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1.
As the societal benefits associated with transitioning to more sustainable, less fossil fuel-reliant energy systems are increasingly recognized by communities throughout the world, the potential of creating ‘green jobs’ within a ‘green economy’ is attracting much attention. Green energy clusters are increasingly promoted throughout the world as a strategy to simultaneously promote economic vitality and stimulate a sustainable energy transition. In spite of their emerging role in regional-scale sustainability planning efforts, such initiatives have not been considered within the sustainability transitions literature. This paper explores the development of one such regional sustainable energy cluster initiative in Central Massachusetts in Northeastern USA to consider the potential for such cluster initiatives to contribute to socio-technical transition in the energy system. Since 2008, a diverse set of stakeholders in Central Massachusetts, including politicians, universities, businesses, local citizens, and activists, have been working toward facilitating the emergence of an integrated cluster of activity focused on sustainable energy. Through interviews with key actors, participant observation, and document review, this research assesses the potential of this cluster initiative to contribute to a regional socio-technical transition. The empirical details of this case demonstrate that sustainable energy cluster initiatives can potentially accelerate change in entrenched energy regimes by promoting institutional thickness, generating regional ‘buzz’ around sustainable energy activities, and building trust between multiple and diverse stakeholders in the region. This research also contributes to emerging efforts to better ground socio-technical transitions in geographic space. 相似文献
2.
A stakeholder dialogue on European vulnerability 总被引:1,自引:1,他引:0
Anne C. de la Vega-Leinert Dagmar Schröter Rik Leemans Uta Fritsch Jacomijn Pluimers 《Regional Environmental Change》2008,8(3):109-124
A stakeholder dialogue was embedded in the ATEAM project to facilitate the development and dissemination of its European-wide
vulnerability assessment of global change impacts. Participating stakeholders were primarily ecosystem managers and policy
advisers interested in potential impacts on ‘Agriculture’, ‘Forestry’, ‘Water’, ‘Carbon storage’, ‘Biodiversity’ and ‘Mountain
environments’ sectors. First, stakeholder dialogue approaches to integrated assessment are introduced. Methodological considerations
on stakeholder selection and dialogue implementation and evaluation follow. The dialogue content and process are evaluated
from the perspectives of stakeholders and scientists. Its usefulness in the research process and the relevance of outcomes
for stakeholders are particularly considered. The challenging compromises required to perform innovative research, which seeks
to achieve both peer scientific credibility and societal relevance, are emphasized. Effective stakeholder dialogues play a
substantial role in raising the visibility and meaningfulness of vulnerability assessments as critical means to improve awareness
on global change and its potential worrying impacts on society. They further provide scientists with critical information
on ecosystem management and sectoral adaptive capacity. These processes of mutual learning and knowledge exchange moreover
foster a better understanding of the potential and limits of global change modelling and vulnerability assessment for policy
and ecosystem management.
相似文献
Anne C. de la Vega-LeinertEmail: |
3.
Urbanization and sustainability: challenges and strategies for sustainable urban development in Bangladesh 总被引:1,自引:0,他引:1
Md. Masud Parves Rana 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2011,13(1):237-256
Like other developing countries, urbanization in Bangladesh is a growing phenomenon, which is steady in nature but fretfully
affects urban sustainability in the wake of lacking in good governance. Despite urban authorities are concerned about this
issue, they often fail to address the problems due to the fact of uncontrollable and unpredictable rural to urban migration,
and negligence of urban poor’s sustainable living and access to basic services. Virtually the rural poverty problem has been
transposed to urban areas, particularly in Dhaka City, Bangladesh. Inadequacy of infrastructural services, basic amenities
and environmental goods; environmental degradation; traffic jam and accidents; violence and socioeconomic insecurity are the
major challenges which are created through rapid urbanization. This paper provides a general understanding of urbanization
in Bangladesh and tries to embrace related sustainability issues and challenges hindrance to sustainable urban development
in Dhaka city. In addition, it presents a brief case study of water supply in Dhaka city which introduces an issue of ‘system
hijack’. The paper concludes providing some strategies that might be helpful to the policy makers in formulating development
policies for sustainable urban services. 相似文献
4.
