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Principles in provincial strategies

Principles that appear in almost all provincial strategies:

• global responsibility;
• living off the interest not the capital;
• minimizing the use of non-renewable resources;
• maintaining biodiversity and the integrity of essential ecological processes;
• accountability in decision making;
• stewardship and individual responsibility;
• full-cost accounting;
• staying within the Earth's carrying capacity;
• changing some basic assumptions and underlying values;
• improved access to information and decision making.

Principles that appear less frequently:

• fairer distribution of costs and benefits;
• meeting basic needs;
• cultural awareness;
• recognition of non-monetary values;
• focussing on the longer-term economic goals;
• quality rather than quantity of development;
• encouraging scientific and technological innovation.

From: Canadian Choices for Transitions to Sustainability. Ottawa : Projet de société. Final draft, May 1995. Chapter 1.

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