Can democracy secure environmental sustainability? This article proposes a basic, yet substantial organising principle – the ‘dilemma of green democracy’ – which maps out the possibility of realising green decision outcomes under democratic constraints. The dilemma posits that there is no logical or unconditional relationship between democratic decisions and environmental sustainability. More specifically, three plausible conditions for collective environmental decision making – robustness to pluralism, consensus preservation and green outcomes – are mutually inconsistent, meaning that they cannot be satisfied simultaneously. To construct a logically possible environmental-democratic institution, we must avoid the dilemma by relaxing at least one of the conditions. This article explores a number of escape routes from the dilemma, and discusses each proposal by drawing on democratic theory and empirical examples in environmental politics. It concludes that as long as the dilemma of green democracy is resolved, democracy can, at least in principle, secure environmental sustainability.
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