Page 77 - Sustainability Communication Interdisciplinary Perspectives and Theoritical Foundations

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Fig. 5.1 Dominant frames in the German sustainability discourse

approach, there are major differences that are due not only to the conflicting interests
of the actors involved but also to their diverging views of society and nature. These
controversial positions can be located in a discourse field structured by two axes
(Fig. 5.1).
The vertical axis distinguishes different understandings of society and justice,
with ‘market liberalism’ and ‘egalitarianism’ at its two ends. Business representa-
tives generally see the free development of a globalized economy and the liberalisa-
tion of world trade as a crucial condition for sustainable development while
international solidarity movements take the opposite view: they regard the power
structures and the dynamics of global capitalism as the central motor of non-
sustainable development and call for a new, more just world economic order. The
horizontal axis shows different models of the relationship between society and
nature, with ‘techno-centrist’ and ‘eco-centrist’ at its two ends. While the eco-centrist
side represents the position of ‘respect for nature’ and calls for a soft ‘adaptation to
natural cycles’ instead of ‘violent’ technological interventions, those groups closer
to the techno-centrist pole see technological innovations as the decisive precondi-
tion for sustainable development.
Until the change of government from the conservative-liberal government under
Chancellor Helmut Kohl to the red-green government of Gerhard Schröder in 1998,
the development of the German debate was dominated by positions that emphasized
both the upper left-hand and the lower right-hand quadrant. The frame favoured by
business and the Kohl government, ‘sustainability through technological innovation’,