Annotated Bibliography

1. Robertson, Margaret (2014) Sustainability Principles and Practice,chapter 2, Abingdon: Earthscan/Routledge.

   This chapter presents a wide overview of the history of sustainability in western thought, stretching back to Thomas Malthus in 1798. It emphasises the environmental dimensions of sustainability.

2. Washington, Haydn (2015) Demystifying Sustainability: Towards Real Solutions, Abingdon: Earthscan/Routledge.

   Washington stretches the historical framework even further than Robertson, going back to some indigenous worldviews and the growth of ecological understanding in the 1960s. The book argues for some deep social and cultural changes.

3. Beder, Sharon (2006) Environmental Principles and Policies: An Interdisciplinary Approach,Sydney: UNSW Press.

   Sharon Beder emerged as a prominent Australian environmental activist/scholar in the 1980s and gained international recognition for her sharp critique of attempts to undermine the credibility of environmental discourses in Global Spin (1997). Environmental Principles and Policies is a more sanguine overview of the ideas that have given rise to the global discourse on sustainability.

4. Blewitt, John (2008) Understanding Sustainable Development,London: Earthscan.

   With an academic background in politics, history and sociology and experience in teaching Social Responsibility and Sustainability to postgraduate students in a business school in Birmingham, UK, John Blewitt presented the first edition of this introductory book in 2008 and updated it for the second edition. Part 1 suggests that the term was coined by the World Council of Churches in 1974 and it follows developments through to ‘disappointments’ that came after the Rio conference in 1972 and the Kyoto summit on greenhouse gas emissions in 1997.

5. Dresner, Simon (2012) 2nd edition, The Principles of Sustainability,London: Earthscan.

   Simon Dresner’s book has been highly regarded since it was first published in 2002. It is admired for its analysis of key sustainability discourses but the book’s title is rather misleading because it does not articulate a clear set of underlying principles. It is somewhat skewed towards the economics of sustainability.

6. Shiva, Vandana (2005) Earth Democracy: Justice, Sustainability and Peace, Cambridge MA: Southend Press.

   Trained in quantum physics and philosophy, Vandana Shiva has been a prominent critic of western models of economic development since the early 1980s. In this book she argues that an emerging global movement for peace, justice and sustainability is drawing on ancient worldview and non-western cultural practices.

7. Jackson, Tim (2016) 2nd edition, Prosperity Without Growth: Foundations for the Economy of Tomorrow, London: Routledge.

   This is the second, revised, edition of a book first published in 2009 in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis. Although the first edition was based on a report commissioned by the British government, the suggestion that prosperity could be achieved without economic ‘growth’ was highly controversial and Jackson spent the next six years examining the criticisms and developing responses. The result is an even stronger edition which has won widespread praise. It argues that we can achieve prosperity by focusing on social care and craft instead of consumption and endless productivity gains. The book argues for changing the role of money in the economy and it outlines a strategy for mobilising investments in a future economy that will deliver social benefits without causing ecological degradation.

8. Adger, W. Neil and Andrew Jordan (eds) (2009) Governing Sustainability, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

   This volume includes contributions from some of the world’s leading thinkers on new forms of governance that will be required to meet the challenges of sustainability, from the local to the global.

9. Barry, John (2012) The Politics of Actually Existing Unsustainability: Human Flourishing in a Climate-Changed, Carbon-Constrained World, Oxford: Oxford University Press.

   A rather passionate argument against business as usual or ‘techno-optimism’ from a lively and entertaining Irish academic writer with a high international profile in environmental politics and ecological economist.

Annotated Links to Further Web Resources

1. United Nations Sustainable Development Commission

   www.sustainabledevelopment.un.org

   The United Nations Sustainable Development Commission was established within the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs in 1993 to continue some of the work initiated by the UN Commission on Environment and Development (UNCED) which was responsible for the 1989 Brundtland Report and the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. This website provides access to relevant UN publications, such as the final report emerging from the Rio+20 conference in 2012 which is titled The Future We Want.

2. Worldwatch Institute

   www.worldwatch.org

   This Washington-based institute was established in 1974 by farmer turned agricultural economist Lester Brown. It is probably best known for its annual State of the World reports but it also publishes other reports which provide a critical perspective on sustainability policies and practices.

3. Earth Policy Institute

   www.earth-policy.org

   This institute was set up by Lester Brown after he left the larger Worldwatch Institute in 2002. With a fairly small team of researchers, Earth Policy Institute has published several books by Lester Brown and it aims to provide resources for environmental activists.

4. Groningen Growth and Development Centre

   http://www.rug.nl/research/ggdc/

   Located at the University of Groningen, Netherlands the Groningen Growth and Development Centre provides a website which collates datasets comparing economic development strategies and outcomes across many nations.

Annotated Links to Video Clips

1. Sustainability: A History, by Jeremy L. Cardonna

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hho1h7OR6l8

   Duration: 5:29

   A well-presented and accessible account of the history of the idea, which suggests pre-industrial origins of the word in European languages which has subsequently taken on wider meanings and greater urgency because of the evident unsustainability of industrial capitalism.

2. Gro Harlem Brundtland: I’m A Lucky Person

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_6cL71L870

   Duration: 4:49

   In this clip Gro Harlem Brundtland looks back on a rather extraordinary life in which she became Norway’s first female prime minister and the lead author of a UN report which added substance and urgency to previously abstract notions of sustainability.

