Towards Reflexive Governance for Sustainable Development

Abstract

This paper proposes a new way of governance for sustainable development that involves reflexive governance in order to tackle the contradiction and tension between the practices of governance and the objectives of sustainable development. This can be accomplished using the theoretical perspectives on governance for sustainable development, `sub-politics` in `reflexive modernization,` for creating the epistemological grounds for new forms of governance for sustainable development, and deliberative and green democracy in relation to applying methodological principles to new forms of governance for sustainable development. This paper highlights necessary change to reflexive governance for sustainable development, pointing out that we should move our focus from 'rationalist problem-solving` (first-order) approach to governance to `secondorder problems` that work to disrupt the structure of modernist problem-solving. Reflexive governance for sustainable development can provide more adequate treatment of sustainable development problems and a better quality of sustainable development objectives.