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On the day DesignTalks unveils its new sustainability theme, a new book from Austin Williams challenges the very foundations of sustainability.



http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1845400984/ref=sib_rdr_dp



He argues that the mantra of sustainability serves as an excuse to limit ambitions and, coupled with the modern obsession of analysing and measuring all activities, are destroying creativity. He harks back to earlier ages, the 1960s and the Victorian age in particular, which were characterised by a can-do attitude and much creative development.



His arguments are couched in the language of architecture but perhaps they also apply to design in general? There are plenty of examples of creatively addressing sustainability issues, but is the focus on sustainability itself constraining our creativity at a more fundamental level?



Hear Austin Williams discussing his views on the Today programme this morning. It's the last slot of the day, about 22 and a half minutes into this clip:



http://www.bbc.co.uk/radio4/today/listenagain/ram/today5_20080501.ram

Last edited by Poster on 01 May 2008 12:39

interesting arguments.....might just end up being fuel for the anti green lot.?

sustainability as an excuse to slow down? well, maybe everyone just needs some more excuses... limiting ambitions he says, instead, but I can´t agree... What is more ambitious than living in a eco-holografic world?

for anyone who likes a goof tubthumping polemic, here's Alex Steffen from Worldchanging on the inadequacies of green thinking:



"....Faced with the need to reinvent the material basis of our civilization, we argue paper or plastic.



If you want truly dangerous bright green ideas, go way out beyond what the conventional wisdom thinks is possible. The conventional wisdom's sense of the possible is irrelevant to reality; it's being melted by climate change and planetary crisis faster than an Alpine glacier. Think, instead, of the implications of ideas like zero energy, zero emissions, zero waste, closed loops, true-cost accounting for the value of ecological services, product-service systems, visible flows, totally transparent backstories, open innovation, green infrastructure, etc. These concepts are really weird, full of new insights and critical uncertainties -- and they, or ideas like them, are very quickly going to become the operating principles of our entire society. If we want to avoid a catastrophic collision with ecological reality, we need to change our thinking."



http://www.worldchanging.com/archives/008064.html

Having read Austin William’s book – I find myself largely in agreement with his thesis- especially the unthinking prefixing of sustainable to just about anything. Unfortunately it seems difficult to discuss these topics without a shrill ‘you can’t do/say that!’ response or even worse face the accusation of being a climate change ‘denier ‘from either a ‘deep’ (or maybe increasingly ‘shallow’) green perspective. Perhaps even worse is to be ignored much like the rantings of Father Jack from Father Ted?



To even question the thinking behind these ideas one would be seen as either ‘barmy’ or wreckless, after all we are told that ‘The science’ of climate change ‘demands action’. But of course the implied action is of only one kind – to design with the intent to produce and use less in the present. This is without even considering the possibility that increasing production, together with the associated research and development which comes with it, may actually leave future generations, both at home and in the developing world, in the position to have more options to mitigate the effects of global warming and climate change. In the medium to longer term (look at how many technology ‘ages’ there have been over the last 100 years) surely it is not beyond humanity’s capability to manage or at least influence the carbon cycle by continuing to develop these options?



To me Gus Desbarats’ assertion that ‘Sober reflection of the environmental impact of sourcing every part of a device’ sounds more like a scheme to develop a bureaucracy of (initially) ideologically driven eco-bean counters – than a way to ‘Boldly go...’ though the coming century.

Well... a problem in sustainability is that it encompasses a lot of things, and then, one can come, destroy an idea or a dozen and then say "sustainability is killed already," or, worse, "is nothing good."



It´s still too much abstraction, and maybe it will forever be so. The action rules---ie. Kyoto Protocol and the like---are not that developed, ´cause they sould be based on prior action, which still lacks. Also it still lacks a big enough science-body, despite all the ecology body which gave birth to it all.



This is definitely not to say this is the way it should be, and we can continue our ways. We have already proof something is coming our way, albeit we still don´t know where from. We have some clues anyway. Instead of trying to debunk an abstraction with facts is itself a waste of time.



Of course, saying that everything is sustainable, as some marketing to a gasoline-combustion new car labeled as "eco" is BS. Though a old-gasoline car outweights a new hybrid one in eco-friendliness, no one can dismiss it as "too abstract" when saying that this is not an issue at all... it´d be weird.

I read Austin William's book too, and through the first few chapters I found it to have the most crushingly weary tone I have ever found in a book. I could hardly turn the pages. But I stuck with it, and in the middle chapters he makes some relevant points about how the West is relabelling certain projects in developing countries as sustainable, to suit our offsetting agendas etc., which in turn robs them of a chance to improve their standard of living. As a case for defending the status quo of technological development for human development I can see he could gather many supporters.



Overall he makes some good points, some flippant points, and some plain inflammatory points. But by the end my overriding impression was: "he has not once addressed the scale of the environmental problems we are told we need to face up to". Arguing for human development with no thought to the repercussions is great, but it's an easy path. He offers no alternatives to the restrictions called for by sustainability, which have been made after an analysis of the problems. All he can say is 'they're bad'. In fact in one chapter he offers his basic proviso as (sorry, haven't got the book to hand but it's something like...) "what humanity needs is higher energy use per person".



Now that will probably make more of a difference if you hardly use any at the moment. But I read once that on average each American requires a continuous 11000W. Maybe that was all industry divided by population, I'm not sure exactly. Considering the average human runs at 100W, it illustrates the massive energy use we have become accustomed to in modern life. And to bring it back to this website, what has Design done? It has hidden it away. Made it invisible. Made it normal.



I imagine that as an architect Williams has been under more pressure from sustainable guidelines, and for longer, than most product designers, or members of the public certainly. So I can understand the frustration of being told to design in a more accountancy/spreadsheet-type way, where each part is rated, and where the final total may be viewed as more important than the quality of solution. Unfortunately given the scale of our environmental impacts, I don't think we can ever go back to a time where we didn't worry about this. Williams talks about sustainability now being the status quo. Maybe in Architecture, but when I look around I see 95% of people stuck in the same mindset we've had for 200 years.



I've been struggling to remember the quote from Raymond Loewy I learnt at Uni. Can't find it on the web anywhere, but it was along the lines of "The job of a designer is to rid the product of evil vibrations, villainous smells, ......." and I can't remember the rest! But when I look at modern cars I see his legacy. You sit in a comfy seat, protected from the elements and the mechanisms beneath you. You could travel 100s of miles in day, at 80mph, with just a small press of your right foot, with the undulations of the road disguised for your comfort. And you never even have to see or touch the fuel, it's just represented by a small needle on a small scale.



All of this combines to form the beautiful illusion that moving each person's 1500kgs of metal, plastic and rubber around at 80mph, and commuting 30/40/50 miles a day, through a process that is perhaps 2% efficient, is normal. And more than that, it's mundane. It's a minimum.



It's only now, when we try to achieve above ground what for a while was hidden away underground, that we start to realise the scale of what we have created.