This article focuses on the problems of water governance at a river basin level, and on the role of institutional coordination,
participation and partnerships between multiple stakeholders towards sustainable water management. Its approach presupposes
that institutional capacity building, strengthening coordination between government institutions (vertical and horizontal),
on the one hand, and broadening participation and consolidating partnerships between public, private and civil society actors,
on the other hand, is among effective tools in integrated water resource management in river basins. It explores environmental
challenges, problems, emerging trends and recent institutional innovations in the Volga basin in Russia—the largest river
basin in Europe. Transfer and adaptation of good practices in good water governance between the EU and Russia are discussed.
This article presents some research findings and lessons learned from practice by the EC international project ‘CABRI—Cooperation
along a big river: Institutional coordination among stakeholders for environmental risk management in the Volga basin’, which
is assessed as one of the selected success stories of the European research.’ 相似文献
5.
This paper presents a theoretical framework that can be used to discuss the question of how context, time and different participatory
process designs influence the results of participatory monitoring projects in terms of concrete outputs (such as sustainability
indicators) and the more intangible social outcomes (such as learning and stakeholder relations). We will discuss and compare
four different cases of participatory monitoring of provincial sustainable development in the Netherlands. The results show
sustainability issues selected by the stakeholders reflect the socio-economic and ecological structural characteristics of
their region. In a different context, stakeholders not only assign different weights to the same set of issues, but more importantly
they select a completely different set of regional aims altogether. Since these regional structural characteristics only change
slowly over time, the influence of time on stakeholder preferences is shown to be only of minor importance. However, the dissipation
of learning effects is shown to be a fundamental challenge for the cyclical nature of participatory monitoring, especially
when its goal is shared agenda building. Another important conclusion is that, in the design of participatory processes, more
attention should be devoted to providing stakeholders with the opportunity to comment on an ‘intermediate’ product. 相似文献
6.
Jayanath Ananda George Domazetis John Hill 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2009,11(5):1051-1071
A ‘roadmap’ has been devised for a progressive greening of the Australian chemical industry over the next two decades. The
roadmap is based on a set of interactive principles broadly termed ‘economic’, ‘social’, ‘technological’, ‘environmental’
and ‘political’, which collectively form the ‘drivers of change’ in chemical industry strategy/business/policy planning—leading
to greater efficiency and economic sustainability of this industry. The proposed roadmap pre-supposes that real economic,
societal and environmental benefits can be obtained through greater use of existing and emerging green chemical technology.
It can play an important role in developing a sustainable chemical industry in Australia. Primarily, the proposed roadmap
involves a paradigm shift of the business operating plan and a significant mindset change of management. 相似文献
7.
The need for environmental and urban planning reached a critical point in the year 2007, when one-half of the world's population
could be defined as living in cities. Urbanisation in India is also increasing at a fast rate. Urban chaos in India, emanating
from the continuous ignorance of fragile ecosystems, calls for the reshaping of existing cities as ‘eco-cities’. The ‘eco-city’—a
well-known concept in the western world—is new to the Indian context. While western connotations of eco-cities should not
be discarded outright in the context of India, core concerns vary significantly for obvious reasons. Recognising two facts—firstly,
eco-city development is altogether a fresh approach to human settlement development in India, and, secondly, the manifold
increase in the vulnerability of cities—this paper discusses documented good practice, reinforcing evolution towards the eco-city
vision. Lessons drawn from the examples cited are further deconstructed in the light of their contribution to urban risk reduction,
which provides direction to appreciating the ‘disaster-resilient eco-community’ concept in Puri, a coastal city in India.
Further, this paper attempts to unravel existing community-based practices in Puri, which are boon to the local environment
and invariably reduce disaster risk. These seemingly modest neighbourhood initiatives symbolise immense societal wealth, which
can be calibrated appropriately for reducing urban environmental risk as well. This paper also illustrates how a ‘disaster
resilient eco-community’ approach is inevitable in the present and future contexts not only to preserve sustainable development
gains but also to secure human well-being. 相似文献
8.
Waseem Ahmad Colin L. Soskolne Tanvir Ahmed 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2012,14(1):67-83
This paper focuses on identified challenges for sustainable development across various sectors and the actions needed by different
institutions and individuals for the achievement of a sustainable path. For finding solutions that impede sustainable development,
emphasis is given to collaborative, inter- and trans-disciplinary problem-solving approaches. The ‘ecological modernization’
view is based on the belief that science and technology will result in continuous improvement in human welfare, while the
emerging postmodern ‘ecological paradigm’ also emphasizes harmony with nature and other actors. Global societies are in the
midst of a number of challenges: (1) implementation of existing and new hard- and soft-law instruments, (2) the degradation
of natural resources, (3) an inadequate global mechanism for handling environmental and social responsibilities by the international
community, (4) an unbalanced distribution of wealth, locally and internationally, (5) unethical and unsustainable business
practices, (6) consequent unethical and unsustainable consumer practices, (7) selective application of ethical principles
by rich countries and (8) the absence of norms of good conduct by powerful and wealthy peoples pertaining to sustainable development.
