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Abstract
The environmental debate seemingly consists of unresolvable competing visions of what constitutes a "good life." Passionate environmentalists assert that if we continue the present blight on the earth, our future well-being and that of our children will be imperiled. Industrialists counter the impracticality of environmental policies by contending that such policies threaten lifestyles, increase unemployment, and eventually lead to economic collapse. The United Nations discourse of sustainable development attempts to provide rhetorical compatibility and comfort in creating a vision of the "good life" not rot with divisiveness, but rather fresh with cooperation. I study the rhetoric of sustainable development by analyzing the discourse found in the World Commission on Environment and Development's (WCED) Our Common Future and the proceedings from the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development's (UNCED) entitled Agenda 21. My analysis relies heavily on the writings of Kenneth Burke. I argue that the vision of sustainable development, in attempting to improve "the quality of life" on earth, promotes a "good life" vision consistent with American ideologies since it demonstrates a commitment to science and technology.
