Sustainability And Short Term Policies

There has been a profound change within the sphere of government and societal regulation in recent years. Traditional hierarchical government has been challenged by new governance instruments relying on negotiations instead of command and control. Alongside this development there has been a change in the time-framing of politics and steering. Traditional politics implicitly has been based on stability and permanence while new forms of governance explicitly are based on just-in-time actions such as projects and issue-based collaborations in networks and programs. This book analyses the implications of this shortening of time frames, focusing particularly on spatial policy interventions. Spatial policies have a special relevance when it comes to governance and new forms of societal steering. On the one hand, the local (geographical) level in politics is the principal battleground for the struggle between top down and bottom up approaches and aspirations. On the other hand, many of the most burning issues of our time require a global, strategic approach, for example, climate change, resource depletion, population growth are anchored in space and the physical world. Whether and how short-term spatial approaches can achieve sustainable development outcomes is thus a critical question, and forms the focus of this volume. The book examines the characteristics of temporary policy measures across a range of rural, urban and regional contexts, in four continents: Europe, North America, Oceania and Africa. The outcomes and effects of these policies and interventions are analysed, particularly focusing on the tension between short-term interventions and long-term effects.

This book calls for the conditions of transition to sustainability: How to take into consideration new global phenomena such as and of the dimension of climate change, the depletion of natural resources, financial crises, demographic dynamics, global urbanization, migrations and mobility, while bearing in mind short-term or local place-based issues, such as social justice or quality of life? Meeting this challenge requires an inclusive approach of sustainability. It is a matter of designing a new social contract: Sustainability requires more than developing the right markets, institutions and metrics, it requires social momentum. To do so, many issues need a clear and complete answer: How to link social justice with sustainability policies? What governance tools to do so? What linkage between one decision-making level and the other? These are major issues to design sound transitions to sustainability.

This book results from a pioneering effort to organize a productive interdisciplinary research program on sustainable development policy in a small country not previously recognized as a world leader in environmental social science. The results are very promising, considering the short time frame and the high barriers to success for such an enterprise - differences in concepts and terminology, disciplinary myopia, and the inherent difficulty of the problem. In the USA, where I work, these barriers continue to pose major challenges after some 30 years of effort. Switzerland has made noteworthy progress in only five. I hope this book represents the beginning of a long term effort at problem-oriented interdisciplinary collaboration among Swiss researchers and prac titioners. The Swiss group has succeeded in developing a unifying framework that makes a major contri bution to environmental policy analysis. The framework broadens policy thinking by giving se rious treatment to underutilized strategies that rely on communication and informal influence as well as to well-studied ones that rely on technological change, regulation, and economic forces. This broad typology makes it easier for an analyst to escape the tendency to presume that the po licy instrument currently in fashion, whether it be market-based instruments, voluntary measures, or whatever, is the right strategy for all problems. It also encourages discipline-based analysts to consider how their favored strategies might be combined with other strategies less familiar to them, and thus to craft strategies that can take advantage of the strengths of various policy instruments.

This edited volume presents the research results of the Collaborative Research Center 1026 “Sustainable manufacturing - shaping global value creation”. The book aims at providing a reference guide of sustainable manufacturing for researchers, describing methodologies for development of sustainable manufacturing solutions. The volume is structured in four chapters covering the following topics: sustainable manufacturing technology, sustainable product development, sustainable value creation networks and systematic change towards sustainable manufacturing. The target audience comprises both researchers and practitioners in the field of sustainable manufacturing, but the book may also be beneficial for graduate students.

Business sustainability has advanced from greenwashing and branding to being a business imperative. Stakeholders, including shareholders, demand, regulators require, and companies now need to report their sustainability performance. No longer is this a choice for businesses. A decade ago, fewer than 50 companies released sustainability reports, and now more 8,000 global public companies disclose sustainability performance information on some or all five economic, governance, social, ethical, and environmental (EGSEE) dimensions of sustainability performance, and this trend is expected to continue. Indeed, more than 6,000 European public companies would be required to disclose their environmental, social, governance and diversity information for their 2017 reporting year. However, the proper determination of sustainability performance, accurate and reliable reporting and independent assurance of sustainability information remain major challenges for organizations of all types and sizes. Through reading this book, you will: Identify sustainability strategies to create innovation in new products, services, energy-efficiency, environmental facilities and green initiatives. Understand the role and responsibilities of all participants in the corporate reporting process, including directors, officers, internal auditors, external auditors, legal counsel, and investors. See ways to improve public trust, investor confidence, business reputation, employee satisfaction, corporate culture, social responsibility and environmental performance. Learn all five economic, governance, social, ethical and environmental (EGSEE) dimensions of sustainability performance separately and their integrated and interactive effects on achieving the goal of creating sustainable value for all stakeholders, including shareholders. Learn how to adopt best practices in sustainability development and performance, and deliver effective integrated sustainability reporting and assurance.

This book deals with short-term and long-term issues associated with directions of economic development in developing as well as industrialized countries. It examines various aspects of the interrelationships among the environment, energy requirements, and economic development-- a topic much discussed since the Rio Earth Summit. It emphasizes the increasing environmental stress arising from such human activities as growing energy consumption associated with economic development; the risk of further environmental degradation due to economic development in developing countries; the importance of global environmental problems such as climate change resulting from greenhouse gas emissions; the significance of impacts of deforestation and desertification on rural societies in the developing world; the role of new technologies in addressing the trilemma of energy demand, economic development, and the environment; the opportunity for the developing economies through implementing technological leapfrogging and phased approaches; and the need for removing technological, economic, and social barriers to achieving sustainable development. It underscores the need for further scientific information and analytical studies, such as improved climate and econometric modelling. The book will be of tremendous value to experts and policy makers dealing with energy and sustainable development issues.

The 2019 edition of Policy Coherence for Sustainable Development looks at countries’ efforts to meet this challenge and identifies opportunities for accelerating progress. The third in a series, it shows how integrated and coherent policies, supported by strong institutional and governance mechanisms, can contribute to empowering people and ensuring inclusiveness and equality.