Governments, civil societies, academicians, indigenous peoples, communities, businesses and international organizations need
to become engaged in the formulation and enforcement of environmentally and ecologically sound development policies along
with relevant research, education, training, awareness and a change in social values as provided in the Earth Charter to support
actions for sustainable development. 相似文献
9.
In this article, we analyse how the Internet is used to bring visibility to water affairs. We focus on the way different organisations
exploit the Web in order to participate in the debates about water policy in Spain and to define the topics concerned. To
do this, we have drawn up an issue network articulated around an alternative and sustainable water policy called ‘New Water
Culture’. We examine the composition of this web structure, its hyperlinking styles, key nodes and political trajectories.
The outcomes indicate that the ‘New Water Culture’ has become a main frame in Spanish environmental policy. Supported both
by governmental and non-governmental players, the ‘New Water Culture’ struggles between two opposing trends: its expulsion
from the public sphere and efforts to open it up to scrutiny from political outsiders. 相似文献
10.
Ecology matters: sustainable development in Southeast Asia 总被引:1,自引:1,他引:0
Victor R. Savage 《Sustainability Science》2006,1(1):37-63
11.
Religion in its most ideal form is seen as a powerful force to create ecological transformations to succeeding generations
that share similar religious beliefs. This provides an interesting argument for enhancing their role in sustainability transitions.
Malaysia is a relevant geographical context in this regard since almost all of its citizens formally embrace some kind of
religious belief. However, such ideas are discussed mostly at the theoretical level with little systematic empirical investigation.
This paper aims to fill this gap by presenting theoretically informed empirical insights on how a number of religious communities
are currently creating successful experiments in recycling within the context of an urban community in Malaysia. The paper
argues that such evidence may demonstrate the ‘potential’ role of religious communities to provide localised resources for
recycling experiments that can be advantageous for the transition towards a more sustainable municipal solid waste management
in Malaysia. The empirical basis of this paper is based on an exploratory multiple case study of successful recycling programmes
conducted by selected religious communities from four key religions in Malaysia—Buddhism, Christianity, Hinduism and Islam.
The theoretical framework for this research is based on the sustainability transitions literature, particularly the ‘transition
experiment’ framework. 相似文献
12.
Gundo Susiarjo Sree N. Sreenath Ali M. Vali 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2006,8(3):313-349
In this paper we develop a novel, comprehensive method for estimating the global human carrying capacity in reference to food
production factors and levels of food consumption. Other important interrelated dimensions of carrying capacity such as energy,
non-renewable resources, and ecology are not considered here and offer opportunities for future work. Use of grain production
(rain-fed/irrigated), animal product production (grazing/factory farm), diet pattern (grain/animal products), and a novel
water accounting method (demand/supply) based on actual water consumption and not on withdrawal, help resolve uncertainties
to find better estimates. Current Western European food consumption is used as a goal for the entire world. Then the carrying
capacity lies in the range of 4.5–4.7 billion but requiring agricultural water use increase by 450–530% to 4725–5480 km3, the range based on different estimates of available water. The cost of trapping and conveying such water, will run 4.5–13.5
trillion over 50 years requiring an annual spending increase of 150–400%, straining the developing world where most of the
population increase is expected. We reconfirm estimates in the literature using a dynamic model. ‘Corner scenarios’ with extreme
optimistic assumptions were analyzed using the reasoning support software system GLOBESIGHT. With a hypothetical scenario
with a mainly vegetarian diet (grazing only with 5% animal product), the carrying capacity can be as high as 14 billion. Ecological
deterioration that surely accompanies such a population increase would negatively impact sustainable population. Using our
approach the impact of ecological damage could be studied. Inter- and intra-regional inequities are other considerations that
need to be studied. 相似文献
13.
The current trend in foreign aid is toward small-scale sustainable development projects in partnership with defined communities.
