Brundtland Report Research Articles

Sustainability: A Public Policy, a Concept, or a Competence? Efforts on the Implementation of Sustainability as a Transversal Competence throughout Higher Education Programs

The concept of sustainability emerged globally in the 1987 Brundtland Report. Initially, it comprised three dimensions: environmental, social, and economic. Over time, sustainability became a global necessity that led to the establishment in 2015 of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), so that sustainability became a public policy of extreme urgency. Thirty-four years later, there is an imperative need to expand the original concept not in a public policy but in a competence that graduates of higher education develop, regardless of their studied academic program. We propose sustainability as a transversal competence. Our work describes the path that a higher education institution in Mexico, Tecnologico de Monterrey, has followed to accomplish this task. The new educational model Tec21 based on challenge-based learning experiences has a focus on the development of sustainability competences and actions ownership towards solving the problems described in the 17 SDGs. Our proposed definition for the sustainability transversal competence is: “The student possesses the knowledge, skills and attitudes necessary for the successful performance of the task and the resolution of problems related to the challenges and opportunities for sustainability in today’s world”. Thus, education is both an objective and a means to achieve all the other SDGs.

Evolutionary benchmarks in sustainability reporting. Incursion from the Brundtland Report to the Sustainable Development Goals

Abstract Sustainable development has become, at a rapid pace, outright desirable, an essential condition for all companies, and the business strategy must be based on transparency and accountability, and the information published must be the architecture of sustainable reporting. This is because the public reports of the companies generate the essential platform that reflects the performance, the social and environmental impact, as well as a subsidiary marketing function through which new customers and investors are attracted, as well as talented employees. The main objective of this research is to identify the main landmarks of the evolution of sustainability reporting in the dimension of non-financial reporting standards applied by Romanian companies. The migration trend from conventional to sustainable accounting is evident, with the latter including a variety of social and environmental issues such as: biodiversity protection, climate change, energy efficiency, greenhouse gas emissions, waste management, social inclusion disadvantaged people, respect for human rights, the fight against corruption and transparency of information.

Evolving from a hydrocarbon-based to a sustainable economy: Starting with a case study for Iran

Environmental and socioeconomic challenges facing many hydrocarbon-rich nations could help them evolve from hydrocarbon-based (black) into renewables-based (green) economies. In this paper, we present a case study for application of this Black Into Green (BIG) method for Iran. We show that with international cooperation Iran could indefinitely meet its energy and freshwater needs by leveraging large-scale renewable energy harvesting systems integrated with seawater pumped storage hydropower, reverse osmosis desalination, and enhanced distribution systems. This BIG transition could be facilitated by allocating a significant portion of Iran’s potential hydrocarbon-based income to acquire, develop, and deploy renewable energy technology that utilizes Iran’s immense solar and wind energy potential. Our analysis shows that developing just 1% of identified sites would provide over 30 TWh of annual renewable electricity generation and storage, and 221 million m3/day of renewably-powered desalination capacity to meet the freshwater needs of over 85% of its population. In addition to providing renewable energy design and manufacturing technology, the international community could also work with Iran to help evolve its nuclear power program toward small modular reactors for baseload power generation. Such an arrangement would contribute to regional and global security, and greatly reduce the Middle East’s carbon emissions of which Iran is the largest emitter. Results from this holistic approach could then serve as a model for the world economy to work with other resource-rich nations to reduce their environmental impact while modernizing their economies and helping them achieve the socioeconomic goals outlined in the UN’s Brundtland report.

Durability, Resilience and Sustainability in the Building Rehabilitation Process

Where buildings are concerned, the term “sustainability” has been used for more than 30 years. It represents a process of designing, constructing and operating the building considering its environmental impact. A year after the major nuclear plant catastrophe from Chernobyl, the Brundtland Report defined sustainability as the actions that meet “the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs”. A different disaster, a natural one – the Katrina hurricane – led, two decades later, to the addition of another building characteristic: “resilience”. It represents the capacity of a system to adapt after a shock. “Durability” may refer to different issues: the building materials, the building structure, its functionality of aesthetics. The more durable a building is - the more it lasts - the less it affects the environment. The more it lasts, the more resilient it is (as it withstands different types of stress). Technical durability, provided by building materials and structures, prevails over the functional durability. A good example is the case of the industrial buildings of the nineteenth century: constructed with solid masonry structures, these buildings have lost the original functions decades ago and they were subject of conversions that provided them a new life cycle. Withstanding the action of natural and anthropic agents, these buildings proved to be resilient and, by saving the natural resources, they can also be considered sustainable. Considering that in the next 30 years we will still face 70% of the current building stock, it is important how we deal with them, in order to provide, by rehabilitation, a new life cycle to the existing constructions. The paper tackles, from a critical perspective, some examples of good and bad practice in the building rehabilitation process.

