Democratic environments: Democratization and the search for sustainable development in Brazi

This study argues that a society's political regime has an important influence on its relationship to the natural and human environment. In particular, it suggests that democratic regimes possess several features predisposing them systematically toward sustainable development. This contrasts with the conventional wisdom and much previous scholarship, which typically emphasized the importance of economic or international variables while ignoring the effect of political regimes. When regime types received attention at all, democracy was often considered a problematic structure, undermined by collective action problems and the larger "tragedy of the commons." However, after considering the essential meaning of "democracy" and "sustainable development," democracy actually becomes a preferable structure for identifying and building support for sustainable development. Although collective action problems continue to Plague democratic regimes, restricting citizen rights will either exacerbate these problems by empowering those with anti-environmental agendas or destabilize the regime by forcing it to finance greater coercion than its revenues permit. When democracies fail to promote sustainability, they are often not acting true to their democratic ideals.;After conceptualizing "sustainable development" as the satisfaction of human needs with a relatively small "environmental footprint" and defining "democracy" as the guidance of public policy by all citizens on a basis of equality, this research examines Brazil as a case study in democratization and sustainable development. In 1964, a military coup took power and sought to develop the country through labor repressive means before restoring democratic government. The military was precisely the type of regime theoretically equipped to engage in rational resource management, but despite the presence of high level military officers interested in environmental themes, it was only as the regime liberalized and democratized that Brazilian society began to identify with environmental themes and organize itself to alter its environmental profile. Even within Brazil, more democratic regions are the more environmentally sensitive, even after controlling for variables such as education and affluence. An analysis of Brazilian history, focusing on the period of bureaucratic authoritarianism and transition (1964--1995) illustrates how the opening of the political regime allowed environmentally oriented citizens to develop institutions for lightening, albeit insufficiently, the national environmental footprint.