Mainstreaming Sustainable Development: from the analysis of power to the critique of ideological fantasy

In this study I analyse three institutional documents on environmental sustainability: a declaration by the United Nations on the purposes for action in relation to the ecologic crisis; the UK framework on sustainability for the devolved governments to follow; a policy document by the Welsh Assembly Government that sets out Wales’ strategy in relation to the environmental challenge. I apply two kinds of discourse analysis to the three documents: Foucaultian Discourse Analysis and Lacanian Discourse Analysis. The overall aim of the study is to consider the wider ideological presuppositions and values that underpin contemporary mainstream discourses on the environment, linking them to their political effects. In particular, I am interested in assessing the ways in which the challenge to capitalism that the ecologic crisis embodies is managed in order for it to survive. Through Foucaultian analysis I consider the way in which power is deployed for and through the ecologic crisis: how discourses make this threat governable but also how the discourse of ‘sustainable development’ becomes a means to govern populations. The Lacanian analysis opens the way for a consideration of fantasy and enjoyment in relation to environmental discourse. I find that ‘sustainable development’ constitutes a powerful ideological fantasy because it gives enjoyment through the promise of a perfect society while repressing the traumatic elements of the present. In the last part of my thesis I consider the two analyses together, draw comparisons and from this suggest new possible insights. This also allows me to assess the strengths and weaknesses of each method, especially in relation to their capacity to generate critical insights. Throughout my work close attention is given to issues of reflexivity and the meaning to scientific rigour in the context of such a post-structuralist piece of research.