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It is widely known that governance is central to the successful implementation of sustainable development policies and measures. Yet, there is a paucity of research which explore the links between governance and sustainability. This paper attempts to address this research need by providing an analysis of the role of governance in enabling e and to some extent e fostering a transition towards sustainable societies. A set of indicators for assessing the capacity for and willingness and commitment to transition to a more sustainable society is presented, enabling identification of direction of change. This paper presents the results of a study, in the context of which sustainability governance has been comparatively investigated in a sample of European countries with, by methodological purpose, very different economic, environmental, political and social conditions (Denmark, Finland, Germany, Latvia, Lithuania and Poland). Lessons learnt and examples of good practice e which may be replicable elsewhere-are outlined. For instance, it is discussed that limited knowledge about sustainable development amongst municipal development planners and decision-makers, deficiencies in policy integration, intersectoral cooperation, municipality and stakeholder cooperation and urban management practices are major reasons for weak governance practices in sustainable development. Furthermore, some recommendations on the role of sustainability governance are made, so as to allow the integration of the principles of governance into sustainability practice and hence provide a more general basis upon which a transition towards sustainable societies may become a reality in different types of European countries and societies. The scientific value of this paper lies in identifying opportunities for integrating principles of governance into sustainability practice, as well as outlining the basis for sustainability transitions, providing a general picture of required policy measures. The paper offers a unique comparative analysis of sustainability governance in the Baltic Sea countries, outlining some of the challenges in sustainability governance in the Baltic Sea region. .

Purpose -The purpose of this paper is to present a methodological framework and practical application of the sustainable development assessment in Lithuania. Design/methodology/approach -The assessment was performed by deriving composite economic, social and environmental indexes and combining them into the integrated sustainable development index. Each composite index aggregates number of selected indicators, which were essential for the assessment of the country's development during the last decade. Having in mind that sustainable development is the development in consistency, the authors have used equal weights for calculation of economic, social and environmental indexes. Findings -The composite indexes indicate rapid economical growth and environmental state; however, social development was comparatively slow. The economical decline in 2008 has influenced also environmental and social development and revealed new trends of sustainable development in Lithuania. The analysis results demonstrate that goals brought forward in the Strategy for Sustainable Development of Lithuania were not achieved. Originality/value -The paper provides a methodology of integrated sustainable development index and its application for the Lithuanian case. The greatest advantage of a proposed calculation methodology is its flexibility, because it can be applied for any period of sustainable development evaluation, with a possibility to select a desired number of sustainability aspects that reflect an evolution of a country the best.

Abstract. While analysing the evolution of sustainable development concept as the basic criteria of periodisation, a number of dimensions could be used. Thus, it is possible to mark three stages in the development of the concept: a) two-dimensional sustainability; b) three-dimensional sustainability; c) four-dimensional sustainability. Sustainable development should be implemented in all spheres and levels of life, estimating economic, social, ecological, territorial, political and institutional aspects. All dimensions of sustainability should be considered in the process of strategic sustainable development planning. Local communities understood that strategic sustainable development plans, which realize their willingness to live following the principles of sustainable development, are important. Different methods of public involvement were used when creating sustainable development strategies for local communities. Sustainable development concept, principles of sustainable development and strategic planning, methodology for strategic sustainable development planning, and participation of local communities are discussed in the article.

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The article presents a new approach to the solution to the paradox of value based on the theory of marginal utility of the Austrian School of Economics. The new approach is based on the theory of compound interests and economic bubbles. The study presents valuable theoretical insight towards sustainable economic development. The paper provides a brief formulation of the theory of compound interests, introduces the structure of compound interests model, and shows the relations between simple and compound interests as well as dimensionless interests. It reveals the saturation phenomena, and emphasizes its impact on economic and financial bubbles. The relation between the value of paradox and the price bubbles is presented. The article also explains the possibilities of the phenomenology of growth in formulating the paradox of saturation and studying the paradox of value. The phenomenological method allows to relate prices and financial and economic bubbles into a general entirety. Therefore, this paper deals with very important sustainable development issues as it discusses the market saturation phenomena, economic bubbles, and emotional consumer behavior. The limitations of behavioral theories are pointed out and their misunderstandings of information cascades are emphasized. The article provides the explanation of the nature of economic bubbles by employing the theory of compound interests.

Abstract. The article overviews the ethical aspects of sustainable development in Lithuania under the conditions of globalisation. With reference to the accumulated theoretical and practical material, evaluating the principles of a sustainable development implementation and the systems of ethical behaviour, further development perspectives of sustainable development on the ethical plane in Lithuania are analysed. Spirituality plays a very important role because unique values and value orientations existing in every culture influence the worldview and life perception of members of the culture. The modern, dynamic lifetime determines rapid cultural changes and many-sided influence of one culture on another and has significant impact on implementation of sustainable development principles in Lithuania.

In this article we construct parallel solvers analyze the efficiency and accuracy of general parallel solvers for three dimensional parabolic problems with the fractional power of elliptic operators. The proposed discrete method are targeted for general non-constant elliptic operators, the second motivation for the usage of such schemes arises when non-uniform space meshes are essential. Parallel solvers are required to solve the obtained large size systems of linear equations. The detailed scalability analysis is done in order to compare the efficiency of prposed parallel algorithms. Results of computational experiments are presented and analyzed.