36  Clumsy solutions to environmental change

Lessons from cultural theory

Michael Thompson

Introduction

“Knowledge is always shaped by the organizational setting in which it is produced” is the cry of those who have taken the social constructionist crock (e.g., Jasanoff and Wynne, 1998). “Of course,” reply cultural theorists, “in which case we should press on to enquire into how many organizational arrangements there are, and how it is that each of them constitutes the production line for a particular kind of knowledge.” Cultural theorists then argue that there are just four ways of organizing, each of which is, at the same time, a way of disorganizing the other three.¹ Each way of organizing, the theory holds, shapes the knowledge it produces in such a way as to strengthen itself and weaken its rivals (Figure 36.1).²

At first glance this may appear to be a daunting diagram, but much of what it contains is fairly orthodox. Indeed, two of its ways of organizing – individualism and hierarchy – have long been familiar to institutional theorists; they are usually referred to as markets and hierarchies (Williamson, 1975; Lindblom, 1977), with their somewhat tangled roots reaching back to the dualistic distinctions of the masters: Maine’s (1861) contract and status, Tönnies’ (1887) Gesellschaft and Gemeinschaft and Durkheim’s (1893) organic solidarity and mechanical solidarity.³ The theory’s novelty therefore lies in its addition of the other two ways of organizing – egalitarianism and fatalism – and in its making explicit the different social constructions (or myths of nature) that sustain and justify these four fundamental arrangements for the promotion of social transactions. For good measure, it also explains the sort of dynamic and contentious processes that generate this fourfold typology; the ways of organizing and their associated ways of knowing can thus be seen as recurrent regularities within an endless flux, like eddies in a fast-flowing stream.

Hierarchies are founded on formal status distinctions and inculcate deference. In consequence, their constituent social beings (to use Durkheim’s terminology) tend to place their trust in expert, certified knowledge and to subscribe to a view of nature that is forgiving of many interventions but is vulnerable to those excessive perturbations that may carry the totality beyond its stabilizing limits. Hence the icon (in Figure 36.1) of a ball nestled in a valley between two peaks. Hierarchical actors also tend to a view of human nature as originated in sin but redeemable by firm, long-lasting and nurturing institutions (as in the headmasterly “Give me the boy and I will give you the man”). Steering a careful path between the egalitarian actors and the individualist actors, hierarchical actors are committed to wise guidance and far-sighted stewardship.

Everything, therefore, hinges on their discovering just where the limits are and then ensuring (by statutory regulation, in the case of the nation state, and by more homely, face-to-face sanctions in the case of, say, the Himalayan village) that everyone stays on the right side of them. Whenever we hear talk of “safe limits,” “assimilative capacities,” “tolerable risks,” “carrying capacities,” “dangerous climate change” – and we hear such talk in both global and local forums – we are in the presence of hierarchy.

Individualist actors, however, do not talk like this. They see nature as robust enough to bounce back from anything we throw at it – hence the ball in the basin (in Figure 36.1) – and they consider man as inherently competitive and self-seeking. They put their trust in those institutional arrangements – the sort of ego-focused networks that characterize markets – that harness man’s self-seeking nature to the benefit of all. Adam Smith’s “invisible hand,” these actors feel, is all the guidance they need, and they note that its track-record in terms of wealth creation and technological innovation has not yet been brought to a halt by any natural limit. “If something is unsustainable,” they reassure one another, “it will stop!”

Individualist actors are not too fussy about the form their knowledge takes. What matters to them is that it works (and that it works for them before it works for their competitors). What does cause them concern is when the hierarchical and egalitarian actors use their knowledge to justify placing restrictions on the individualistic urge to engage in trial-and-error. “Curiosity killed the cat” is not a proverb that appeals to them, nor are they particularly interested in “treading lightly on the earth.” “Suck it up and see” is more to their taste: an attitude that results in a never-ending, exuberant and anarchic interrogation of Mother Nature.

