Sustainable Development PDF

The Contemporary World Page 1 of 6 General Education 3 GE 3: The Contemporary World Module 15, Week 15: Sustainable Development III. LESSON PROPER Many...

The Contemporary World Page 1 of 6 General Education 3 GE 3: The Contemporary World Module 15, Week 15: Sustainable Development III. LESSON PROPER Many scholars are now raising their concerns over free-market and neoliberal economic thinking. They see this ideology as a fueling globalization, creating extreme levels of inequality and devastating the environment, making it unable to support life. By catering to increasing consumer demands, companies expand their operations. New factories are opened, leading to the urbanization and flattening of forests and natural ecosystems. For example, the rising demand for palm oil in big markets like China, India and other Asian countries has led to companies investing in the burning of forests in Indonesia, Mozambique and Malaysia so that they can be converted to palm tree plantations. It is important to know that all of us treat the world’s limited resources can affect the health of the environment, world populations and the faunal and floral species that we consume. It is also important that we reflect on our patterns of consumption. Sustainable development, therefore, cannot be more emphasized. STABILITY AND SUSTAINABILITY Stability is the condition of being stable or in equilibrium, and thus resistant to change. It is the tendency to recover from perturbations. However, sustainability is the ability to sustain something. A means of configuring civilization and human activity so that society, its members and its economies are able to meet their needs and express their greatest potential in the present, while preserving biodiversity and natural ecosystems, planning and acting for the ability to maintain these ideals for future generations. In addition, sustainable is something (like an action or a process) that can be maintained/supported so that it can continue on existing into the future. Example: In the sentence: The two countries' new deal proved their sustainable relationship. A "sustainable" relationship in this sentence is one that can continue to be maintained at the same level of friendliness. Otherwise, stable means that it is unchanging or will resist any sudden change. To be stable means that it is presently firm and unmoving. A "stable building" is one that will not be shaken or moved. The Bruntland Report prepared by the World Commission on Environment and Development for the United Nations in 1987 defines the term sustainability as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’”. Plociennik in 2014 refers to this as the responsible use of resources. Many economic models today are concerned with growth or the increase in the production of economic goods and services through time and the combination of resources that could induce production. Economic models do not take into consideration the issues related to the depletion of natural resources to achieve this growth. Plociennik adds that economic theories also focus on technology as a form of escape from the sustainability dilemma, saying new techniques of production help to expand size of output without raising necessary input. Plociennik explains that this perspective neglects the role of sustainability in economic development since it merely focuses on new technologies, making better use of resources instead of literally saving resources. The Contemporary World Page 2 of 6 General Education 3 Another factor that contributes not only to the neglect of sustainability but to the degradation of the environment is the capitalist system’s use of open/waste spaces such as agricultural lands, forests, open seas, in order to sustain patterns of consumption – especially in the developed world – at the expense of poorer countries’ environmental and economic decline. This mindset has led to western countries colonizing, polluting, enslaving and exploiting poorer developing countries as early as the eighteenth century until today. It can be said that the issue on sustainability was foreseen as early as the time of Malthus, but decision-makers and economic leaders have refused to listen to these warnings in exchange for progress that is not only unsustainable but also predatory to the most vulnerable sectors in the world. SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT Sustainable Development has become the buzzword in development discourse, having been associated with different definitions, meanings and interpretations. Taken literally, sustainable development would simply mean “development that can be continued either indefinitely or for the given time period. Structurally, the concept can be seen as a phrase consisting of two words, “sustainable” and “development.” Just as each of the two words that combine to form the concept of sustainable development, that is, “sustainable” and “development”, has been defined variously from various perspectives, the concept of sustainable development has also been looked at from various angles, leading to a plethora of definitions of the concept. Although definitions abound with respect to sustainable development, the most often cited definition of the concept is the one proposed by the Brundtland Commission Report (Schaefer & Crane, 2005). The Report defines sustainable development as development that meets the needs of the current generation without compromising the ability of future generations to meets their own needs. Acknowledging the pervasiveness of WCED’s definition, Cerin in 2006 as well as Abubakar in 2017 argue that sustainable development is a core concept within global development policy and agenda. It provides a mechanism through which society can interact with the environment while not risking damaging the resource for the future. Thus, it is a development paradigm as well as concept that calls for improving living standards without jeopardizing the earth’s ecosystems or causing environmental challenges such