The World Bank on Sustainable Development

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As a core fundamental and central organization, it is essential to recognize the

World Bank's unwavering commitment and contribution to international environmental

and developmental programs. As the top funding agency to international organizations,

NGO's, independent countries, and other societal groups the World Bank plays a

marquee role in international funding in an increasingly industrializing world and

changing market economy. It might be presumptuous to label the World Bank as an

elitist organization because of its nouveau-riche style of economic contributions to the

international community. However, it is critically important to point out that the World

Bank is indeed 'at the top of their game' and has considerable influence on environmental

and developmental policies at the international level, and at the community level with

NGO's and their mainstream approaches to environmental issues. With the ability to

reflect their policies and political agenda to meet the new demands of fluctuating world

markets, the World Bank has made considerable advances towards shifting away from

their traditional model of development towards more 'greener' policies of sustainable

development. The 'greening' of the World Bank by adopting sustainable development is

a problematic approach towards development in the twenty first century as it has many

complications as a working definition, and has serious negative implications for the

World Bank and how it goes about incorporating sustainable development into its

relationships with other international organizations, and non-governmental organizations,

as well as into its own bureaucratic structure.

As the major international contributor to development and environmental projects

world wide, the World Bank hands out loans and grants totaling $20 billion on an annual

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basis to countries, NGO's and other independent organizations. The World Bank is the

world's largest single international funding source for biodiversity projects, with a total

Bank-managed biodiversity portfolio amounting to more than U.S. $2.6 billion since

1998. At the end of the past fiscal year, the World Bank's active portfolio of

environment and natural resource programs amounted to U.S. $11.2 billion, or 12.2

percent of the Bank's total active portfolio that year. Pollution management and

environmental health issues accounted for approximately a third of the active

environment portfolio. Having established a strong economic portfolio with

environment and natural resource programs, it should be a relatively easy task for the

World Bank to promote and actively engage in sustainable development programs in the

twenty first century.

However, what is sustainable development and what are the implications for

the World Bank in adapting such 'greener' policy options in the twenty first century?

The UN Commission on Economic Development in its landmark 1987 report titled Our

Common Future defines sustainable development as that which "meets the needs of the

present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs."

It is a straight forward definition which political organizations have come to highly

criticize because of its lack of substance. Since the release of Our Common Future, more

than 70 competing definitions of sustainable development have been offered by

academics and policy analysts. No other definition has gained as much critical acclaim

or notoriety as this one. When you actually begin to break down the definition and

critically analyze it one question particularly stands out amongst critics: How can we

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reasonably be expected to know what the needs of people in 2100 might be? Better yet,

how can we reasonably expect to know what the needs of people in 2100 might be when

we are trying to sufficiently meet the needs of society at the present?

The definition of sustainable development has become heavily criticized by

political scientists and public policy advocates. More than ever, disagreement exists as to

the precise meaning of the term. "Sustainable development is a vague term almost

notorious for its lack of precise definition," James M. Sheehan wrote in a

foreign policy briefing of The Greening of the World Bank: A Lesson in Bureaucratic