Others – the egalitarian actors – see nature as everywhere precarious – hence the ball on the up-turned basin – and consider man as essentially caring-and-sharing, until corrupted by coercive and unjust institutions. Egalitarians are aghast at this business-as-usual complacency, and will point out that the individualist actor’s true predicament is akin to that of the man who, having fallen off the top of a skyscraper, remarks “So far, so good” as he passes each floor. Nor are the egalitarian actors prepared to stop off at the hierarchical halfway-house. Nature, they are convinced, allows us no safe limits (see Figure 36.1), and they are deeply distrustful of the sort of “bench science” that is so relied on by the hierarchical actors. Holism – the insistence that “you can never change just one thing” (which, of course, is what those bench scientists claim to do) – is the bedrock of egalitarian science.

Finally, fatalism is the odd one out, in the sense that, unlike with the other three, its rules are made by those who are not themselves the upholders of this way of organizing. Fatalism is a sort of passive margin that is made up of those who find themselves squeezed out from the three “active” ways: unable (like the “undeserving poor”) to conform to the expectations of the hierarchy, unable to come up with the entry fee for the market, and unable to muster the communal fervor and engagement that keeps the upholders of egalitarianism equal and united. Nature, they know, operates without rhyme or reason, and man is inherently fickle and untrustworthy. With no way of ever getting in sync with nature (i.e., push the ball this way or that and the feedback is everywhere the same (see Figure 36.1)) – or of building trust with others, the fatalist world (unlike the other three) is one in which learning is impossible. “Don’t just do something, stand there” is therefore the sensible advice.

Because of the dualistic focus on markets and hierarchies, the other two ways of organizing – egalitarianism and fatalism – have tended to be ignored by social science in general and by policy science in particular. This has resulted in a regrettable loss of explanatory power, as is evident in the case, back in the 1990s, of the enormous Brent Spar oil storage structure, the deep ocean disposal of which was proposed by the market actor – Shell – and approved by the hierarchical actor – the British government’s regulatory agency.

Had there been only markets and hierarchies the Brent Spar would now be an artificial reef way out in the Atlantic, but of course it is not. Another actor – Greenpeace – from a third way of organizing (egalitarianism) forced its way in, at the eleventh hour, by audaciously landing a helicopter on the structure as it was being towed towards what the market and hierarchical actors had agreed was to be its final resting place. Such was the media attention that Shell quickly abandoned its disposal plans (motorists, especially in Germany, having stopped buying its petrol) and the British government was left with egg all over its face (John Major, the prime minister at the time, called Shell’s senior management “wimps”). Shell then entered into lengthy negotiations with Greenpeace, and the Brent Spar was eventually cut up into huge cylindrical sections to help form a ferry terminal in Norway. Those British citizens who managed to remain ignorant of the entire affair (and they were many) or who found themselves totally convinced by whichever of the protagonists they happened to have last seen arguing their case on television, were evidently bound into none of the “active” ways of organizing and constituted the fourth and rather “inactive” way – fatalism – assuring one another either that ignorance is bliss or that “Nothing we could do would make any difference anyway.”

So cultural theory, by doubling up from two ways to four, and by filling in their contentious and non-linear dynamics, is able to make sense – predictive sense – of something that must always remain beyond the explanatory grasp of those who have equipped themselves with the conventional (i.e., dualistic) social and policy science wisdom. That is the practical argument in favor of cultural theory.

The next step along the road to clumsy solutions is to point out that these four ways of organizing, in varying strengths and patterns of pair-wise alliance, are clearly discernible almost anywhere you care to look: in debates over water engineering in South Asia (Gyawali, 2001; Thompson and Gyawali, 2007; Gyawali and Dixit, 2010), in international fora where delegates struggle to do something about climate change (Thompson et al., 1998; Douglas et al., 2003; Verweij, 2006, 2011); in the different ways international regimes cope with trans-boundary risks such as water pollution (Verweij, 2000) and municipalities go about the business of transport planning (Hendriks, 1994); in the various ways households set about making ends meet (Dake and Thompson, 1999); in the different diagnoses of the pensions crisis in countries with ageing populations (Ney, 2009) and in the different panaceas that are variously championed and rejected by theorists of public administration (Hood, 1998), to mention but a few.

In all these examples we find that each way of organizing is generating a storyline that inevitably contradicts those that are generated by the other ways. Each, in rejecting the others, then seeks to impose its elegant solution: the solution that is nicely matched to the problem as it is defined in its storyline. Yet, since each storyline distils certain elements of experience and wisdom that are missed by the others, and since each provides a clear expression of the way in which a significant portion of the populace feels we should live with one another and with nature, it is important that they all be taken into some sort of account in the policy process: that they are all able to make themselves heard, and that each is then responded to by the others. That, in essence, is the case for clumsiness (Verweij and Thompson, 2006).

