the assumptions (such as people as consumers and individuals) representative of the people to/about which these discourses speak? And, what kind of representations of more ‘marginal’ people are implicit or explicit in sustainability discourse? In this research, I trouble these assumptions by asking

individuals how they locate themselves in various ways in discourses of sustainability (Research Objective 2).

2.3 Summary

In this chapter, I provided an overview of the historical and current context of hegemonic sustainability discourses in modern societies. I discussed how problems of unsustainability including but not limited to environmental damage, poverty and increasing population have compelled multiple and competing discourses of

sustainability. I proposed that there are two waves of sustainability discourses, noting the caveat that the division between these two waves is anything but clear. The first wave is considered critical discourses that question modernist pursuits of progress, as defined and achieved through economic growth. The second wave are considered neoliberal discourses that are framed within the current economic model. While many attempts are made by scholars and policy makers to define what sustainability is, I argued (in support of Davison (2008) and Dobson (1999)) that for a concept to hold meaning, it must be socially, culturally and historically relevant in a local context. This study goes some way to understanding located encounters and

conceptualisations of sustainability in social locations outside what is predominantly represented in sustainability discourses.

In addition, research reported in this chapter, compels scholars and policy makers to consider how agency is constituted and how individualism is represented and reflected in discourses of sustainability. With the exception of the authors mentioned above, almost completely absent from the field of sustainability are conceptualisations of what sustainability means and can look like from across a diversity of social locations. This work, I argue, provides an opportunity for

environmentalists and policy makers to examine and understand – in new ways – the experiences of sustainability from people who, for the most part, are disengaged from hegemonic accounts.

In the next chapter, I begin to examine more closely conceptions of social location and identity and develop the theoretical and methodological framework that I utilise in this study to explore encounters of sustainability of people from a diverse range of social contexts.