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Environmental Planning and Cooperative Behavior

Catalyzing Sustainable Consensus

Environmental concerns have been framed in the planning profession as manifestations of resource scarcity, and hence a contributing factor in community conflicts. While mismanaged environmental scarcity can certainly lead to conflict, there is also considerable potential to stimulate cooperation on the basis of environmental scarcity itself. In the language of game theory, the latter outcome can be obtained by converting "dilemmas of common competing interests" to "dilemmas of common aversion." The cooperation which would result from the use of environmental concerns as a binding element in conflicts among parties, is likely to catalyze a more "sustainable consensus"—a robust contract between erstwhile adversaries.Planners are in a unique position to glean the positive attributes of environmental indicators since they can bridge technical knowledge of environmental impact with an understanding of sociopolitical context at community consultation forums. This paper attempts to provide the theoretical basis for this approach and develop examples of how such a strategy for conflict resolution may be implemented.

Key Words: environmental security • resource wars • consensus catalysis • common aversions • linkage politics • pistemic community • escalation

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