Download or read book Striving for Environmental Sustainability in a Complex World written by George Francis and published by UBC Press. This book was released on 2017-01-18 with total page 261 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the face of growing anxiety about the environmental sustainability of the world, George Francis, a leading authority in the field of sustainability studies, examines initiatives undertaken in Canada over the past twenty-five years to protect some of our unique environments. With rich and varied insight, spirited prose, and a deep and personal engagement with the material, the author documents the challenges faced by those who manage complex sustainability projects. Focusing mainly on collaborative studies of sixteen landscape regions designated as “Biosphere Reserves” by UNESCO and fifteen regions designated as “Model Forests” by the Canadian Forest Service, the book also summarizes a number of smaller sustainability initiatives in regions across the country. The author concludes on a hopeful note, looking forward to a future of solutions – those considered, proposed, promoted, and in some cases already implemented by groups striving to create sustainable societies in an increasingly complex world.
Download or read book The Age of Sustainability written by Mark Swilling and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2019-11-06 with total page 331 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: With transitions to more sustainable ways of living already underway, this book examines how we understand the underlying dynamics of the transitions that are unfolding. Without this understanding, we enter the future in a state of informed bewilderment. Every day we are bombarded by reports about ecosystem breakdown, social conflict, economic stagnation and a crisis of identity. There is mounting evidence that deeper transitions are underway that suggest we may be entering another period of great transformation equal in significance to the agricultural revolution some 13,000 years ago or the Industrial Revolution 250 years ago. This book helps readers make sense of our global crisis and the dynamics of transition that could result in a shift from the industrial epoch that we live in now to a more sustainable and equitable age. The global renewable energy transition that is already underway holds the key to the wider just transition. However, the evolutionary potential of the present also manifests in the mushrooming of ecocultures, new urban visions, sustainability-oriented developmental states and new ways of learning and researching. Shedding light on the highly complex challenge of a sustainable and just transition, this book is essential reading for anyone concerned with establishing a more sustainable and equitable world. Ultimately, this is a book about hope but without easy answers.
Download or read book Economic Growth and Sustainability written by Karen L. Higgins and published by Academic Press. This book was released on 2014-11-24 with total page 222 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: How to sustain our world for future generations has perplexed us for centuries. We have reached a crossroads: we may choose the rocky path of responsibility or continue on the paved road of excess that promises hardship for our progeny. Independent efforts to resolve isolated issues are inadequate. Different from these efforts and from other books on the topic, this book uses systems thinking to understand the dominant forces that are shaping our hope for sustainability. It first describes a mental model - the bubble that holds our beliefs - that emerges from preponderant world views and explains current global trends. The model emphasizes economic growth and drives behavior toward short-term and self-motivated outcomes that thwart sustainability. The book then weaves statistical trends into a system diagram and shows how the economic, environmental, and societal contributors of sustainability interact. From this holistic perspective, it finds leverage points where actions can be most effective and combines eight areas of intervention into an integrated plan. By emphasizing both individual and collective actions, it addresses the conundrum of how to blend human nature with sustainability. Finally, it identifies primary three lessons we can learn by applying systems thinking to sustainability. Its metaphor-rich and accessible style makes the complex topic approachable and allows the reader to appreciate the intricate balance required to sustain life on Earth. - Highlights the application of system thinking in economics - Identifies systemic leveraging actions for achieving sustainability - Outlines a comprehensive and integrated plan for achieving sustainable stewardship in the future
Download or read book Reshaping Environments written by Helena Bender and published by Cambridge University Press. This book was released on 2012-10-08 with total page 417 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Reshaping Environments: An Interdisciplinary Approach to Sustainability in a Complex World draws together a team of specialist authors from disciplines including urban planning, social sciences, engineering and environmental science to examine the diverse influences humans have upon the natural environment. This interdisciplinary approach presents multifaceted responses for complex environmental issues. The book explores current environmental science theories to provide a solid foundation of theoretical knowledge. Drawing on a range of case studies, it develops core analytical skills for application to real-world environmental issues. Reshaping Environments gives environmental science students the tools and insight to comprehend the range of influences society imposes on the natural environment. It is essential reading for those interested in creating a mutually beneficial future for human society and the natural environment.
