In 1996, Dobson said that there were then over 300 definitions of sustainable development.
This figure still gets quoted today as though it is still meaningful, and is usually cited, according to taste, either to illustrate a rich plurality of view, or the
conceptual looseness of the idea.
Despite its wide adoption at the global level as a policy goal, critics of the idea of sustainable development still abound, with its being described as an oxymoron or as a compound policy slogan. Clearly, it is a, compound policy slogan in the same way that equal opportunities is. Linguistically speaking, it is a multi-syllable concept comprising two abstract nouns that each have contested meanings and are already in everyday use in potentially unhelpful ways, and all this is illustrative of some of the difficulties there are in expecting the idea to be grasped by the general public. Unesco (nd) talks about sustainable development in this way: Sustainable development is the overarching paradigm of the United Nations. … There are four intertwined dimensions: society, environment, culture and economy. Sustainability is a paradigm for thinking about the future in which environmental, societal and economic considerations are balanced in the pursuit of an improved quality of life. Sustainable development refers to the many processes and pathways to achieve a more sustainable world (e.g. sustainable agriculture and forestry, sustainable production and consumption, good government, …) This language is difficult: far too many paradigms and sustainables to make easy reading or conceptual sense. The Brundtland Report (1987), which is popularly cited as the origin of the idea, is not much better. It says that sustainable development is: …development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It contains within it two key concepts: the concept of 'needs', in particular the essential needs of the world's poor, to which overriding priority should be given; and the idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social organization on the environment's ability to meet present and future needs.” (