(Sustainable) Development, Environment, and the Relational ‘Third Space’: Lessons from Aotearoa New Zealand’s Fast-track Approvals Act

Abstract

Policymakers often cite a need to balance, or trade off, the protection and restoration of the natural environment on the one hand, and the extractive use of the environment for economic reasons on the other. This tension is inherent in the goal of ‘sustainable development’, which, despite providing a conceptual basis for Western environmental and conservation law, has also been criticized for legitimizing socio-ecologically destructive practices. This tension comes to the fore in the New Zealand government’s Fast-track Approvals Act 2024, which, to prioritize economic development interests, circumvents prior environmental and conservation law safeguards, as well as constitutional protection for the rights of Indigenous Māori. We undertook a contextual legal analysis of the fast-track legislation, demonstrating how it works to undermine conservation outcomes and Indigenous rights. Our findings hold particular significance for scholarly and policy debates about transnational environmental law, especially the contribution of Indigenous knowledge and law in a multi-level governance context. We argue that centring relationality in environmental law frameworks might help to shift away from binary approaches to environmental law, which trade off economic versus environmental and cultural interests.