3. Gro Harlem Brundtland: Interview part 1

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZNTw3kyQkyk

   Duration: 1:11

   In this 2007 interview, Gro Harlem Brundland reflects on the impact of the 1987 report—Our Common Future—which is so closely associated with her name.

4. Gro Harlem Brundtland

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SLkn0Qk2KkE

   Duration: 2:38

   In this short 2009 clip United State Secretary of State Hilary Clinton praises the lifetime contribution made by Gro Harlem Brundtland.

5. Reflecting on Rio: Looking Back to 1992

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=68WECTt_DfU

   Duration: 3:22 

   Twenty years after the 1992 Rio Earth Summit some of the prominent players in that event reflect on what was achieved and what its legacy has been.

6. Severn Cullis-Suzuki Returns to Rio 20 Years after Stopping the World

   http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwNICantjJo

   Duration: 10:58

   In 1992, 12-year-old Severn Cullis-Suzuki – daughter of Canadian writer Tara Elizabeth Cullis and environmentalist David Suzuki – caught world attention for a heart-felt speech delivered at the Rio Earth Summit in which she said that she was deeply concerned for her own future. Twenty years later she returned for Rio+20 to say that she now wanted to speak about the concern she feels for her children’s future.

7. Tim Jackson: An Economic Reality Check

   https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NZsp_EdO2Xk

   Duration: 24:31

   A well-presented TED talk by the leading international ecological economist Tim Jackson explaining why the world cannot continue with existing trends in economic growth and development. An accessible account of the blind spots in global economic systems.

Group Activities

Tragedy of the Commons game

Submitted by Arley Marks, RMIT University

The group is split into five groups (nations), all have a cup of lollies (carbon emissions). In the centre of the room/table is an empty bowl which represents the amount by which emissions need to be reduced worldwide to contain global warming to less than two degrees centigrade. Overall goal of the game is for groups to negotiate and ensure that the bowl (the ‘commons’) is filled with lollies. Nobody gets to eat any lollies until the bowl is full.

However, the individual group/nation that manages to reduce their own emissions/lollies the LEAST wins a super exciting mystery prize (the ‘commons’ bowl) (plus whatever lollies are left in their cup).

If you want to make it more complicated/realistic, allocate different amounts of lollies to different countries based on ratio of emissions per capita.

Supply the following data to each of the nations (I used sticky labels on the lolly cups). What factors will influence their decision about what is a ‘fair’ input from each?

China: 26% (8,286,892 thousand tonnes annually); (4.9 thousand tonnes per capita)
USA: 17% (5,433,057 thousand tonnes); (16.4 thousand tonnes per capita)
Australia: 1.19 % (373,081 thousand tonnes); (18.8 thousand tonnes per capita)
Cambodia: 0.01% (4,180 thousand tonnes); (0.3 thousand tonnes per capita)
Denmark: 0.15% (46,303 thousand tonnes); (8.4 thousand tonnes per capita)

Discussion questions

1. What were the arguments/decision making criteria that came up in deciding who should allocate the most lollies to the commons bowl?
2. What worldviews are evident? Did we frame this as a shared problem that everyone should play an equal role in solving (equality of input) or a problem stemming from some players having to give more than others (diversity of input)?
3. What was our goal? (equity in outcomes, or diversity?) Why?
4. Who became the most powerful and most vulnerable in this game?
5. What was the complexity in the situation? How did competing vested interests hinder this process?
6. What would have made it easier to fill the commons?

Additional Case Studies

Durban leads the way in South Africa

Submitted by Martin Mulligan, RMIT University, Melbourne

Nelson Mandela was elected president in post-apartheid South Africa in 1994. This was also the year that Durban became the first city in the country to commit to the Local Agenda 21 action strategy that emerged from the 1992 Rio Earth Summit. As a result, the Environmental Management Branch (EMB) of the Durban Metropolitan Council gained a national and international reputation for its pioneering work. This included implementation of Environmental Impact Assessments, development of an open space plan for the city and innovative community education work that featured resident interviews and street theatre performed by Green Bafana. Durban’s Local Agenda 21 initiatives won praise at the World Summit on Environment and Development held in Johannesburg in 2002 and from the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI).

According to Roberts and Diederichs (2002) Durban’s Local Agenda 21 has been hampered by a lack of real political support and, consequently, resources. Critics have suggested that it is a luxury to worry about ‘green issues’ when the country faces so many social problems. Another challenge is that the municipal area of Durban has grown from 300 square kilometres to 1,366 square kilometres and Durban has now become part of an even bigger urban conglomeration covering 2,297 square kilometres which is known as Unicity. However, the work of Durban EMB has been reflected in the development of an Environmental Services Management Plan for the larger municipality known as the eThekwini Municipality. This includes the adoption of an open spaces plan for a municipality that includes large peri-urban and rural areas.
1994 was a year of great promise for Durban and South Africa as a whole. While it has proved to be more difficult than expected to stick to the commitments of Local Agenda 21, Durban has continued to provide national and international leadership on sustainability policy and practice.

Key reference: Debra Roberts and Nicci Diederichs, 2002, ‘Durban’s Local Agenda 21 programme: Tackling sustainability in a post-apartheid city’, Environment and Urbanization 14(1): 189–201.