as deforestation and water and air pollution that can result in problems such as climate change and extinction of species. It is argued that the relevance of sustainable development deepens with the dawn of every day because the population keeps increasing but the natural resources available for the satisfaction of human needs and wants do not. It implies that sustainable development is an effort at guaranteeing a balance among economic growth, environmental integrity and social well-being. According to Kolk in 2016, this is achievable through the integration of economic, environmental, and social concerns in decision-making processes. However, it is common for people to treat sustainability and sustainable development as analogues and synonyms but the two concepts are distinguishable. According to Diesendorf in 2000, sustainability is the goal or endpoint of a process called sustainable development. Gray (2010) reinforces the point by arguing that, while “sustainability” refers to a state, sustainable development refers to the process for achieving this state. Additionally, the sustainable development is a development with sustainable rate in time yet preserving the natural resources and values for the coming generations. The concept of sustainable development is rooted in a critique of the concept of development, primarily understood as "economic growth", where economic development was understood as progressive and necessary stages. But at the beginning of the 1960s, some doubts began to arise, which led to emphasizing the importance of taking into account both social change and institutional requirements (in addition to the growth of production and income). The role of education, the "human capital", and the policies The Contemporary World Page 3 of 6 General Education 3 for basic sanitation became legitimate questions at the United Nations and its financial institution (the World Bank). However, since the 1970s, ecological concerns have been raised about two issues: Development in the South has caused severe environmental consequences (degradation of resources, biotypes, soil quality and reducing biodiversity) due to a combination of factors: the inappropriateness of Western technologies, and unfamiliarity with local populations' aims, priorities, and cultural references, among others, all of which have led to worrying levels of degradation. In parallel with these concerns regarding land and particularly regarding the social and ecological impact of development, there was another debate which took the form of a world-wide alert: on a global scale the continuation of human economic and demographic development was becoming untenable. "Limits to Growth" were the words used for the Club of Rome's report, and Georgescu-Roegen in 1979 agreed: tomorrow comes decrease. Sustainability is development that satisfies the needs of the present without compromising the capacity of future generations, guaranteeing the balance between economic growth, care for the environment and social well-being. MODEL OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT Three Overlapping Circles Model The overlapping-circles model of sustainability acknowledges the intersection of economic, environmental, and social factors. Depending on our mindset, we re-size the circles to show that one factor is more dominant than the other two. For example, some business leaders prefer to show the economy as the largest circle because it is the most important to their success and it makes their world go round. The concept of sustainability appears poised to continue to influence future discourse regarding development science. This, in the view of Porter and van der Linde (1995), implies that the best choices are likely to remain those that meet the needs of society and are environmentally and economically viable, economically and socially equitable as well as socially and environmentally bearable. This leads to three interconnected spheres or domains of sustainability that describe the relationships among the environmental, economic, and social aspects of sustainable development. Basically, it can be concluded from the figure that, nearly everything man does or plans to do on earth has implications for the environment, economy or society and for that matter the continued existence and wellbeing of the human race. Akin to this, as argued by Wanamaker (2018), the spheres constitute a set of interrelated concepts which should form the basis of human decisions and actions in the quest for SD. Yang (2019) supports the argument by opining that basically, the figure depicts that proper decisions on sustainable resource management will bring about sustainable growth for sustainable society. Examples of these include decisions on land use, surface water management, agricultural practices, building design and construction, energy management, education, equal opportunities as well as law-making and. Kahn in 1995 and Basiago in 1999 provide a vivid illustration regarding the relationships among economic, social and environmental sustainability, arguing that the three domains must be integrated for sustainability sake. According to Khan in 1995 as cited in Bassiago: “If a man in a given geographical area lacks a job (economic), he is likely to be poor and disenfranchised (social); if he is poor and disenfranchised, he has an incentive to engage in practices that harm ecology, for example, by cutting down trees for firewood to cook his meals and warm his home (environmental). As his actions are aggregated with those of others in his region cutting down trees, deforestation will cause vital minerals to be lost from the soil (environmental). If vital minerals are lost from the soil, the inhabitants will be deprived of the dietary nutrients required to sustain the intellectual performance needed to learn new technologies, for example, how to operate a computer, and this will cause The Contemporary World Page 4 of 6 General Education 3 productivity to reduce or stagnate (economic). If productivity stagnates (economic), poor people will remain poor or poorer (social), and the cycle continues.” PILLARS OF SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT As a visionary and forward-looking development paradigm, sustainable development emphasizes a positive transformation trajectory anchored essentially on social, economic and environmental factors. According to Taylor (2016), the three main issues of sustainable development are economic growth, environmental protection and social equality. Based on this, it can be argued that the concept of sustainable development rests, fundamentally, on three conceptual pillars. These pillars are “economic sustainability”, “social sustainability”, and ‘environmental sustainability. 