However, these projects are subject to the influences of self-interested human behavior, poorly defined community structures
and resources and organizational constraints that can prevent full realization of development models. Under these constraints,
attempting participatory community development models to the exclusion of other techniques may not be the most effective way
to achieve positive change. Instead, development agencies should consider adopting other proven elements of development in
combination with the spirit of community development to achieve a positive impact within the community and organizational
structures and ensure accountability for success. A small-scale attempted, sustainable development case study in Rwanda is
reviewed, as well as a new concept for larger scale development integrating ‘carbon credits’. Additionally, a development
accreditation organization is proposed to ensure additional accountability in this field. 相似文献
14.
Renato A. M. Silvano John Valbo-Jørgensen 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2008,10(5):657-675
Studies investigating the local ecological knowledge (LEK) held by fishermen about the fishing resources have indicated that
fishermen’s LEK may have the potential to improve fishery management, by providing new information about the ecology, behavior
and abundance trends of fish and other aquatic animals. Our major aim is to undertake a brief review of published ethnoichthyological
studies with a focus on coastal Brazilian fisheries and freshwater fisheries in both Brazil and Southeast Asia. Based on such
review, we provide 29 hypotheses on fish ecology based on fishermen’s LEK and compare them with what is already known from
the biological literature, using an arbitrary ‘likelihood’ measure: “Low likelihood” corresponded to unexpected hypotheses,
which contradict existing biological data. “Medium likelihood” corresponded to hypotheses that could not be compared to available
scientific knowledge. Hypotheses that agree with scientific data were considered as “High likelihood”. We therefore discuss
these three categories of hypotheses about several distinct topics, such as migration, reproduction, feeding habits, abundance
patterns, ecological relationships between fish and their predators, and fishing pressure. Our results may contribute to the
fisheries management and research in the studied regions and other similar places, besides raising the interest of biologists
to properly include fishermen’s LEK when planning and conducting fisheries surveys.
Readers should send their comments on this paper to: BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue. 相似文献
15.
Conceptualising climate change in rural Australia: community perceptions, attitudes and (in)actions 总被引:2,自引:0,他引:2
Public engagement and support is essential for ensuring adaptation to climate change. The first step in achieving engagement
is documenting how the general public currently perceive and understand climate change issues, specifically the importance
they place on this global problem and identifying any unique challenges for individual communities. For rural communities,
which rely heavily on local agriculture industries, climate change brings both potential impacts and opportunities. Yet, to
date, our knowledge about how rural residents conceptualise climate change is limited. Thus, this research explores how the
broader rural community—not only farmers—conceptualises climate change and responsive activities, focussing on documenting
the understandings and risk perceptions of local residents from two small Australian rural communities. Twenty-three semi-structured
interviews were conducted in communities in the Eden/Gippsland region on the border of New South Wales and Victoria and the
north-east of Tasmania. There are conflicting views on how climate change is conceptualised, the degree of concern and need
for action, the role of local industry, who will ‘win’ and ‘lose’, and the willingness of rural communities to adapt. In particular,
residents who believed in anthropogenic or human-induced factors described the changing climate as evidence of ‘climate change’,
whereas those who were more sceptical termed it ‘weather variability’, suggesting that there is a divide in rural Australia
that, unless urgently addressed, will hinder local and national policy responses to this global issue. Engaging these communities
in the twenty-first-century climate change debate will require a significant change in terminology and communication strategies. 相似文献
16.
Yosef Jabareen 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2008,10(2):179-192
A critical review of the multidisciplinary literature on sustainable development reveals a lack of a comprehensive theoretical
framework for understanding sustainable development and its complexities. A critical review shows that the definitions of
sustainable development are vague; there is a lack of operative definitions and disagreement over what should be sustained;
the concept is unclear in terms of emotional commitment; and it “remains a confused topic”, “fraught with contradictions”.
This article aims to theoretically synthesize the interdisciplinary literature on sustainable development, and then identify
the results by broad categories. Therefore, this article uses conceptual analysis, which reviews multidisciplinary literature
on sustainable development, which recognizes patterns and similarities within the literature, then it synthesizes the patterns
to different categories and independent concepts, where each concept has distinctive meanings and represents close ideas on
sustainability. The analytical process elaborates seven concepts that together assemble the theoretical framework of ‘sustainable
development’ and each concept represents distinctive meanings of the theoretical framework. 相似文献
17.