Covid-19 and organisational development: important signs of a new pillar for sustainability

PurposeThe global pandemic has had a considerable effect on organisations’ performance and development and on the daily lives of the general population. This study aims to analyse the recent literature on the topics of Covid-19 and sustainability and proposes to rethink and redefine sustainability with the intersection of human health as a fourth sustainable pillar.Design/methodology/approachUsing the Scopus and ISI Web of Science databases, 119 articles were analysed in detail and classified according to concepts and principles for achieving sustainable development, based on the Brundtland Report, 1987.FindingsThe results indicate a high number of publications in the social dimension, with a relevant proportion of studies in the health sector. This study allows us to conclude that all sectors of society are being affected by the pandemic. However, the enormous tension and the immediate impact felt by the health sector during the pandemic reflect directly on the population, and there are clear signs that in the medium and long term, instability and uncertainty in the environmental, economic and social dimensions will remain. In national health systems, monitoring, innovating in human resource management and investing in information technology can ensure organizations’ reliability and sustainability. The conclusion involves the suggestion of introducing health as a new pillar for sustainability to consolidate the basis and structure of the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Objectives. The use of fundamental concepts is necessary and must be aligned to reassess the results obtained in studies, in comparison with observational data.Practical implicationsThe implications arising from the inclusion of health as a fourth pillar of sustainability are diverse. The need to build a new theoretical and conceptual framework for sustainability derives from the fact that health reflects the concern of many postulants in this field of practices. The determining or conditioning conditions of the observed effects of the pandemic by COVID-19, whether situated simply as factors and/or economic, environmental or social reflexes that precede them, requires a conceptual development that allows its approach, as a complex object, whose determinations are subject to variable degrees of uncertainty and diversity.Originality/valueThis study aims to redefine the concept of sustainability, considering that health has become a public health emergency of international interest. Health affects the supply chain, cash flow, interferes with the educational format and interrupts the workforce’s routine, among other aspects, showing the true nature of its importance and its impact in all spheres (economic, environmental and social).

The role of the SDGs as enhancers of the performance of Spanish wine cooperatives

According to the Brundtland Report, a new era of economic prosperity is possible through forceful yet socially and environmentally sustainable growth. In 2015, the United Nations set 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to eradicate poverty and achieve sustainable development. The social economy is a key force in achieving the SDGs. We argue that the alignment of business activity with SDGs directly enhances business performance. We study wine cooperatives and show that their performance depends on structural and organizational variables linked to certain SDGs. The aim of this study is to analyze the factors that can boost the performance of Spanish wine cooperatives with websites. Using fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA), we study the influence of key factors cited in the recent literature and linked to the SDGs as drivers of high performance. We consider concern for the environment (through organic production), innovation (as a cross-cutting tool) in terms of website quality, internationalization (level of export activity), end-market orientation, and company size. The results show that cooperatives’ performance is enhanced by these factors and that they are linked to the SDGs. A key finding is that higher performance results from the interaction of several variables, including size. However, there is also a need for the presence of other variables, including diversification, which can simultaneously lead to greater performance.

Sustainable Development in Mountainous Areas: Relimitation of Mountain Areas in Giresun Province and A Socio-Economic Analysis

The integration of sustainability to the concept of development and the sustainable development goals set by the United Nations added another dimension to the relationship between human and environment. The Brundtland Report and Agenda 21 report published in 1987 and 1992, respectively, diversified the mountainous area approaches and they have become a research subject for sustainability research. Studying developmental aspects of sustainability approaches towards mountainous areas and determining their limits have posed challenges since the beginning. Recently, these impediments are overcome by various Geographic Information Systems and criteria for mountainous area relimitations based on environmental and topographic characteristics. However, socio-economic assessments for the mountainous area relimitations are yet to be performed. This article highlights the importance of international and national scale in, several relimitation projects and analysis of Giresun’s mountainous areas focusing on topographical and the socioeconomic characteristics. A three-step approach has been adopted for socio-economic analysis of mountainous areas. The first step is the introduction of the physical integrity of the mountainous areas and the natural environmental conditions. The second is to determine the boundaries of mountainous areas and zones affected by mountainous areas in social and economic terms by adhering to natural conditions. Third, the socio-economic analysis of the mountainous areas in Giresun Province through 11 criteria. An assessment proposal based on socio-economic characteristics regarding human-nature interactions in mountainous areas has been presented, as well. The diversity of aspects that affect the sustainability of mountainous areas is explained with practical examples.