Download or read book Pursuing Sustainability written by Pamela Matson and published by Princeton University Press. This book was released on 2016-03-29 with total page 245 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An essential guide to sustainable development for students and practitioners Sustainability is a global imperative and a scientific challenge like no other. This concise guide provides students and practitioners with a strategic framework for linking knowledge with action in the pursuit of sustainable development, and serves as an invaluable companion to more narrowly focused courses dealing with sustainability in particular sectors such as energy, food, water, and housing, or in particular regions of the world. Written by leading experts, Pursuing Sustainability shows how more inclusive and interdisciplinary approaches and systems perspectives can help you achieve your sustainability objectives. It stresses the need for understanding how capital assets are linked to sustainability goals through the complex adaptive dynamics of social-environmental systems, how committed people can use governance processes to alter those dynamics, and how successful interventions can be shaped through collaborations among researchers and practitioners on the ground. The ideal textbook for undergraduate and graduate students and an invaluable resource for anyone working in this fast-growing field, Pursuing Sustainability also features case studies, a glossary, and suggestions for further reading. Provides a strategic framework for linking knowledge with action Draws on the latest cutting-edge science and practices Serves as the ideal companion text to more narrowly focused courses Utilizes interdisciplinary approaches and systems perspectives Illustrates concepts with a core set of case studies used throughout the book Written by world authorities on sustainability An online illustration package is available to professors
Download or read book A Complexity Approach to Sustainability written by Angela Espinosa and published by World Scientific. This book was released on 2011 with total page 390 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: A major challenge of our times is to understand and manage the increasing complexity of socio-economic reality. This has immediate relevance for sustainable development. The impact of recent contributions from systems and complexity sciences in addressing this issue has not filtered down into effective practice ? notably, there remain problems caused by the legacy of competing paradigms and the application of their associated methodologies. This book argues the urgency for the application of analytical tools that embody the principles of complexity management. The authors describe a theoretical framework based on complexity science with a focus on organisational and second order cybernetics, one that presents a powerful new insight into the concept of sustainability. The book also describes actual applications of the ideas in the area of organisational, societal and environmental management, and reflects upon the impact of such an approach on current practice.
Download or read book Navigating Peace and Sustainability in an Increasingly Complex World written by Ayyoob Sharifi and published by Springer. This book was released on 2024-12-08 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:
Download or read book Complex Science for a Complex World written by Pascal Perez and published by ANU E Press. This book was released on 2006-08-01 with total page 352 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is well known that human activities are endangering the stability and sustainability of many fragile ecosystems. This title looks at the science that addresses the frontiers of interactions between human behavior and environmental responses.
Download or read book Green Development written by W. M. Adams and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2003-09-02 with total page 472 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This revised and updated new edition retains the clear and powerful argument which characterized the original. It gives a valuable analysis of the theory and practice of sustainable development and suggests that at the start of the new millennium, we should think radically about the challenge of sustainability. Fully revised, this latest edition includes further reading, chapter outlines, chapter summaries and new discussion topics, and explores: the roots of sustainable development thinking and its evolution in the last three decades of the twentieth century the dominant ideas within mainstream sustainable development the nature and diversity of alternative ideas about sustainability the problems of environmental degradation and the environmental impacts of development strategies for building sustainability in development from above and below. Offering a synthesis of theoretical ideas on sustainability based on the industrialized economies of the North and the practical, applied ideas in the South which tend to ignore 'First World' theory, this important text gives a clear discussion of theory and extensive practical insights drawn from Africa, Latin America and Asia.
Download or read book Governance for Sustainable Development written by Jens Newig and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2013-09-13 with total page 203 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Sustainable development stirs up debate about the capacities of political steering and governance. The complexity of the task expounds limits of steering in three dimensions: goals, knowledge, and power: Sustainability goals are subject to changing and controversial risk perceptions, values and interests. Moreover, knowledge of the coupled dynamics of society, technology and nature is limited. Finally, the power to shape structural change in society and technology is distributed across a multitude of actors and societal subsystems. Steering attempts therefore have to cope with conflict and ambivalence, with uncertainty, and with a lack of central control; and they have to face the necessity of coordinating different actor groups and social networks. This volume explores steering strategies and governance arrangements for sustainable development with a view to these problem dimensions. The contributions by authors from various disciplines approach these challenges from different conceptual angles, ranging from positivist, managerial up to post-modern, constructivist perspectives. By combining theoretical reflections with insights from empirical research in European and American contexts, the volume maps out conditions and identifies approaches which both reflect the limits of steering and reveal options for constructively taking up the task of sustainable development in science and practice.
Download or read book Protecting the Future written by Sarah Holdsworth and published by CSIRO PUBLISHING. This book was released on 2004-10-26 with total page 220 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Protecting the Future showcases tangible examples of the practical implementation of global sustainability and the triple bottom-line plus one (comprising environmental, social and cultural economic and governance dimensions) in the scholarship and operations of RMIT University. These practical initiatives, applications and methodologies can provide information and inspiration for individuals or organisations wanting to implement global sustainability principles in their planning and operations. Global sustainability is one of the fastest growing concerns around the world. Organisations of all kinds are increasingly aware that their future may well depend on their ability to create solutions to economic, environmental, social and cultural as well as governance issues.