This cultural theory framing, we should note, takes us straight to some normative advice – “elegance out, clumsiness in” – without our having to invoke the notion of sustainable development. Sustainable development, we can now see, really only makes sense in relation to the hierarchical myth of nature (Figure 36.1). Behavior that lies within the stable trough between the two humps is sustainable; behavior that takes us beyond those humps and onto the downward slopes is unsustainable (and this is consistent with the concept of assimilative capacity, which was the basis for the British government’s giving of the all clear to the Brent Spar’s ocean disposal). But, with the individualist’s myth – the ball in the basin – all development is sustainable (which is what Shell’s scientists argued) whilst, with the egalitarian myth – the ball on the upturned basin – no development is sustainable (which is what Greenpeace’s scientists were insisting when they argued that, in relation to marine ecosystems, there is no scientific validity to the concept of assimilative capacity).

To rely on the notion of sustainable development, and to require that the policy debate be conducted in terms of it, is simply to impose one social construction – one myth of nature, one storyline – and discard the others. That, of course, is the epitome of elegance and the suppression of clumsiness: the exact opposite of what is needed. A moratorium on the word “sustainability” is therefore the first essential if we are to stand any chance of not making things worse than they already are.

Clumsy approaches to human security

Should this moratorium also be extended to the concept of human security? The answer is a qualified “No,” in the sense that all humans, be they binding themselves into the hierarchical, individualist, egalitarian or fatalist ways of organizing, are concerned about security, but in very different ways.

For the hierarchical actor, the biggest fear is loss of control. That is why the British government’s agency carefully re-examined its involvement in the Brent Spar fiasco and concluded that its initial decision – that the disposal be permitted – had been “flawed,” in that it had failed to take account of the “thin end of the wedge” implications: that the precedent would open the way for a host of similar disposals and that they, added together, would exceed the ocean’s assimilative capacity. In carefully shifting its position in this way, this hierarchical actor was able to regain control. This is the voice that talks of “global stewardship,” that readily invokes the fallacy of composition (that what is rational for the parts – belt-tightening during a recession, say – may be disastrous for the whole) and that insists that global human security problems (such as climate change) demand global and expertly planned solutions.

For individualistic actors, there is not really anything out there in the environment that could trigger a loss of security. But unwarranted interference with the proper functioning of the market does cause them concern. And of course it is the hierarchical actors (with all their statutory regulation) and the egalitarian actors (with their precautionary principles and their “tabooing” of nature) who are all the time striving to do exactly that! So this is the voice that calls for deregulation, for the freedom to innovate and take risks, and for the internalization of environmental costs so as to “get the prices right.”

For egalitarian actors, the loss of security is very much inherent in the way we are currently treating the environment, and that, in turn, is very much a consequence of the grossly inequitable ways in which we are treating one another. We (by which they mean those who are binding themselves into the non-egalitarian ways) are drinking in the Last Chance Saloon, sawing off the branch we are all sitting on … operating Beyond The Limits. With devastating insecurity almost upon us, radical change now, before it is too late, is our only hope. So this is the voice that defines the opposite of development as hospitality, that scorns the idea of “trickle down” and seeks instead to target “the poorest of the poor,” that argues for zero growth, and that calls urgently for major shifts in our behavior so as to bring our profligate consumption down within the limits that have been set by Mother Nature.

For fatalist actors (or perhaps we should say non-actors) insecurity is just something you have to live with. Sometimes it hits you, sometimes it doesn’t, but, either way, there is nothing you can do about it. So fatalist actors don’t really have a voice; if they had they wouldn’t be fatalistic. Nevertheless, since time and money spent on something about which nothing can be done is time and money wasted, there is some wisdom here that should not be ignored.⁴

A clumsy solution, it must be stressed, is not a compromise; still less a consensus. Rather, it emerges from a messy, noisy and argumentative process: a constructive engagement between the three “active” ways of organizing: hierarchy, individualism and egalitarianism. Fatalism too is involved, in its characteristically “passive” way, becoming ever more extensive as one or more of the active ways are excluded, and shrinking when things shift towards clumsiness. A reduction in fatalism is not the only benefit of clumsy solutions. In a clumsy solution (and this is the counterintuitive bit) each voice ends up getting more of what it wants, and less of what it doesn’t want, than it would have got if it had somehow managed to achieve “hegemony” and go it alone. Let me finish, therefore, by giving a quick example: the Bhattedanda Milkway in Nepal.

