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As the idea of sustainable development has become increasingly more topical in the political arena, the question still remains as to whether our modern capitalist economies can preserve their most basic principle of maximising profits, whilst still protecting the environment. It is therefore the purpose of this essay to examine this. Can compromises be reached that enable us to protect and conserve the environment without hindering development.
Since the disbandment of the Soviet Union the dominant economic system globally has been capitalism. Private ownership of the means of production, creation of goods or services for profit in a market, and prices and wages are elements of capitalism (Tormey, 2004). This promotes a society in which the main objective is individual economic gain, where the levels of supply and demand determine the price of goods and services.
Although capitalism has undoubtedly brought with it huge economic benefits, they have come at a price and it has become evident that the planet can not sustain the current methods of pursuing economic growth. With the onset of climate change, swelling population rates and our non-renewable resources running out the only solution is for us to look for ways to develop in a sustainable way. As we can see from this graph there is a direct correlation between economic prosperity and CO2 emissions. Seeing as the the most economically prosperous nations are the main culprits behind the destruction of the environment, it is my opinion that the onus now rests with them to lead the way toward a sustainable future.
Sustainable development as a theory was first defined in the Brundtland report (also known as Our Common Future) in 1987. The report was the work of the United Nations...
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...). “Examples of Projects, Programmes, and Initiatives - Transportation Planning and Traffic Management” http://archive.rec.org/REC/Programs/Sustainablecities/Transportation.html Visited: 10/04/2011
Chavis, Jason (2011) “What is Environmental Risk Management?” http://www.wisegeek.com/what- is-environmental-risk-management.html. Visited: 10/04/2011
Working Party of the RSC Environment Health and Safety Committee (2008). “Environmental Risk Assessment” http://www.rsc.org/images/Environmental_Risk_Assessment_tcm18-122341.pdf. Visited: 10/04/2011
Shell Oil Company (2011) “Environment & Society” http://www.shell.com/home/content/environment_society/. Visited: 10/04/2011
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Grubb, M. (July, 2003). "The Economics of the Kyoto Protocol".
The following case study critiques Upton’s vision to establish a sustainable community through implementing comprehensive sustainable strategy. The urban periphery development is thought to demonstrate superior execution of sustainable principles in development (Jackson 2007). As a parallel, the report focuses on the development of Upton’s design code and demonstrates how large -scale mix-use developments can incorporate sustainable practice and principles of urban growth.
(8) Barbier, E. B.; Markandya, A. The conditions for achieving environmentally sustainable development. Eur. Econ. Rev. 34, 659-669. (1990).
“Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generation to meet their own needs” (Sassi, 2006).
What is sustainability? There is a Native American (n.d.) proverb which says: ‘When the last tree has been cut down, the last fish caught, the last river poisoned, only then will we realize that one cannot eat money’. Defining sustainability is a challenge itself, achieving it is even more arduous but what it is certain is the consequence of not acting sustainable. For too long the main goal of western countries has been profit, ignoring the extended list of benefits deriving from acting sustainable. The sustainability topic offers a wide range of arguments to discuss but in this paper only few of them are reviewed. Firstly, the 'three-legged stool ' model as a way of conceptualizing sustainability and its stability will be
Sustainable development adapted after the Brundtlandt Report 1987, is a planned, aim- and process oriented procedure that meets the needs of today’s generations without endangering the needs of future generations and world regions (Ott & Döring 2004, 2006).2 The principle of sustainability describes the efforts of the international community, all countries and people to create equal opportunities for development by explicitly taking into account the interests of future generations. Most frequently the concepts of sustainability are based on a triple bottom line represented by the tree pillars – ecology, economy and social security (e.g. by the Enquete Commission, 1998). Apart from the general weaknesses of the column model that is the interchangeability of dimensions and the ignorance of (social) relatedness (c.f. Ott & Döring, 2004)3 the definition of sustainability (the model is illustrating), is seen as a bad compromise between the needs for conservation of natural resources and the aspirations for economic growth by some scholars (Döring & Muraca, 2010). Irrespective of that, the model sometimes is competed by other pillars such as “knowledge”, “institution”, ”governance”, “arts” or the like (c.f. a.o. Ott & Döring, 2004). Whereas in “Resetting the Compas...
