Social sustainability as a challenge for urban scholars

Abstract

Urban sustainability is an increasingly popular term used by scientists and policymakers from all disciplines, increasingly without any reference to the tradition of critical urban studies. It is often observed that the social pillar is missing, if sustainability is understood via the 'three-legged stool' concept encompassing social, economic and environmental dimensions. With a few notable exceptions, there appears to be a lack of interest also within urban scholarship to use the term 'social sustainability' to address this gap, although critical urban scholars are productive in the critique of sustainability as a social and political construct. Drawing on the idea of a politics of knowledge, this paper points to political, institutional and conceptual factors that have limited the purchase of social sustainability in research. These factors are rooted in sustainability being predominantly understood as an environmental concern, and a culture that may marginalise research subscribing to a postpositivist epistemology. This article asks whether the social pillar of sustainability could offer a discursive and symbolic tool for researchers to make the case for a critical urban epistemology in interdisciplinary research environments.

How has the COVID Crisis Impacted Local Governments’ Sustainability Efforts? An Examination of Initial Effects

“…Sustainability’s social dimension—with its focus on justice, empowerment, equal access, and well-being—is considered the least developed of the sustainability pillars and is often not conceptualized distinctly from traditional welfare policies, which are themselves embedded in an unsustainable society ( Boström 2012 ). While calls for increased attention to and a reimagining of social sustainability have become more frequent over the last decade ( Cauvain 2018 ), the translation of this concept into concrete municipal actions has lagged ( Opp 2017 ). Against this backdrop, the inequitable impact that COVID has had across communities may accelerate the prioritization of social sustainability initiatives.…”