ENVIRONMENT, QUALITY OF LIFE, AND DEVELOPMENT-SEMANTICS OR TELEOLOGY?

MICHAEL J. MORAVCSIK

ABSTRACT: A great problem with language is that it is ambiguous, and this leads to untold complications in all walks of life.

          The ambiguity is to an extent due to our desire to speak concisely in terms of a relatively small vocabulary. As a result, we endow each word with a whole spectrum of meanings. Words which quietly sit in an uncontroversial corner of our attention do not suffer much on account of this ambiguity. But every so often, a word is torn from its peaceful niche, is thrust into the limelight of debates and rhetorics, and immediately its failings become evident and the word falls prey to the special aims, desires and ambitions of the parties in the controversy. Then the battle is on for expropriating the word, for nailing down its meaning according to one's own self-interest. The weapon in this battle is overuse, a constant reiteration in a tendencious context until it is thought that victory is achieved and the word was given the "right" unique meaning.

          But such victories are almost always Pyrrhic: the word seldom survives such a battle over its meaning without becoming dead, turning into a cliche, losing its power to. participate in meaningful discourse.

          Such a disaster befell in recent years the three expressions "environment", "quality of life", and "development". At the risk, therefore, of flagging a dead horse (or, more appropriately, three dead words), I would like to attempt a revitalization of these concepts and an analysis of the ways in which. a ceasefire can be declared over their meanings.

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National Academy of Science. Seoul. Republic of Korea