The concept of sustainability was formalized in 1987 with the publishing of Our Common Future, also known as the Brunndtaland Report, by the World Commission on the Environment and Development (WCED). Sustainable development was defined in this report as “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” (p. 43). Murphy (1998) identified 14 major components of sustainable development based on his interpretation of Our Common Future. A summary of these components has three general concepts that are environmental concepts, social concepts, and economic concepts. From these concepts one general goal for sustainable development can be developed. The primary goal of sustainable development is to meet the basic needs of society and extend the opportunity for a higher quality of life (WCED, 1987). To achieve this goal the economic system must be able to produce a continuous source of surplus and a source of technical knowledge through a social structure to solve the
Sustainable development is, in its simplest the survival of the planet Earth. Sustainable development meets the demands of today’s society without limiting the ability of future generations to meet their own demands. First, the basic needs of the world...
Quite often, these two sides appear to face each other with opposing prescriptions for future world development. The former argues for environmental protection and creation of a stable ecosystem; the latter supports jobs and increased development of Third World countries. Yet this false dichotomy between jobs and the environment need not exist. The key is promotion of worldwide sustainable development, or development that “meets the needs of the present generation without compromising the needs of future generations,” as defined by the Worl...
decrease. That means that the natural capital (oil, coal, forests, etc.) can decrease as long as the sum of physical (produced means of production; technology) and human (people’s
After going through a careful consideration of my familiarity with a number of multinational corporations that I selected earlier, I chose Henkel (Henkel AG & Company, KGaA), a manufacturing company headquartered in Germany, to be the corporation that I am going to analyze in depth. Size wise, “the company has some 47,000 employees worldwide and counts among the most internationally aligned German-based companies in the global marketplace.” (Henkel, 2014) Aside from having a broad employee base and solidly built financial resources, it also has branches scattered all over the world, including Hong Kong. Business wise, Henkel chiefly runs in three areas. They are household products, personal care products, adhesives that can be found easily at any local supermarket or grocery store.
Harris. J.M. 2000 Basic Principles of Sustainable Development, Global and Environment Institute Working Paper 00-04, USA
Over the past few decades there have been discourses both in favor and against Globalization’s capacity to guarantee a sustainable future. Authors attest societies and businesses’ inability to account for ecological and environmental limits when dealing with economic growth, examples of this are some of the traditional business metrics used by most global companies, and nations’ measure of wealth (GDP); both sides heavily resting on economic factors, fail to account for societal and environmental concerns (Byrnea & Gloverb, 2002). Other researchers point at the intensive use of resources, especially by global corporations; such as the increasing and careless consumption of fossil fuels, water, precious metals, etc. leading to a rise in GHG (Starke, 2002) (United Nations Development Program (UNDP), 2000). Most fervent opponents go as far as to call ‘sustainable development’ an oxymoron (Ayres, 1995).
Economic growth heavily relies on our natural resources therefore they play a pivotal role in our world today. However, economic theory suggests that being environmentally sustainable limits economic growth. Strong sustainability, which is what we should aim to achieve is outlined as; The existing stock of natural capital must be maintained and enhanced because the functions it performs cannot be duplicated by manufactured capital (Hart, 1998). In more recent years there has been in an increase in debates over sustainable development and how it is meant to be achieved. One factor hindering this is the poverty environmental trap is very common in developing countries. This trap is defined as the relationship between the poverty condition and the degradation of the environment (Finco, 2009). Some studies show that there is a connection between poverty and the environment as higher levels of poverty imply less environmental sustainability i.e. more natural resources being exploited. According to the
In class we discussed what sustainable development meant to us; each group had its own definition. Our group’s definition was that sustainable development is for the long term for future generations, for the basic needs such as food, clothing, shelter, and job. The basic will increase over time and our resources will diminish, which why sustainable development is important. Sustainable development is important for future generations so that they end up with a world better than ours. Sustainable development is achievable if society works together to meet everyone’s basic needs and create a better world.
‘Development that meets the needs of the present with the ability for the future generation to meet their own needs.’ (World Commission on Environment and Development, 1987) Sustainable development requires three key components: economy, society and environment, sustainable development can be success through striking balance in those factors. These three components are indispensible, they compel to depend on each other. On the other words, we can only gain a decent and energetic environment and society if the economy is strong with a healthy a stable growth rate.