Download or read book Global Challenges written by Angela Churie-Kallhauge and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2017-09-08 with total page 156 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg 2002 was the latest conference in an international process to manage environment and development issues that can be traced back to the late 1960s. Three milestones mark this 30-year process of social and political interaction: the United Nations Conference on the Human Environment (UNCHE), held in Stockholm in 1972, the first international meeting at a high political level convened to address environmental issues; the 1992 United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), held in Rio de Janeiro; and the WSSD, which attempted to set policy goals and targets for the global environmental and developmental challenges previously identified.But what did the WSSD achieve? Following the summit there have been various opinions of its significance and its outputs, many of them negative. This book argues that there is a need to place the WSSD in its broader context. Understanding the connections between the WSSD and its precedents as well as those between this overall process and individual environmental decision-making processes (such as on climate change), and how they all contribute to the overall global policy process, adds a critical dimension to the analysis of the WSSD outcomes. This book examines the challenges facing the global policy process for sustainable development as it continues beyond Johannesburg into the future. It combines a forward outlook with a historical perspective in tracing the evolution of selected cross-cutting themes on the agenda of the three conferences, the institutions and formal results of the process, and the actors and their patterns of interaction over time. The focus is on the decision-making dimension – the multilateral negotiations-which can be seen as the development over time of a pattern of interlinked political activities.Global Challenges has four operational objectives: first, to define the ongoing process that formally began with the Stockholm Conference in 1972 and evolved towards its latest major manifestation at the WSSD; second, to present some dynamics of the Stockholm–Rio–Johannesburg (SRJ) process by exploring the themes identified; third, to introduce an approach on how to consider the outcomes of this process as a way of reflecting on what the process has actually accomplished; and, finally, to discuss lessons learned for theory and practice from this exercise. The practical lessons include reflections on how the continued SRJ process should best be organised and supported into the future. The book takes a uniquely broad outlook and interdisciplinary approach in addressing important lessons relating to the emergence of substantive issues as well as to process and institutional dynamics. It is a bridge-building exercise from academic analysis to long-term strategic thinking in environmental regime building. Global Challenges provides a new perspective on the continuing and increasingly complex global environment and development policy process and analyses the interlinkages between the process, trends and cross-cutting issues that set the conditions for the global efforts to achieve sustainable development. It will be essential reading for academics and practitioners interested in seeing the big picture of the global challenges facing people and planet in the 21st century.
Download or read book Promoting Global Environmental Sustainability and Cooperation written by Idris, Sofia and published by IGI Global. This book was released on 2018-06-08 with total page 293 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Due to natural factors and human activity, nature has been changing since the beginning of time. As the environment continuously undergoes such transitions, it is necessary for society to understand the complex interdependency between nature and humanity to promote global sustainability. Promoting Global Environmental Sustainability and Cooperation is a pivotal reference source featuring the latest scholarly research on the rising awareness of environmental issues and their relationships with sustainable development. While highlighting topics including global governance, international business, and sustainable consumption, this book is ideally designed for environmentalists, developers, policy makers, academicians, researchers, and graduate-level students seeking current research on the globalized world in relation to environmental issues.
Download or read book The World We ll Leave Behind written by William Scott and published by Routledge. This book was released on 2018-02-05 with total page 323 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: It is now clear that human activity has influenced how the biosphere supports life on Earth, and given rise to a set of connected environmental and social problems. In response to the challenge that these problems present, a series of international conferences and summits led to discussions of sustainable development and the core dilemma of our time: How can we all live well, now and in the future, without compromising the ability of the planet to enable us all to live well? This book identifies the main issues and challenges we now face; it explains the ideas that underpin them and their interconnection, and discusses a range of strategies through which they might be addressed and possibly resolved. These cover things that governments might do, what businesses and large organisations can contribute, and the scope for individuals, families and communities to get involved. This book is for everyone who cares about such challenges, and wants to know more about them.
Download or read book Globalization and Environmental Challenges written by Hans Günter Brauch and published by Springer Science & Business Media. This book was released on 2008-01-23 with total page 1141 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Put quite simply, the twin impacts of globalization and environmental degradation pose new security dangers and concerns. In this new work on global security thinking, 91 authors from five continents and many disciplines, from science and practice, assess the worldwide reassessment of the meaning of security triggered by the end of the Cold War and globalization, as well as the multifarious impacts of global environmental change in the early 21st century.
Download or read book Can Business Save the Earth written by Michael Lenox and published by Stanford University Press. This book was released on 2018-05-22 with total page 191 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Increasingly, business leaders are tasked with developing new products, services, and business models that minimize environmental impact while driving economic growth. It's a tall order—and a call that is only getting louder. In Can Business Save the Earth?, Michael Lenox and Aaron Chatterji explain just how the private sector can help. Many believe that markets will inevitably demand sustainable practices and force them to emerge. But Lenox and Chatterji see it differently. Based on more than a decade of research and work with companies, they argue that a bright green future is only possible with dramatic innovation across multiple sectors at the same time. To achieve this, a broader ecosystem of players—including inventors, executives, customers, investors, activists, and governments—all must play a role. The book outlines how and the extent to which each group can serve as a driver of green growth. Then, Lenox and Chatterji identify where economic incentives currently exist, or could exist with institutional change, and ultimately address the larger question of how far well-coordinated efforts can take us in addressing the current environmental crisis.
Download or read book Ecological Sustainability written by Robert B. Northrop and published by CRC Press. This book was released on 2016-04-19 with total page 542 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Complex systems is a new field of science studying how parts of a system give rise to the collective behaviors of the system, and how the system interacts with its environment. This book examines the complex systems involved in environmental sustainability, and examines the technologies involved to help mitigate human impacts, such as renewable ene