1. Economic Sustainability = Economic sustainability implies a system of production that satisfies present consumption levels without compromising future needs. Traditionally, economists assuming that the supply of natural resources was unlimited, placed undue emphasis on the capacity of the market to allocate resources efficiently. They also believed that economic growth would be accompanied by the technological advancement to replenish natural resources destroyed in the production process. According to Dernbach in 1993, there are guiding frameworks by which transactions are evaluated and decisions about economic activities are made. Three main activities that are carried out in an economy are production, distribution and consumption but the accounting framework used to guide and evaluate the economy with regard to these activities grossly distorts values and this does not augur well for society and the environment. 2. Social Sustainability = Social sustainability encompasses notions of equity, empowerment, accessibility, participation, cultural identity and institutional stability. The concept implies that people matter since development is about people. Basically, social sustainability connotes a system of social organization that alleviates poverty. However, in a more fundamental sense, “social sustainability” relates to the nexus between social conditions such as poverty and environmental destruction. According to Kolk, social sustainability is not about ensuring that everyone’s needs are met. Rather, its aims at providing enabling conditions for everyone to have the capacity to realize their needs, if they so desire. Anything that impedes this capacity is considered a barrier, and needs to be addressed in order for individuals, organization or community to make progress towards social sustainability. 3. Environmental Sustainability = The concept of environmental sustainability is about the natural environment and how it remains productive and resilient to support human life. Environmental sustainability relates to ecosystem integrity and carrying capacity of natural environment. It requires that natural capital be sustainably used as a source of economic inputs and as a sink for waste. However, the quest for unbridled growth is imposing ever greater demands on the earth system and placing ever greater strain on these limits because technological advancement may fail to support exponential growth. The effects of climate change, for instance, provide a convincing argument for the need for environmental sustainability. Climate change refers to significant and long-lasting changes in the climate system caused by natural climate variability or by human activities. ACTIONS TAKEN TOWARD SUSTAINABILITY Today, concerted efforts to correct these practices are being done, spearheaded by international governing agencies and civil society movements. Governments, national and international civil society are moving toward arresting the dire effects of policies and economic practices responsible for the rapidly deteriorating state of the global climate and environment. The United Nations has developed a set of global targets that nation-states, with participation from multiple sectors, should aspire to achieve through policy and formal and informal actions. The United Nations states that these goals are “the blueprint to achieve a The Contemporary World Page 5 of 6 General Education 3 better and more sustainable future for all. They address the global challenges we face, including those related to poverty, inequality, climate, environmental degradation, prosperity and peace and justice”. According to UNDP, these goals are interconnected – often the key to success on one will involve tackling issues more commonly associated with another. It enumerates 17 development goals, namely: 1. poverty eradication 2. zero hunger 3. good health and well-being 4. quality education for all 5. gender equality 6. clean water and sanitation 7. decent work and economic growth 8. affordable and clean energy 9. industry innovation and infrastructure 10. inequality reduction 11. sustainable cities and communities 12. responsible production and consumption 13. climate action 14. life below water 15. life on land 16. peace, justice and strong institutions 17. partnership for the goals SIMPLE STEPS TOWARD SUSTAINABILITY Most of us may be overwhelmed by the magnitude of issues and concerns surrounding the precarious world that we are all living in. while there is legitimate cause for alarm, we should use this toward efforts that can help achieve a balanced attainment of our individual and societal development goals in an environment friendly and sustainable manner. Changing our consumerist ways can do a lot to help improve our global condition. By changing our habits, we can help reduce our negative impact to the environment. Below are simple steps toward sustainability: Reduction of carbon footprint Buy and consume only what is needed Organize and support tree planting projects Reduce the use of plastic Patronize goods and services that are sustainably produced, promote environment-friendly practices and mitigate climate change Petition your local leaders to adopt environment friendly measures in your locality Share your ideas We share one world Change of perspective Act