Sustainability is based on the principle that everything we need for our survival depends, either directly or indirectly, upon our natural environment.
This simple truth creates and maintains the conditions under which humans and nature can exist in productive harmony; under which personal, social and economic fulfillment are possible not only for today but for future generations as well.
Although a population or state can be sustained by exploitive powers.....corporations, governments etc, it will not last. Every commodity that we produce, extract and harvest from the earth without in turn creating the space for those natural resources to grow back degrades our potential for truly lasting growth. In developing regions of the world where millions of individuals still live by the land in villages, water, soil, and trees are the currency of communities. There is a great need for these families, women, students, elders and men to be involved in the decision making processes of how their precious environment is being used to support the loftier goals of human development: increased income, schooling, business, and enterprise. This inclusionary empowerment is and must be the crucial ingredient of Sustainability.
Ownership of the earth and it's resources is communal. Responsibility for how to cultivate the sustainable use of those resources needs to be communal as well.