Abstract
Given the complex nature of the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), there are increasing calls for new inclusive and bottom-up governance mechanisms in building a relationship between governments and their citizens, in particular, the youth, to localise the 2030 Agenda. But such successful bottom-up multi-stakeholder engagement tools have yet to emerge in practice. Hence, of specific interest in this study is exploring bottom-up approaches useful for localising the SDGs and harnessing real transformative change to leave no one behind by 2030. Using a case study from the UK, we present a novel integrated mechanism to achieve this. An integrated Social Innovation (SI) and Scenarios Thinking (ST) mechanism remains a valuable bottom-up tool capable of empowering citizens, including the youth and decision-makers in delivering coherent SDGs plans, policies, and programmes. The study reveals that although the SDGs are distinct, they are also interconnected. A scenario development workshop with youth with no prior knowledge of the SDGs showed a common thread of policy measures for different SDG future images. Standard policy measures amongst different SDGs call for an equitable society at all levels; that all energy sources be from clean and renewable sources; investment in low-carbon technologies and research; and financial support for promoting sustainable transportation and consumption measures. This study highlights that we need to change how we think and talk about SDGs and recommends socially innovative steps to embrace cross-sectoral and nexus thinking as the backdrop of the citizen science concept. We conclude that the SDGs should not become a performative exercise or failed social experiment. And any practical localisation from the UN’s Member States across the northern and southern hemispheres will require robust measures addressing future-oriented systemic thinking, inclusivity and good governance, together with standards for community resilience and sustainability.
Highlights
In the last several decades, the term sustainable development (SD) has become a buzzword in the global development discourse
While the international community sees the 2030 Agenda as a holistic and transformative agenda [3], we argue that Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) achievement by the Member States depends strongly on progress made at the local level through localised thinking—arguably even more so amid the COVID-19 pandemic
It is critical that the SDGs not become a performative exercise or a failed social experiment
Summary
In the last several decades, the term sustainable development (SD) has become a buzzword in the global development discourse. The nature of SDGs’ complex problems (sometimes described as ‘wicked problems’) has resulted in calls for new inclusive and deliberative multi-stakeholder governance mechanisms in building a relationship between governments and their citizens to localise the SDGs [3,4] Despite these calls, successful bottom-up multi-stakeholder engagement tools, which are useful in localising and implementing the SDGs at the local level, have yet to emerge in practice [5]. There have been calls for the UK government to identify a formal mechanism for relevant responsible Ministers to come together regularly to discuss the implementation of the SDGs at the highest political level (ibid) Into this void, and the ‘decade of action’ for the international community to deliver the 2030 Agenda, testing of new bottom-up approaches to support regional and local level SDGs plans, policies, and programmes is urgently needed [5,7]. The importance of this study’s aim to explore bottom-up approaches useful for localising SDGs and harnessing a real transformative change to leave no one behind by 2030
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