The need to reassess the discourse of sustainable development in terms of equity and justice has grown rapidly in the last decade. This book explores renewed and distinctive approaches to the sustainability and justice debate, integrating a range of perspectives that include moral philosophy, sociology and law. By bringing together young and senior scholars from the field of global environmental law and governance from around the world, this work is divided into three sections, covering sustainable development and justice, sustainable development in context, and sustainable development and judiciaries. This book will appeal to academics, law practitioners and policy-makers interested in shaping future socio-legal research on global environmental law and governance.
Throughout the past decade, the meaning of "sustainable development" - which rose to prominence following after the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development - has evolved toward a broad and integrative concept that focuses on environmental protection as well as intergenerational social equity, human rights, and social justice. As the definition of sustainable development has expanded its meaning has become even more ambiguous, and the gulf between theory and practice continue to widen. Often obscured by jargon-laden debate and embedded in capitalism, the possibilities of realizing goals of sustainable development have begun to fade while the reproduction of the socioeconomic forces that lead to unsustainable development continues to thrive. Yet to dismiss the notion of sustainable development would be a tacit acceptance of the conditions of unsustainable development. The rapidly maturing capitalism worldwide appears have brought sustainable development to an impasse both in terms of theory and in practice. Capitalism has shown remarkable creativity and power to undermine the goals of sustainable development by appropriating and exploiting the language and practices of sustainable development. To effectively engage with the interplay between capitalism and sustainable development it is urgent that the debate takes on a greater conceptual and analytical clarity and be centered on the consideration of a just world order. A specific institutional environment is needed to achieve sustainable social justice must be clearly identified and articulated in ways that could be translated into effective practice. This special issue of The ANNALS takes a radical departure from current reformist approaches to sustainable development and makes the argument for the necessity of an alternative vision of global political economy linked to strong commitment to a equity and social justice. With the help of case studies from different parts of the world, this volume examines and provides a foundation for thinking about alternative framework of analyses. Especially, it calls to reexamine the currently dominant formulations concerning the 'desirable' role of the state and no-governmental organization (NGOs) in sustainable development. Providing an in-depth look at the conditions and processes that perpetuate unsustainable development, these articles examine a myriad of pivotal topics: poverty, prosperity, insecurity, diversity, and (NGOs), overproduction and scarcity, the role of the state, cultures of instability and violence, and social justice. Social and environmental theorists, practitioners, and activists will find an innovative and ardent perspective that strives radical changes in the current discourse of sustainable development.
Sustainable urbanization has moved to the forefront of political debate and policy agendas for numerous reasons. Among the most important are a growing appreciation both of the implications of rapid urbanization now occurring in China, India, and many other low and middle income countries with historically low urbanization levels and of the related challenges posed to urban areas worldwide by climate and environmental change. Conceptualizing urban sustainability for this new era, this compact book makes a clear contribution to the sustainable urbanization agenda through authoritative interventions that contextualize, assess, and explain the importance of three central characteristics of sustainable towns and cities everywhere: that they should be fair, green, and accessible.
Publisher: PUBLICACIONS UNIVERSITAT ROVIRA I VIRGILI
ISBN: 9788484245858
Category: Education
Page: 219
View: 374
This book describes the practices implemented at the Universitat Rovira i Virgili to promote the university's internationalisation. This has been one of the URV's central objectives since it was created 25 years ago and will continue to be in the future. Internationalisation is one of the driving vectors behind all universities, the crucial element that allows them to be in constant dialogue with other institutions around the world, to stay at the cutting edge of knowledge, to recruit talent and to transmit knowledge.
This book challenges the way development has been conceptualized and practiced in South Asian context, and argues for its deconstruction in a way that would allow freedom, choice and greater well-being for the local people. Far from taking development for granted as growth and advancement, this book unveils how development could also be a destructive force to local socio-cultural and environmental contexts. With a critical examination of such conventional development practices as hegemonic, patriarchal, devastating and failure, it highlights how the rethinking of development could be seen as a matter of practice by incorporating people’s interest, priorities and participation. The book theoretically challenges the conventional notion of hegemonic development and proposes alternative means, and, practically, provides nuances of ethnographic knowledge which will be of great interest to policy planners, development practitioners, educationists and anyone interested in knowing more about how people think about their own development.
This open access book is based on work from the COST Action RESTORE - REthinking Sustainability TOwards a Regenerative Economy, and highlights how sustainability in buildings, facilities and urban governance is crucial for a future that is socially just, ecologically restorative, and economically viable, for Europe and the whole planet. In light of the search for fair solutions to the climate crisis, the authors outline the urgency for the built environment sector to implement adaptation and mitigation strategies, as well as a just transition. As shown in the chapters, this can be done by applying a broader framework that enriches places, people, ecology, culture, and climate, at the core of the design task - with a particular emphasis on the benefits towards health and resilient business practices. This book is one step on the way to a paradigm shift towards restorative sustainability for new and existing buildings. The authors want to promote forward thinking and multidisciplinary knowledge, leading to solutions that celebrate the richness of design creativity. In this vision, cities of the future will enhance users' experience, health and wellbeing inside and outside of buildings, while reconciling anthropic ecosystems and nature. A valuable resource for scientists and students in environmental sciences and architecture, as well as policy makers, practitioners and investors in urban and regional development.