Sustainability Assessment Methodologies: Implications and Challenges for SIDS

Over the past years, an increasing number of initiatives was considered to address emerging global sustainability issues. Sustainability assessment tools were the most commonly applied methodologies towards measuring sustainability performance. There are a number of assessment tools and techniques for sustainable development. This article aims at identifying the various sustainability assessment tools at country level taking into consideration the integration of environmental, economic, and social dimensions. The target of this paper is to compare the various sustainability measurement techniques and their characteristics using evaluation criteria. The outcome of this analysis is used to direct and clarify researchers and practitioners on sustainability assessment at country level, more specifically in developing countries. The focus of the paper rests on the Brundtland Report definition of sustainable development. The work was carried out using a bibliometric analysis approach based on Web of Science platform from the period 2000 to 2020. There was tremendous works which were conducted on sustainability assessment during the last two decades. The comparative analyses show the research gap among the various tools with respect to the criteria they satisfied. The research discussion suggests that a sustainability assessment framework for Small Island Developing States (SIDS) is identified as a future research direction.

UNDERSTANDING AND MONITORING ENVIRONMENTAL PERFORMANCE OF INFRASTRUCTURE DESIGN PROJECTS

AbstractThe formalization of environmental issues has gained prominence since the definition of sustainable development by the Brundtland's report. Environmental performance has then been introduced to qualify the “green” contribution of an organization to its surrounding environment. However, its multi-dimensional aspects can be problematic when designing projects and making decisions, especially in the infrastructure sector where industrial activities are the most polluting ones. The aim of the study is to fill the environmental gap and confusion for decision-makers on the understanding of environmental performance, as well as to communicate on it, to define and share a clear vision and targets. A literature review is conducted and confronted with an industrial example in the railway sector to analyze the existing misunderstandings in industries while approaching environmental issues. By proposing and setting a clear framework of environmental performance, this research contributes to the conceptualization of environmental performance. More precisely, it characterizes an environmentally performant design project, in order to consider environmental performance as a driver and catalyzer of value creation.

Sustainability Implications of Stakeholders’ Perspectives in Agroforestry Management in Manyu Division, South West Region Cameroon.

Agroforestry which focuses on the domestication and cultivation of Non-Traditional Forest Products (NTFP) has important sustainability implications for both livelihoods. Brundtland Report and subsequent international and regional instruments, sustainable development as epitomized in Agenda 2030 of the United Nations Organisation (UNO) has become the cornerstone of developmentalism. This study seeks to examine the interplay of sustainability from a stakeholders’ perspective. The findings of this qualitative method which was conducted in 11 villages in Manyu Division of the South West Region revealed that there was a plethora of stakeholders involved in the domain of agroforestry in the study area. These stakeholders were composed of state institutions (Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife-MINFOF, Program for Sustainable Management of Natural Resources in the South West Region-PSMNR-SWR), international organisations (World Agroforestry Center-ICRAF, the World Wildlife Fund-WWF) and local community based institutions (EFOKHOYU), among others. Agroforestry related programmes implemented by these stakeholders ranged from the creation of training centers, allocation of funds and seedlings to farmers as well as the dissemination of knowledge on land conservation and the development of partnerships among farming communities. The findings revealed that this could be felt at the level of household food security with increased cultivation of species such as Irvingia gabonensis and Irvingia wombulu by nearly 62%. Such high rates of domestication and commercialisation of these species implied that the livelihoods of local farmers were assured without endangering over-exploitation of scarce forest resources. In conclusion, some challenges such as issues related with accessibility, high cost associated with domestication among others complicate the activities of stakeholders in Manyu Division. That notwithstanding, the study recommends that tailor made policy interventions should be deployed to address the challenges raised.

ENVIRONMENTAL EDUCATION AND SUSTAINABILITY: AN ANALYSIS OF THE RELATIONSHIP BETWEEN PEDAGOGY AND NATURE IN ITALIAN AND INTERNATIONAL DOCUMENTS / EDUCAZIONE AMBIENTALE E SOSTENIBILITÀ: UN'ANALISI DELLA RELAZONE TRA PEDAGOGIA E NATURA NEI DOCUMENTI ITALIANI ED INTERNAZIONALI