Evaggelos Vallianatos 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2012,14(3):335-346
‘Sustainable’ agriculture is a relative recent invention. It is a salvage operation designed to undo some of the harm of agribusiness,
which nearly wiped out farming as a way of life. Sustainable agriculture tries to restore methods of farming and values that
satisfy present needs for food without compromising the food for future generations. Sustainable farming, however, remains
experimental and on the fringes of society and science. It includes all kinds of farming practiced by peasants, small-scale
family farmers, organic farmers as well as large farmers. In what follows, I am showing, first, farming is or becomes sustainable
when two things prevail: First, it is democratic, spread throughout the land in the form of family farming while the difference
in size among farms is modest at best. Second, farming is sustainable when it draws its inspiration and methods not merely
from the most advanced ecological science but from ancient agrarian cultures. I briefly highlight the case of ancient Greek
farming as having the virtues of sustainability: that of equity and democracy. In our times, however, agribusiness and animal
farming fail the criteria of sustainability. 相似文献
18.
F. R. Funes-Monzote Marta Monzote E. A. Lantinga H. van Keulen 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2009,11(4):765-783
From the 1960s onwards, a ‘High External Input’ dairy production model was applied widely in Cuba. Overall milk production
of the national herd increased considerably, but the system was inefficient from both a financial and energetic point of view.
In the early 1990s, after the abrupt end of inflow of capital and other resources from Eastern Europe, the dairy sector collapsed.
In the short term, the modern infrastructure of milk production deteriorated and the sector experienced profound vulnerability.
However, in the longer term, this situation stimulated a search for more sustainable approaches, such as low external input
Mixed Farming Systems (MFS). The current study aimed to evaluate two small scale prototype farms to assess the implications
of converting ‘Low External Input’ Dairy Farming Systems into MFS. Fifteen agro-ecological and financial indicators were selected
and monitored over a 6-year period. Two configurations of MFS, i.e. the proportion of the farm area occupied by arable crops,
were tested: 25 and 50%. Productivity, energy efficiency and cost-effectiveness all improved following conversion. Total energy
input was low for both farms and decreased over time, whereas energy efficiency was high and increased over time. Human labour
input was high directly following conversion, but decreased by one-third over the 6-year period. This study demonstrates,
at an experimental scale, the potential of MFS to achieve ecological, productivity and financial advantages for dairy production
in Cuba.
Readers should send their comments on this paper to: BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue. 相似文献
19.
Bhaskar Nath 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2008,10(4):471-486
Most environmental professionals and decision-makers, and certainly the public at large, hold the view that the integrity
of earth’s natural environment will be conserved for posterity and sustainable development achieved if all the nations rigorously
enforced their environmental and emission standards. It is argued in this paper that this view, sincerely held by many as
an “axiomatic truth,” is mistaken and misplaced. This is because as a biogeochemical entity the Earth has limited self-regenerative
capacity (SRC) to cope with anthropogenic pollution, and all kinds of environmental problems ensue when that limit is exceeded.
Indeed, mounting environmental problems now occurring on all fronts amply testify to the fact that the limit has already been
exceeded. They also provide necessary and sufficient proof that environmental and emission standards have been woefully inadequate
for protecting earth’s natural environment and life-support systems. It is argued that true global environmental sustainability
will be achieved, paving the way to true global sustainable development, if and only if global environmental and emission
standards are set so that global anthropogenic pollution does not exceed the limit of earth’s natural SRC to cope with such
pollution. These and related issues are discussed in this paper. A simple mathematical model using basic mathematics is also
presented to explain how the phenomenon of “positive feedback” works in some of the environmental problems to exacerbate environmental
degradation and progressively to erode nature’s SRC.
相似文献
Bhaskar NathEmail: |
20.
Wouter T. De Groot Haranath Tadepally 《Environment, Development and Sustainability》2008,10(4):519-536
In southern India, tens of thousands of village-level irrigation systems (‘tanks’ and feeder channels) are in disrepair. This
paper analyses the results of a local NGO effort that focused on awareness-raising and advice to bring about self-sustained
community action for irrigation system restoration. After designing a model structure that contains both motivational and
capacity (social capital) factors, it is found that (pre-existing) collective social capital, as measured through five simple
indicators, strongly correlates with success of the NGO strategy. The intensity of the NGO’s effort shows a negative correlation
with success, however. The discussion focuses on issues of social capital definition and measurement and the practical implications
of the concept for environmental action, especially the difference between using existing social capital for environmental
management versus the construction of social capital as a basis for later self-sustained environmental work.
Readers should send their comments on this paper to BhaskarNath@aol.com within 3 months of publication of this issue. 相似文献