Grydehøj, A;
Kelman, I;
(2017)
The eco-island trap: Climate change mitigation and conspicuous sustainability.
Area
, 49
(1)
pp. 106-113.
10.1111/area.12300.
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Abstract
Small islands worldwide are increasingly turning to conspicuous sustainability as a development strategy. Island spatiality encourages renewable energy and sustainability initiatives that emphasise iconicity and are undertaken in order to gain competitive advantage, strengthen sustainable tourism or ecotourism, claim undue credit, distract from failures of governance or obviate the need for more comprehensive policy action. Without necessarily contributing significantly to climate change mitigation, the pursuit of eco-island status can raise costs without raising income, distract from more pressing social and environmental problems, lead to competitive sustainability and provide green cover behind which communities can maintain unsustainable practices. We argue that eco-islands do not successfully encourage wider sustainable development and climate change mitigation. Instead, island communities may place themselves in eco-island traps. Islands may invest in inefficient or ineffective renewable energy and sustainability initiatives in order to maintain illusory eco-island status for the benefit of ecotourism, thereby becoming trapped by the eco-label. Islands may also chase the diminishing returns of ever-more comprehensive and difficult to achieve sustainability, becoming trapped into serving as eco-island exemplars. We conclude by arguing that island communities should pursue locally contextualised development, potentially focused on climate change adaptation, rather than focus on an eco-island status that is oriented toward place branding and ecotourism.
| Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Title: | The eco-island trap: Climate change mitigation and conspicuous sustainability |
| Open access status: | An open access version is available from UCL Discovery |
| DOI: | 10.1111/area.12300 |
| Publisher version: | http://doi.org/10.1111/area.12300 |
| Language: | English |
| Additional information: | © 2016 Royal Geographical Society (with the Institute of British Geographers) This is the peer reviewed version of the following article:Grydehøj, A; Kelman, I; (2016) The eco-island trap: Climate change mitigation and conspicuous sustainability. Area, which has been published in final form at http://dx.doi.org/10.1111/area.12300. This article may be used for non-commercial purposes in accordance with Wiley Terms and Conditions for Self-Archiving. |
| Keywords: | Islands; climate change mitigation; conspicuous sustainability; renewable energy; sustainability; ecotourism |
| UCL classification: | UCL UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences UCL > Provost and Vice Provost Offices > UCL BEAMS > Faculty of Maths and Physical Sciences > Inst for Risk and Disaster Reduction |
| URI: | https://discovery.ucl.ac.uk/id/eprint/1507979 |
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