Sustainable Development Reconsidered: A Semiotic Study of Russian Environmental Thinking.
TAKKINEN, TERHI (2002)
2002
Kansainvälinen politiikka - International Relations
Yhteiskuntatieteellinen tiedekunta - Faculty of Social Sciences
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Hyväksymispäivämäärä
2002
Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi:uta-1-9140
https://urn.fi/urn:nbn:fi:uta-1-9140
Sisällysluettelo
1. Introduction: Global Politics, Cultural Studies and the Enigma of Russia . . . . . 3 2. Background to the Research Problems . . . . . . . . . . . . . .9 2.1. A History of the Russian ‘Local’ and the UN ‘Global’. . . . .9 2.1.1. Environmental Thought in Russia. . . . . . . . . . . . 9 2.1.2. The Global Culture of Sustainability. . . . . . . . . .14 2.2. Heuristic Formulations. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 19 2.2.1. Sustainable Development or Ecological Safety? . . . .19 2.2.2. Isaiah Berlin on the Transformation of Western Ideas in Russia. . . . . 22 3. Theoretical and Ontological Points of Departure . . . . . . . 24 3.1. Integrating Culture into the Agenda of International Relations. . . . . 24 3.2. Global Politics of Environment in the Framework of Cultural Diversity? . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 27 4. Yuri Lotman and the Semiotic Study of Languages . . . . . . . 29 4.1. Semiotics as a Discipline, a Method and a Worldview . . . . 29 4.2. “Modelling” My Research Material with Lotman’s Concepts . . . 32 4.2.1. Language and Speech . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .32 4.2.2. Three Functions of a Text . . . . . . . . . . . . . .34 4.2.3. Sign and Symbol-Images . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .36 5. The Operative Analysis: Tools and Scope . . . . . . . . . . . 39 5.1. The Phases of the Analysis. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 39 5.1.1. The Premises: Exploring the Memory of Environmental Texts . . . . . . 39 5.1.2. What and How? Looking for Crises in Three Dimensions. . . . . 40 5.1.3. Model-Images and Symbolic Reading . . . . . . . . . . .42 5.1.4. A Summary of the Problem-formulation. . . . . . . . . .43 5.2. Definition of Scope and Identification of Sources . . . . . 44 6. A New Paradigm of Nature in the Making? . . . . . . . . . . . 48 6.1. A Sample of the First Phase of the Analysis. . . . . . . . 48 6.2. Framing the Model-Images in Three Dimensions. . . . . . . . 54 6.2.1. The Ecological Integration of Russia to the International Community . . . . . 55 6.2.2. Epistemology: The Planet as a Unitary System. . . . . . . 57 6.2.3. Praxeology: Science as the Keyword in New Policies . . . 60 6.2.4.Axiology: “From a Strategy f Nature towards a Strategy of Reason” . . . . . . 62 6.3. Sustainable Development Turned Inside Out?. . . . . . . . . 67 7. Concluding Remarks: Going against the Myth of Russia. . . . . 72 Primary Sources. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 74 Bibliography . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 77
Tiivistelmä
This study seeks to inquire about the way in which the concept of sustainable development, which has been authorised by the United Nations as a global policy-guideline, has been adopted among the environmental scientists in Russia. The argument is that sustainable
development, despite its status as a ’global’ development paradigm, is a culture-bound notion, representing elements that are alien to the Russian culture. At the same time, this is a study about Russia’s relationship with ’the west’, about the way in which the
Russian culture interacts with the ’western’ one adapts to it and challenges it. The main themes of the study are globalising environmental policy-making and the cultural mechanisms that govern the relationship between Russia and her western neighbours. A heuristic starting point is provided by the Russian concept of 'ekologicheskaya bezopasnost', ecological safety. This is a concept that in the Russian environmental discourse occupies a position similar to that of sustainable development in the western
context. The question is: what is the relationship between these two concepts? Is ecological safety replacing sustainable development or just complementing it, or maybe something else? The notion of ’boomerang effect’ by Isaiah Berlin will guide the inquiry in this
respect. The concept of culture is central both in the theoretical and methodological orientations of this study. At the level of the concrete methodical application, the aim is to inquire about
the cultural deep structures behind the concept of ecological safety with the help of an application of Yuri Lotman’s semiotics. Central tools include Lotman’s notions of symbolic model-images and their memory-function. Within this study, only the concept of
ecological safety is analysed, but in order to make comparisons, a corresponding analysis of ’sustainable development’ will be taken up in the last section of the study.
From the point of view of the theoretical application, ’culture’ incorporates what I consider relevant in International Relations: politics cannot be explained only by reference to some universal theories but instead cultural and historical factors should be taken seriously when explaining and understanding the things that take palce at the international arena. The main results of the study include, first of all, that there are both similarities and differences between the symbolic deep structures transmitted by the two concepts: sustainable development and ecological safety. Although both of these concepts draw from
the archives of their own cultural memories, there are points where these coincide. A central conclusion concerns globalisation: it is important to examine it also as a form of cultural interaction and see the way in which ’the local’ is affected by ’the global’. The
question about the cultural mechanisms in the relationship between Russia and ’the west’ is left open and it is certainly a topic for a further study.
development, despite its status as a ’global’ development paradigm, is a culture-bound notion, representing elements that are alien to the Russian culture. At the same time, this is a study about Russia’s relationship with ’the west’, about the way in which the
Russian culture interacts with the ’western’ one adapts to it and challenges it. The main themes of the study are globalising environmental policy-making and the cultural mechanisms that govern the relationship between Russia and her western neighbours. A heuristic starting point is provided by the Russian concept of 'ekologicheskaya bezopasnost', ecological safety. This is a concept that in the Russian environmental discourse occupies a position similar to that of sustainable development in the western
context. The question is: what is the relationship between these two concepts? Is ecological safety replacing sustainable development or just complementing it, or maybe something else? The notion of ’boomerang effect’ by Isaiah Berlin will guide the inquiry in this
respect. The concept of culture is central both in the theoretical and methodological orientations of this study. At the level of the concrete methodical application, the aim is to inquire about
the cultural deep structures behind the concept of ecological safety with the help of an application of Yuri Lotman’s semiotics. Central tools include Lotman’s notions of symbolic model-images and their memory-function. Within this study, only the concept of
ecological safety is analysed, but in order to make comparisons, a corresponding analysis of ’sustainable development’ will be taken up in the last section of the study.
From the point of view of the theoretical application, ’culture’ incorporates what I consider relevant in International Relations: politics cannot be explained only by reference to some universal theories but instead cultural and historical factors should be taken seriously when explaining and understanding the things that take palce at the international arena. The main results of the study include, first of all, that there are both similarities and differences between the symbolic deep structures transmitted by the two concepts: sustainable development and ecological safety. Although both of these concepts draw from
the archives of their own cultural memories, there are points where these coincide. A central conclusion concerns globalisation: it is important to examine it also as a form of cultural interaction and see the way in which ’the local’ is affected by ’the global’. The
question about the cultural mechanisms in the relationship between Russia and ’the west’ is left open and it is certainly a topic for a further study.