DEVELOPMENT REVEALED: THE REAL ECONOMIC FACE AND THE SUSTAINABLE MASK

The context: The discourse about sustainable development gradually loses its expressiveness, mainly because it is a normative concept that gives scope for the construction of several definitions and innumerable interpretations. Despite the conciliation of economy and environment, sustainable development can be seen as a mask of economic development. 
Objectives: The primary goal of the research is to verify sustainable development as a disagreement discourse in relation to social reality, which contributes to the minimization of the space destined to other strategies of environmental preservation and that hides a secret goal (the economic character that does not deviate from development). 
Methodology: The methodology was developed through reading by the hypothetical-deductive method. This is basic, exploratory and bibliographical research, structured in three fragments. 
Result: The initial part identifies economic development and differentiates economic development from economic growth. The following fragment broach sustainable development, giving emphasis to the difficulties of interpretation. Finally, the sustainable disguise of economic development is examined, and the suggestion of a progressive abandonment of the term sustainable development is presented, presenting alternatives to harmonize the economy and the environment.