In a general sense, environmental education can be understood as a process that leads to a better understanding of the relationship between man and the natural environment, and sustainability as the possibility for those who come after us to be able to do the same things we can do today. Environmental education and sustainability as such imply collaboration between all social actors in the prevention and resolution of environmental problems. Direct contact with nature in education implies the assumption of a holistic approach, which sees in the relationship between economics, politics, society and ecology a useful tool for educating the new generations, as already widely noted by prominent early 20th century pedagogues such as Giuseppina Pizzigoni. Environmental education is therefore a type of holistic and lifelong education, including education "about, for and through" the environment, the importance of which has grown over time, partly as result of increasingly frequent environmental disasters. These have been followed by various measures, such as the Tbilisi Declaration, the Declaration of the Rights of Nature, the Brundtland Report, the Kyoto Protocol, the Aahrrus Convention, Agenda 2021, Agenda 2030 and so on, in which environmental education and sustainability have been strongly linked to educational processes, so much so that, in Italy, they have been treated in an interdisciplinary key and borrowed in the National Indications (MIUR, 2012) and the National Indications and New Scenarios (MIUR, 2018), as well as in the 2014 Environmental Education Guidelines for Sustainable Development. The contribution, starting from data considerations, focuses on the construction of attitudes, behaviours and conducts in school contexts related to care and protection, as well as environmental awareness, which are combined with those of protection and teaching capable of reading and preserving the environment from the perspective of sustainability.
 
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La sustentabilidad del espacio-tiempo para la reproducción de las naturalezas en El Chaltén (Santa Cruz, Argentina)

Starting with the publication of the Brundtland Report in 1987, development policies incorporated sustainability into their discourses as a way of avoiding the socio-ecological problems caused by the capitalist system. However, social and ecological conflicts were not resolved, but have proliferated ever since. Considering the polysemy of the concept of sustainability, in this work it is proposed to understand it from the analysis of spatial production enriched by world-ecology and feminism proposals. For this, the livelihoods of El Chaltén were analyzed through participatory methodologies. The results show that tourism, even under sustainability policies, affects social, community, family, and ecological relations. Therefore, sustainability for El Chaltén would correspond to the possibility of maintaining the spaces-times of reproduction of nature during the year.

Sustainability as a “magic concept”

Sustainability studies have not been able to come up with a consensus conceptualization of “sustainability,” despite many attempts. This article asks what this conceptual confusion means. I do this through a (conceptual history) vertical analysis, and horizontal (discourse) analysis of the current use of the term. It finds that sustainability is a perfect fit for what Hupe and Pollit have called a “magic concept,” in that it is; broad, has a positive normative charge, imply consensus or at least the possibility of overcoming current conflicts, and has global marketability (2011: 643). This has both positive and negative effects: On the one hand, the popularity of the concept of sustainability has enabled an overarching discourse on the responsible use of natural resources. On the other hand, the concept is vulnerable to various strategic misuses, ranging from corporate greenwashing to Luddite passions. Based on a vertical analysis of the history of sustainability, this vagueness is not a coincidence: It was part of a political bargain at its birth, where environmental concerns were grafted onto an older discourse on “development” during the writing of the 1987 Brundtland report. Based on a horizontal analysis, this vagueness is now inherent to the concept and cannot be abandoned without losing the very magic qualities that make sustainability such a rallying point. This finding points to the conclusion that we should be cautious about how sustainability is wielded.
 Received: 03 February 2021Accepted: 01 March 2021

“Eco-polis”: Environmental Sustainability in Ecotopian Cities

This article analyzes Ernest Callenbach’s 1975 novel “Ecotopia” by focusing on the description of ecologically sustainable features of cities in this fictitious ideal state, although the term “sustainability” is not mentioned once in the original text (except in an afterword in the 2004 anniversary edition) because “sustainability” as an environmentally relevant notion only became widely used after the publication of the so-called Brundtland Report (Commission). Scholarly environmental ethical terminology was neither employed nor intended in the book since the aim of the book was to reach a wider audience and not just academics. The article’s second section analyzes Ecotopian cities’ environmental sustainability with the help of the ecology domain of the “Circles of Sustainability” (circlesofsustainability.org). In doing so, the objective is to screen ecologically sustainable characteristics in Ecotopian cities that may still serve as potential blueprints for environmentally sustainable cities. We focus on the...

Una visión crítica del turismo comunitario desde la Ecología Política. Turismo comunitario como alternativa de Desarrollo Sustentable. Caso Comunidad de Yunguilla, Ecuador

El presente ensayo analiza un estudio de caso de turismo comunitario en Ecuador y los alcances que tiene este emprendimiento como una alternativa sustentable para la comunidad. A partir del caso, se discute, desde la ecología política, la desigualdad socioeconómica y ecológica, que se suscita dentro de las comunidades indígenas y campesinas andinas a causa del sistema económico capitalista, y, cómo las luchas y reivindicaciones de estos grupos han permitido desplegar alternativas económicas locales. En el centro del debate está el concepto de Desarrollo Sustentable, para ello, se revisa la propuesta emitida en el Informe Brundtland. A la vez, se discute si la actividad turística es otra de las formas contemporáneas para seguir capitalizando la naturaleza.