A case for clumsy development

Development aid has always been over-elegant – some combination of just hierarchies and markets. But a few years ago a Nepali activist group – the egalitarian voice – managed to get through to Chris Patten who, being at that time a European Commissioner, was able to persuade the European Union to devote €75,000 to a goods-only ropeway, rather than to the road-building programme it normally spends our money on. This egalitarian voice is clearly evident in the project being labeled a “conservation ropeway,” its primary stated aim being to reduce the pressure on the forest (see Gyawali et al., 2004). But, of course, the project had to find its way through all the hierarchical procedures by which development aid is delivered (baseline studies, screening tools and so on) and it also had to mesh with the market aspirations of the very poor villagers it was designed to help. So all three “active” voices were there, and with little choice, it would seem, but to respond to one another.

Just south of Kathmandu a small, unsurfaced road climbs up to the rim of the Kathmandu Valley and then goes off down the valley on the other side. If you stand on the col and look across half-left you will see, just a mile away, an extensive danda – a high, rounded ridge – and this one, Bhattedanda, has several villages on it and rather a lot of cows and water buffaloes which, between them, produce a fair amount of milk. The trouble is that, between the col and the danda, there is a 2,000-foot chasm. In consequence, by the time the farmers have carried their milk down and then up and got it onto the milk-lorry to Kathmandu, it is sour. So they have had no option but to laboriously boil it down into a condensed form, khuwa, consuming vast amounts of fuel wood in the process. On top of that, khuwa fetches a much lower price in Kathmandu than fresh milk.

The secondhand Austrian ropeway, in spanning this chasm, gets the milk to the lorry in just 20 minutes and then all the way to Kathmandu while it is still fresh. The villagers get a better price for their milk. They are relieved of the twin drudgeries of boiling it down into khuwa and then carrying it all the way down and up to the road, and the pressure on the forest is massively reduced.

Nor is that anything like the end of it. The ropeway, initially, was powered by a diesel engine but the villagers, after the project had been handed over to them, got onto the internet and worked out how to convert it to electricity. Since the electricity is from hydropower, they have effected the transition from fossil fuel to renewable energy and reduced the ropeway’s running costs to one quarter of what they were paying for the diesel. The only fossil fuel now is the milk-lorry, and even here there has been a substantial saving because, where in the past it came up empty, it now carries goods destined for the danda: sacks of rice-chaff, for instance, as a supplementary feed to increase the fat content (and the market price) of the milk, sheets of corrugated iron to replace the thatched roofs, and bags of white cement for the frescos in the new gompa (Tibetan Buddhist temple).

In a somewhat informal survey we asked a number of the villagers how they would rate their quality of life now, if they took 100 as the score for how it was before the advent of the ropeway. One hundred and forty was the average; and that from farmers who, as we all know, are famously pessimistic.

Well, however you choose to measure it, this is economic growth – development as defined in the conventional “aid paradigm” – achieved, moreover, by means of a carefully-planned intervention that would never have happened “autonomously.” So those who speak with the hierarchical voice have certainly got a lot of what they want. Individualist actors, too, have come out well: incomes increased substantially, along with a host of innovations that have shifted them away from a precarious subsistence agriculture and onto what is, increasingly, a lucrative form of market gardening. Kathmandu, like all South Asian cities, is growing fast, and ropeways such as this one to Bhattedanda can massively expand accessible food production, even with just the existing road system. And those who speak with the egalitarian voice, though they may not have got zero-growth, have secured the conservation of the forest, along with a convincing demonstration of how to effect the transition from fossil fuels to renewables. Moreover, it is the “poorest of the poor” who have benefited most; even more so, now that the ropeway has been extended to the next danda: a danda so remote and so impoverished that hitherto could not even get its khuwa to market. Indeed, it used to be said of it that all it was good for producing was Maoist insurgents.

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