Socially just development for land use
This blog post was contributed by PLUS Change Ambassador Esmeralda Wirtz and is the first of a series featuring personal accounts from our Ambassadors. These blogs offer first-hand reflections on the challenges and opportunities shaping land use planning across Europe and beyond.
Ambassadors contribute to PLUS Change discussions on equitable land use, representing the interests of groups that may be excluded from or underrepresented in land use planning and decision-making in Europe. These individuals bring valuable perspectives rooted in their experiences and lived realities, helping to shed light on how land use change impacts different communities.
What does “development” even mean?
When I was in university, pursuing my master’s in environmental sciences in 2015, I had to choose a major. One of the options was called “Pays en Developpement” (developing countries). While I was interested in the contents of the programme, the name of it made me put it aside and join another programme.
Even in 2015, 22-year-old me totally rejected the fact that some countries were developed, and others not, or not fully. While “developed” implies that a country reached an almost final state and a desirable one, I wanted to completely discard this idea, as the country I was living in (Belgium) looked far from developed, according to my standards, values and experience. Many people, including myself, are growing up without having our most basic needs met. We are destroying the environment, our water is contaminated and dysregulating human and animal hormones, and racism, sexism, ableism and other types of discrimination are a daily struggle for those affected … The list of examples is almost infinite. In those regards, I did not (and still don’t) see my country as developed, and even less like a role model for other countries.
Imagining development
Despite working extensively with local actors from Global Majority countries, I obviously feel more comfortable and skilled to talk about what kind of development I would want for my own region (Belgium-Luxembourg). However, we can’t deny the historical and current responsibility that we have, linked to colonisation, industrialisation, current modes of consumption and neocolonialism. Therefore, we need to make sure that the ways we could develop here don’t have a negative effect on other humans and non-humans of the world. I also strongly believe that reparations are needed, but those can’t take the form of “development assistance”.
Rather than exploring “what” I would want, I would like to put more emphasis on the “how”, and especially the “with whom”. While we all deserve full access to fundamental human rights, the ways to access those can vary, depending on our age, nationality, culture, language, race, disability, sexual identity and orientation, physical and mental health, and more. This means that we absolutely need to build development strategies by involving as many different actors as possible, in order to leave no one behind and to meet those accessibility needs.
The barriers to inclusive projects
When I was living in rural East Belgium, I got to work with plenty of initiatives trying to imagine and implement more sustainable strategies. However, I never felt like I was in the right place. Thinking back on those experiences, I could identify two main reasons for this.
The first one is that the solutions proposed by those groups did not really align with my reality. As an example, some groups work on a membership fee base, loudly affirming that paying X€ per month is not an obstacle for anyone. Coming from a working-class background, I can assure you that even a few monthly euros to pay would have been a major barrier for my family to participate. Another example is the access to local, organic and zero-waste food. Besides the economic barriers, my neuro-divergence often makes it extremely hard for me to have enough energy and to be organised enough in order to clean and prepare empty jars, and adapt to the restricted opening hours of small farmer shops.
This brings me to the second point: discrimination. As much as most groups will identify with humanistic values and say they want diversity in their community, the practice shows another story. I have heard a lot of discriminatory language. To talk about food again, people will promote “our land”, “our traditional farming”, “local products”. How can immigrants feel connected to the land and to these phrases, when they are constantly being asked “Where are you from?”. Also, those local shops will often have a limited range of foreign products, such as bananas, while still arguing that immigrants need to adapt to our eating habits – justifying the fact that the shops won’t sell products such as cassavas for example. But why would a banana have a spot in those shops, and not a cassava when they are both from far away? Also, lactose intolerance is widely spread amongst BIPOC, but dairy products are often the only option in those local shops, in eastern Belgium. I also experienced direct discrimination, as I heard many times that queer identities don’t have a space in environmental conversations, as we are seen as “unnatural”. Sadly, these groups often also reproduce patriarchal patterns, such as giving the lead and most of the speaking time to cis men. While these things might not be considered as discrimination by those local groups, they have a real impact on the people who are directly affected.
Towards environmental justice
I heard many local development groups claim that they want to be more diverse, but that other people (working-class, disabled, BIPOC, queer people…) don’t join their groups because they don’t feel concerned by environmental issues. Luckily, I later got to connect with many people and communities proving the opposite: people in a marginalised position are overwhelmingly aware of climate change, pollution and biodiversity loss. We therefore need to admit that there is a huge difference between wanting diversity and actively working to create inclusive and safe spaces. This requires unlearning internalised stereotypes and discrimination, as well as collaborating in a respectful manner with people to identify the barriers to their participation and to make the spaces more accessible.
Beyond that, we also need to acknowledge the continuous efforts of women, queer people, BIPOC, the working class and disabled people, who are already working in their daily habits and in their communities to create a more sustainable and just world. Those initiatives are often overlooked or unknown.
Inclusivity, the creation of safe spaces, and the recognition and support of projects led by groups in marginalised positions are even more important if we connect them to the concept of environmental justice. Research and experience have shown that those communities are statistically the least responsible for environmental degradation, and at the same time the most affected by it.
Therefore, I strongly believe that imagining new futures to respond to the socio-ecological crisis can only be done in radically inclusive and safe spaces, ideally led by those most affected by environmental degradation. This should be followed by direct democracy and a fair distribution of resources.
Land: a crucial resource
Amongst those resources, one is quite crucial: the land. As long as the land belongs to or is managed by the same people who are destroying it, there will be no fair solution to environmental issues. While we are lacking data on land ownership and management, for example in its distribution by gender, it is very likely that the distribution is unequal and unfavourable to those most affected by the socio-environmental crisis.
One solution would be to try and find a balance in which people or entities own the land. However, the most sustainable land use that I have seen and read of is found in communal plots of land. Those exist in Mexico for example, or in Brazil, where indigenous peoples are still reclaiming demarcation of their lands, but also in Europe, notably in Spain where some areas belong to communities rather than to individuals or public entities.
New developments for every being on the planet
Radical imagination, in accessible and safe bottom-up spaces, is a key to imagine the developments of our communities. The diversity of our accessibility needs must be considered in order to create sustainable and socially just solutions. There is no “one size fits all” – we need all voices to be heard, especially the ones that are usually the least heard. Only then will we be able to tackle the socio-ecological crisis with a diversity of solutions.
Besides imagining the solutions, resources are needed in order to implement the projects. Land ownership and decision-making is one example, that could allow communities to access common goods and to use them in the interest of every person in the community.
No country is fully developed until all its inhabitants have their basic needs met. No country is fully developed until all countries are fully developed. Tackling the socio-ecological crisis is a global challenge that needs to be tackled locally, while actively supporting other communities in their resilience process. Land distribution and use is a key player, and we need to make sure that everyone is involved in conversations and decision-making around this topic.
Banner photo by Carl Tronders on Unsplash