What Is in a Name? The Rising Star of the Circular Economy as a Resource-Related Concept for Sustainable Development

The most popular definition of sustainable development, which can be found in the Brundtland Report, sets an ideal goal but do not provide a clear direction for the implementation of sustainable solutions. Other related concepts and approaches have emerged as means to progress towards sustainability in a more pragmatic way, such as the circular economy. The circular economy has risen to prominence at a rate and on a scale to rival the idea of sustainable development itself. This is despite the fact that there is relatively little about the circular economy that is entirely original—it draws heavily on precursor concepts such as industrial ecology and industrial symbiosis. These ideas have received renewed impetus even whilst being eclipsed in both academic and policies debates. In order to address this paradox and help establish the identity and contribution of these fields, this article presents the concepts of circular economy, industrial symbiosis and sustainable development, summarizing their complex and often intertwined evolutionary paths, focusing on relevant developments and implementation challenges. In addition, the authors point out the divergences and interrelations of these concepts and link them to other adjacent concepts and research fields, such as ecological modernisation and the green economy. Additionally, the potential contribution of industrial symbiosis and the circular economy to sustainable development and to the Sustainable Development Goals set in the United Nations Agenda 2030 is briefly discussed.

Cara N. Daggett, The Birth of Energy. Fossil Fuels, Thermodynamics, and the Politics of Work

While the energy transition now seems to be accelerating, with electric vehicles on the roads and renewables becoming competitive, reducing sustainability challenges to technological improvements would be misleading. Since the Brundtland report, which popularised the notion of sustainable development in the late 1980s, and after three decades of research and experiments, it has been now well established that the conciliation of human desires with environmental viability requires also new poli...

RESILIENCE COVERAGE OF GLOBAL SUSTAINABILITY ASSESSMENT FRAMEWORKS: A SYSTEMATIC REVIEW

ABSTRACTSustainable development has been a popular concept since 1987 and the issuance of the Brundtland report. A diverse number of sustainability assessment frameworks are available to examine the environmental performance of buildings and communities. With the current pace of climate change and the increasing threat of stronger, more frequent natural hazards, however, there are doubts that sustainability alone is an effective response. Sustainability assessment frameworks in recent years have been criticized for not incorporating hazard resilience. To better understand the current level of emphasis put on resilience to natural hazards in green building rating systems, this study aims to assess the level of resilience integration in existing sustainability assessment frameworks. The results demonstrate an overall lack of resilience coverage in the frameworks with only four frameworks, CASBEE, LEED, Green Globes, and DGNB having resilience coverage of 27.5%, 15%, 2.6%, and 1.1% respectively. This confirms a need for more systematic integration of resilience indicators into sustainability rating systems to create combined frameworks for sustainability and resilience.

Concept Paper on Sustainability

Sustainability has immensely become a widespread buzzword with a contested meaning in the last century. Different scholars have portrayed the concept from different backgrounds and magnitudes. This paper aims to discuss various standpoints of the concept of sustainability. The notion has been defined as the procedures of maintaining a suitable environment for the growing consciousness, for instance, environmental dilapidation, resource diminution, and socioeconomic discrimination. The concept of sustainability has its root in the ‘Brundtland Report’, which has been encircling social, economic, and environmental dimensions. Thus, sustainability is the ability of prevailing or co-existing of human beings and the biosphere uninterruptedly. In 1978, Thomas Malthus discussed his theory of growing starvation for the barren land to feed a high population. Moreover, sustainability is the concept of economics where the scarcity of resources is the primary concern. In 1987, the Brundtland commission introduced the concept of sustainable development for ensuring improved life within this scarce resource.

Sustainable development: beyond appearances

Global resilience and stability have produced changes in the collective mentality, aimed at developing the spirit of resource conservation, increasing the quantity of recycled materials with effects in reducing climate change. The interdependence between economic, environmental and social considerations for ensuring sustainable development is obvious, their trend being of real interest in current research, because like those presented in the Brundtland report, only this will ensure “the needs of current generations without compromising the possibility of future generations to satisfy their own needs”. Based on a cascading research, from the global approach to sustainable development, to the practices reported by entities in Romania in the last five years, we aim to take stock of the achievements to identify where we are currently compared to the global target launched through the 17 sustainable development goals set by the UN in the 2030 Agenda.