The United Nations have just launched a new campaign to accelerate progress towards their Sustainable Development Goals. The ‘5 Years For’ campaign aims to encourage the ‘final sprint’ to deliver the SDGs by 2030, in line with the UN Agenda for Sustainable Development. Since these goals were created in 2015, they have served as a universal framework used by governments, businesses, and civil society to align their priorities and measure progress in sustainability in ways that extend far beyond the scope and mission of the UN. In the UK alone, they are used by private businesses, local government, health service providers, schools and universities, to guide everyday choices and decision-making. They have shaped how we think about the environment, our position within it, and what counts as positive progress in social and environmental terms for over a decade.
But what if the SDGs are part of the problem, rather than the solution to global challenges of inequality, injustice, and environmental degradation? What if the way the SDGs frame human beings and the environment actually harms the planet and hinders progress towards a fairer and safer world for all? What if acceleration is the last thing we need and putting the brakes on ‘sustainable development’ would be of far greater benefit to the Earth and all its inhabitants?
Researchers in linguistics have argued for some years now that the ‘Development Frame’, which underpins our understanding of sustainability and social progress, is in fact highly damaging to people and the planet and that new frames for thinking and talking about the environment, society, and global justice are desperately needed.
The term ‘frame’, used in this way to refer to how we see the world and how we express this through language, originates in the linguistic theories of Charles C. Fillmore. Fillmore defined frames as ‘the appeal, in perceiving, thinking and communicating, to structured ways of interpreting experiences’ (Fillmore 1976: 20). In other words, our understanding and use of words is based on our existing knowledge and no word can be understood without reference to a wider system of concepts and experiences. For example, the word ‘sell’ is only meaningful within the context of a ‘Commercial Transaction’ frame, which also includes a buyer, a seller, goods, and money. Frames therefore serve as the background knowledge against which linguistic choices are made and the language we produce reflects how we think about the world. At the same time, the language we receive can shift our worldview and directly affect our behaviour.
Linguist, George Lakoff, explains why frames are so important for real-world decisions and actions:
Frames are mental structures that shape the way we see the world. As a result, they shape the goals we seek, the plans we make, the way we act, and what counts as a good or bad outcome of our actions. In politics our frames shape our social policies and the institutions we form to carry out policies. To change our frames is to change all of this. Reframing is social change.
George Lakoff
These ideas form the basis of a sub-discipline of linguistics known as ‘ecolinguistics’, which examines how the language we use affects ecosystems and can contribute both to environmental destruction and sustainability. In 2021, one of the world's leading figures in ecolinguistics, Arran Stibbe, published a detailed analysis of the language through which UN SDGs are articulated and the knowledge frames which underpin them. Although each of the 17 individual SDGs relates to a different aspect of human society or planetary health, and each is presented in varying language and has different measurable targets attached, the goals as a whole are brought together under the overarching frame of ‘Sustainable Development’.
While the UN calls for a ‘final sprint’, Stibbe’s work suggests we are running on a treadmill of 1940s economic theory. Stibbe traces the evolution of the ‘Development’ frame in environmental politics and policy making, pinpointing its origins in President Truman’s inaugural address in 1949. He argues that Truman’s post-war promise to ‘embark on a bold new program for making the benefits of our scientific advances and industrial progress available for the improvement and growth of underdeveloped areas’ began the rise to prominence of a way of thinking about social progress as measurable only by economic growth. Over time, as it became clear that this growth benefited only the richest nations and came at the expense of poorer communities, the ‘Development’ frame underwent minor modification and became first ‘Equitable Development’ and later ‘Sustainable Development’. In essence, however, the core conceptual structure underpinning this way of thinking and talking remains the same: the key to prosperity, peace, and social progress is inextricably linked to economic growth.
Although environmental protection, gender equality, and the elimination of poverty are all included in the UN 2030 Agenda, Stibbe shows how the primary framing of this agenda is economic and includes the following UN statements as typical examples:
- ‘We will seek to build strong economic foundations for all our countries. Sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth is essential for prosperity’
- ‘Private business activity, investment and innovation are major drivers of productivity, inclusive economic growth and job creation’
- ‘We will adopt policies which increase productive capacities, productivity and productive employment’
He demonstrates how this framing is present not only in the language of the SDGs, but often also reflected in their visual presentation. No mention is made anywhere in the UN agenda of the now established fact that the richest nations will need to drastically curb their production and consumption if there is ever to be any real hope of repairing environmental damage, protecting the most vulnerable more-than-human populations on the planet, and enabling all nations to meet their basic needs.
There is a growing movement not just in ecolinguistics, but in a range of ecologically focused disciplines and activism which is calling for a new language around sustainability, in the hope that this new language will also shape a new way of thinking about the planet and its future. Tony Juniper, for example, recently set out his vision for ‘thrivalism’ in his book, Just Earth: How A Fairer World Will Save the Planet (2025); James Lovelock makes an argument for ‘sustainable retreat’ in his book The Revenge of Gaia: Earth’s Climate in Crisis and the Fate of Humanity; while Jason Hickel (2020), Serge Latouche (2007), and Kohei Saito (2024), among many others, favour the concept of ‘degrowth’. All of these ways of thinking about progress shift the focus away from economic development and towards environmental protection, social equality, and more-than-human wellbeing.
Ultimately, if we are to avoid a sprint toward further ecological collapse, we must stop trying to solve the current crisis with the very economic frames that created it. True progress lies not in accelerating development, but in reframing our future around planetary limits and collective wellbeing.
Author: Professor Joanna Gavins
This article was part of the 'Rethinking Prosperity on a Finite Planet' event series.
References
Fillmore, C.J. (1976) ‘Frame semantics and the nature of language’, Origins and Evolution of Language and Speech, 280 (1): 20-32.
Juniper, T. (2025) Just Earth: How A Fairer World Will Save the Planet. London: Bloomsbury.
Hickel, J. (2020) Less is More: How Degrowth Will Save the World. London: Penguin Random House.
Lakoff, G. (2014) Don’t Think of an Elephant!: Know Your Values and Frame the Debate. White River Junction: Chelsea Green Publishing.
Latouche, S. (2007) Farewell to Growth. Cambridge: Polity Press.
Lovelock, J. (2006) The Revenge of Gaia: Earth’s Climate in Crisis and the Fate of Humanity. New York: Basic Books.
Saito, K. (2024) Slow Down: The Degrowth Manifesto. New York: Astra House.
Stibbe, A. (2021) Ecolinguistics: Language, Ecology and the Stories We Live By (2nd Edition). London: Routledge.