ABSTRACT
This chapter examines current uses of the term in relation to the tensions between modernity and ecology, which it evokes, and suggests ways of diminishing its ambiguity. Ecological modernisation has been used narrowly to describe technological developments with environmentally beneficial outcomes – such as chlorine-free bleaching of pulp for paper and more fuel-efficient cars – specifically aimed at reducing emissions at source and fostering greater resource efficiency. M. A. Hajer predominantly regards ecological modernisation as a policy discourse which assumed prominence around the time of the European Community’s Third Action Plan for the Environment and, more explicitly, the 1984 OECD Conference on Environment and Economics. Both Hajer and A. Weale also use the concept in more radical ways. For Weale, ecological modernisation represents a new belief system that explicitly articulates and organises ideas of ecological emancipation, which may remain confused and contradictory in a less self-conscious discourse.
