An Introduction to Sustainable Development

Elliott, Jennifer

doi:10.4324/9780203420225

Cited by 70 publications

(36 citation statements)

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“…Despite having many characteristics in common such as overpopulation, heavy indebtedness, and ailing economic growth, the Southern countries are actually at different developmental stages. In fact, some development studies (e.g., Baker 2006;Kerbo 2006;Elliott 2000) draw attention to significant differences in levels of economic 15 In the early stages of negotiating the Rio Declaration, for instance, some developed countries (especially the U.S. and the European Community) objected to the emphasis on "their unsustainable patterns of production and consumption" as the main causes of environmental degradation. They insisted to put population growth as an equal cause of environmental degradation.…”

Section: Sustainable Development In a Global Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sustainable Development in a Global Context: A Success or a Nuisance?

Bakari¹

2015

New Global Studies

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This article argues that the evolution of, and challenges to, sustainable development cannot be understood completely outside its contemporary global context, consisting mainly of three interconnected spheres, i.e., the global governance system, the North-South debate, and global trade liberalization. As the boundaries of these three spheres get more and more blurred in a context of an intensifying globalization, the project of sustainable development is very often faced with obstacles that set back its evolution and might very well bring it to a halt. Above all, sustainable development is now caught in the crossfire between the push for exponential economic growth, on the one hand, and a compelling need to reverse catastrophic ecological threats and social exigencies, on the other. More often than not, the current structure and scope of global governance constitutes more of a hindrance than a help to the emerging paradigm of sustainable development. Accordingly, this article seeks to pinpoint the different challenges to the implementation of sustainable development in the field of global governance and to discuss to what extent these challenges are inherent in the structure and scope of this system. In a similar vein, this article examines and discusses the challenges to sustainability within two other highly interrelated spheres, namely global trade and the North-South politics. With this end in view, a special focus is placed throughout this paper on the interconnectedness of, and overlap between, these three global spheres and the determinant role played by the major actors therein.

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Section: Sustainable Development In a Global Contextmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sustainable Development in a Global Context: A Success or a Nuisance?

Bakari¹

2015

New Global Studies

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“…During the last 20 years, sustainable development (SD) has become a widely accepted principle in practice, national, and international politics (Baker 2006;Elliott 2006). SD also gained attention on the firm level (Krysiak 2009) throughout all kinds of economic branches, as seen in the broad acceptance of the Global Reporting Initiative's sustainability reporting framework (GRI 2007) Among the growing number of successively created definitions of what sustainable development is, the Brundtland formulation achieved authoritative status (Baker 2006).…”

Section: Sustainable Development and Participationmentioning

confidence: 99%

Sustainable development and sustainable forestry: analogies, differences, and the role of flexibility

Hahn

Knoke

2010

Eur J Forest Res

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Various approaches have been developed to achieve sustainability in forestry, under changing social needs and, consequently, changing definitions of sustainability. This has led to the confusing situation in which various groups have different understandings of the meaning of 'sustainability'. Likewise, the concepts utilized to achieve sustainability, often with a poorly defined objective, are sometimes not clear and/or inconsistent as a systematic overview regarding definitions and concepts is lacking. Based on a literature review, this paper discusses related terms such as sustainability, sustained yield management, sustainable forestry, sustainable forest management and sustainable development: their history, concepts and relationships, from a European perspective. Finally, flexibility is proposed as a solution to overcome the identified shortcomings at all scales, while focussing on the enterprise level. The origin of the sustainability concept in forestry was first driven by forest experts, while participatory elements have been considered since the more recent idea of sustainable development. Since then, much effort has been made to achieve intragenerational fairness by creating an improved participatory process. Concurrently, the original idea of sustainable forestry as long-term and future-oriented management, considering future generations' needs fell behind. An increasing standing timber volume in Europe and the discussion on climate change brought new interest in how to cope with risks in the context of pervasive future uncertainties within the scope of promoting sustainable development. Although the consideration of risk has been concentrated on as a topic in forest science in recent years, studies have mainly focused on the enhancement of forest resistance against disturbances. However, precaution and risk avoidance alone are probably insufficient to achieve an improved sustainable development that focuses on intergenerational fairness, as these more defensive approaches may disregard important management opportunities involved with an uncertain future. A perhaps more promising approach, the idea of future options and the ability to respond to changing social and biophysical circumstances (i.e. flexibility) as criteria for sustainable development have only shown a shadowy existence up to now. To further develop the consistency of sustainability concepts, a shift of sustainability approaches from continuity towards flexibility options is proposed.

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“…Internal sustainability is thus achieved through the export of undesired products or impacts, to the detriment of the area's external sustainability [30]. Thus, policies aiming at the realization of sustainable development must be conceived on areas large enough to minimize imported sustainability from outside areas [2,22].…”

Section: Linking the Different Spatial And Temporal Scales: A New Catmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Rio's Agenda 21 has seen national and even regional and local governments enter into discussions on sustainability [2]. But with the ever increasing debates on sustainable development, the term took on a multiplicity of sometimes contradictory meanings [3].…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Pitfalls of Sustainability Policies: Insights into Plural Sustainabilities

Mancebo

2013

CiS

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A lot can be learned from the numerous pitfalls of sustainable development implementation: they outline how collective representation, short term interests and balance of power can undermine sustainability. For instance, the usefulness of global institutions in dealing with sustainable development is questionable as most are skewed toward the interests and perceptions of developed countries. The notion of sustainable development itself induces a profound cleavage between academic authors and the actors of its implementation, some of whom confuse it with sustainable growth (which favors spatial equity), whilst the others with environment management (which favors intergenerational equity). This polarization is a real problem, since originally, "Our Common Future" report promotes an inclusive approach, able to cope with both equities simultaneously. Finally, if there are obligations toward future generations, there are also obligations toward the current generation. The key issue for effective sustainability policies should be making them acceptable to everyone by including the expectations of local societies and communities. As a matter of consequence, universal solutions do not exist. They would not meet the specificities of local circumstances. The traditional prescriptive sustainable development model should give way to flexible plural sustainabilities. Singular, top-down, global-to-local approaches to sustainable development should be substituted for multiple sustainabilities.

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An Introduction to Sustainable Development

Cited by 70 publications

References 0 publications

Sustainable Development in a Global Context: A Success or a Nuisance?

Sustainable Development in a Global Context: A Success or a Nuisance?

Sustainable development and sustainable forestry: analogies, differences, and the role of flexibility

The Pitfalls of Sustainability Policies: Insights into Plural Sustainabilities

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