Sustainability 2.0

Through this class I can now proudly say that I am more aware of what sustainability is or what it means to be sustainable, and would gladly share my knowledge with anyone that might care to listen. Sustainability is a multi-faceted word. It’s meaning can hardly be confined within the boundaries of plurality. According to some, like Orr, sustainability has two basic parts: “technological and ecological”. He views technological sustainability as a means through which humankind can solve the environmental dilemmas at hand and ecological sustainability as a way of discovering what habits or actions got the us into these environmental dilemmas in the first place. Environment: Science and Policy for Sustainable Development, however, speaks of “sustainable development”, which is that “humanity has the ability to make development sustainable—to ensure that it meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. And the list goes on and on! Many individuals, including some in our class, perceive this multi-definitiveness of “sustainability” as preventative of an overall understanding of the word. I do not agree with this. The fact that “sustainability” has so many different meanings gives it flexibility. In society, flexibility has always been proven as an efficient way of preserving a cause or movement because it allows the individual application on a personal level. For example, it seems that environmentally friendly clothing and apparel are all the rage these days. Some people buy wallets made out of recycling because they want to save the world, others buy them simply because they look cool. In the end, it doesn’t matter why they bought the wallet because either way they are supporting the recycling movement. Applying this concept to the word “sustainability”, it doesn’t matter how one interprets the word, if they are paying attention to the movement, the word has achieved it’s purpose. Because “sustainability” has so many applications, it can be seen as a gateway word. Use of this word might cause individuals to inquire more about the environmental movement. Therefore, sustainability is a word with many meanings lending it flexibility to interpretation and, as a result, greater awareness and acceptance of the environmental movement as a whole.