The global, regional, and local energy landscape has changed dramatically in the twenty-first century. Many factors have affected what we know about energy: a consensus among scientists on climate change and related support for renewable energy, evolving energy and resource extraction technologies, growing resource demand in the developing world, new regional and global energy governance actors, new major fossil fuel discoveries on land and underwater in states that have previously been under-resourced, rising interest in corporate social responsibility in energy companies, and the need for energy justice. The Oxford Handbook of Energy Politics synthesizes the diverse literature on these topics to provide a foundational resource for teaching and research on critical energy issues in international relations and comparative politics. Through chapters authored by both scholars and practitioners, the Handbook further develops the energy politics scholarship and community, and generates sophisticated new work that will benefit all who work on energy issues.
This book bridges the gap between Education for Sustainable Development and community development and examines the contributions of critical environmental education as a theoretical framework to the policy, research, and practice of Education for Sustainable Development. The book investigates what Education for Sustainable Development really means when it happens from the perspectives of a marginalized individual at the very bottom of society in a local community, where there is no such ‘educational’ institution, no policy or no curriculum to support the effort, but there is the necessity of learning and empowerment for changing the situation. In particular, drawing on the experience of the indigenous Ainu fisherman, it critically examines the theoretical foundation of Education for Sustainable Development, critical environmental education, investigating methodologically and epistemologically the relevance and efficacy of critical environmental education to socially critical approaches to Education for Sustainable Development in a community development context. And this investigation leads to develop a praxis framework for socially critical Education for Sustainable Development in a community development context so that both fields would be mutually supportive to strengthen the practices.
As the impact of climate change has become harder to ignore, it has become increasingly evident that children will inherit futures where climate challenges require new ways of thinking about how humans can live better with the world. This book re-situates weather in early childhood education, examining people as inherently a part of and affected by nature, and challenges the positioning of humans at the centre of progress and decision-making. Exploring the ways children can learn with weather, this book for researchers and advanced students, works with the pedagogical potential in children’s relations with weather as a vital way of connecting with and responding to wider climate concerns.
Rethinking a Sustainable Society Alan Mayne The world has already passed the midway point for achieving by 2015 the eight Millennium Development Goals for a “more peaceful, prosperous and just world” that were set by the United Nations in the wake of its inspirational Millennium Dec- 1 laration in 2000. These goals range from combating poverty, hunger, and disease, to empowering women, and ensuring environmental sustainability. However Ban Ki-Moon, the United Nations Secretary-General, conceded in 2007 that progress to date has been mixed. During 2008 the head of the United Nations World Food P- gramme cautioned that because of the surge in world commodity prices the program had insuf?cient money to stave off global malnutrition, and the World Health Or- nization warned of a global crisis in water and sanitation. Depressing news accounts accumulate about opportunities missed to achieve a fairer world order and ecolo- calsustainability:themanipulationofelectionresultsinAfrica,humanrightsabuses in China, 4000 Americans dead and another nation torn apart by a senseless and protracted war in Iraq, and weasel words by the world’s political leadership in the lead-up to negotiations for a climate change deal in 2009 that is supposed to stabilize global carbon dioxide emissions. It is clear that the parameters of the debates that drive progressive policy change urgently require repositioning and energizing. As is shown by the contributors to Rethinking work and learning, experts in the humanities and social sciences (HASS) couldhaveanimportantroletoplayinthisprocess.
This book presents a broad discussion on sustainable development, rethinking and improving its effectiveness as a paradigm of today and tomorrow. Outstanding visionary thinkers and scientists offer their timely assessment on the future prospects of mankind: In what direction are we heading? How can the world become more just and equitable, and how can future development be sustained to adequately address economic, social, and – perhaps most important – environmental issues?
This book offers comprehensive insights into the cultural and ecological values that influence sustainable development across Asia, addressing the cultural, religious and philosophical moorings of development through participatory and grassroots communication approaches. It presents a range of contributions and case studies from leading experts in Asia to highlight the debates on environmental communication and sustainable development that are relevant today, and to provide an overview of the positive traditions of ecological sensitivity and cultural communication that may find common ground between communities. This well-researched guide to the dynamic and complex terrain of communication for sustainable development offers uniquely practical perspectives on communication, environment and sustainable development that are of immense value for policy makers, media scholars, development practitioners, researchers and students of communication and media studies.
