Sustainability science - AbsoluteAstronomy.com

Sustainability science has emerged in the 21st century as a new academic discipline. This new field of science was officially introduced with a "Birth Statement" at the World Congress "Challenges of a Changing Earth 2001" in Amsterdam organized by the International Council for Science

International Council for Science

The International Council for Science , formerly the International Council of Scientific Unions, was founded in 1931 as an international non-governmental organization devoted to international co-operation in the advancement of science...

(ICSU), the International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP), the International Human Dimensions Programme on Global Environmental Changehttp://www.ihdp.unu.edu/ (IHDP) and the World Climate Research Programme

World Climate Research Programme

The World Climate Research Programme was established in 1980, under the joint sponsorship of International Council for Science and the World Meteorological Organization, and has also been sponsored by the Intergovernmental Oceanographic Commission of UNESCO since 1993. It is a component of the...

(WCRP).

The name of this scientific field reflects a desire to give the generalities and broad-based approach of “sustainability” a stronger analytic and scientific underpinning as it:

... brings together scholarship and practice, global and local perspectives from north and south, and disciplines across the natural and social sciences, engineering, and medicine — it can be usefully thought of as "neither ‘‘basic’’ nor ‘‘applied’’ research but as a field defined by the problems it addresses rather than by the disciplines it employs; it serves the need for advancing both knowledge and action by creating a dynamic bridge between the two."

Sustainability science, like sustainability

Sustainability

Sustainability is the capacity to endure. For humans, sustainability is the long-term maintenance of well being, which has environmental, economic, and social dimensions, and encompasses the concept of union, an interdependent relationship and mutual responsible position with all living and non...

itself, derives some impetus from the concepts of sustainable development

Sustainable development

Sustainable development is a pattern of resource use, that aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for generations to come...

and environmental science

Environmental science

Environmental science is an interdisciplinary academic field that integrates physical and biological sciences, to the study of the environment, and the solution of environmental problems...

.

Sustainability science provides a critical framework for sustainability while sustainability measurement

Sustainability measurement

Sustainability measurement is a term that denotes the measurements used as the quantitative basis for the informed management of sustainability...

provides the evidence-based quantitative data needed to guide sustainability governance.

Definition

Consensual definition of sustainability science is as elusive as the definition of "sustainability" or "sustainable development". As outlined by the Sustainability Science Program at Harvard University's Center for International Development sustainability science seeks to:

Advance basic understanding of the dynamics of human-environment systems; to facilitate the design, implementation, and evaluation of practical interventions that promote sustainability in particular places and contexts; and to improve linkages between relevant research and innovation communities on the one hand, and relevant policy and management communities on the other.

A more broad-based definition is:

“The cultivation, integration, and application of knowledge about Earth systems gained especially from the holistic and historical sciences (such as geology, ecology, climatology, oceanography) coordinated with knowledge about human interrelationships gained from the social sciences and humanities, in order to evaluate, mitigate, and minimize the consequences, regionally and worldwide, of human impacts on planetary systems and on societies across the globe and into the future – that is, in order that humans can be knowledgeable Earth stewards.”

It has been noted that the new paradigm

"must encompass different magnitudes of scales (of time, space, and function), multiple balances (dynamics), multiple actors (interests) and multiple failures (systemic faults)."

Broad objectives

The case for making research and development an important component of sustainable development strategies was embraced by many international scientific organizations in the mid-1980s, promoted by the Brundtland Commission's report Our Common Future
Our Common Future
Our Common Future, also known as the Brundtland Report, from the United Nations World Commission on Environment and Development was published in 1987....

in 1987, and noted in the Agenda 21
Agenda 21
Agenda 21 is an action plan of the United Nations related to sustainable development and was an outcome of the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development held in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, in 1992...

plan that emerged from the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development in 1992 and further developed at the World Summit on Sustainable Development, held in Johannesburg in 2002.

The topics of the following sub-headings indicate recurring themes that are addressed in the literature of sustainability science. Only in 2010 have the seminal papers and thinking of sustainability scientists been drawn together.

Knowledge structuring of issues

Knowledge structuring has been identified as an essential first step in the effort to acquire a comprehensive view of sustainability issues which are both complex and interconnected. This is needed as a response to the requirements of academia, industry and government.

Coordination of data

The key research and data for sustainability are sourced from many scientific disciplines, topics and organisations. A major part of knowledge structuring will entail building up the tools that provide an “overview” of what is known. Sustainability science can construct and coordinate a framework within which the vast amount of data can be easily accessed.

Interdisciplinary approaches

The attempt, by sustainability science, to understand the integrated “whole” of planetary and human systems requires cooperation between scientific, social and economic disciplines, public and private sectors, academia and government. In short it requires a massive global cooperative effort and one major task of sustainability science is to assist integrated cross-disciplinary coordination.

Journals

The open-access e-journal for sustainable solutions Sustainability: science, practice, policy opened in March 2005.
The journal Sustainability Science was launched by Springer
Springer Science+Business Media
- Selected publications :* Encyclopaedia of Mathematics* Ergebnisse der Mathematik und ihrer Grenzgebiete * Graduate Texts in Mathematics * Grothendieck's Séminaire de géométrie algébrique...

in June 2006.
Another semiannual journal SAPIENS was launched by Veolia Environment in February 2007. A notable essay on sustainability indicators
Sustainability metrics and indices
Sustainable development indicators have the potential to turn the generic concept of sustainability into action. Though there are disagreements among those from different disciplines , these disciplines and international organizations have each offered measures or indicators of how to measure the...

by Paul-Marie Boulanger appeared in the first issue.
Sustainability: the journal of record is a bimonthly journal launched by Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.
Mary Ann Liebert, Inc.
Mary Ann Liebert, Inc. is a publishing company founded by its current president, Mary Ann Liebert, in 1980. The company publishes peer-reviewed academic journals, books, and trade magazines in the areas of biotechnology, biomedical research/life sciences, clinical medicine, alternative/integrative...

in December 2007.
A third seminannual journal Consilience was launched in February 2008.

Study courses

In recent years, there have been set up more and more study courses that are directly addressing the issues of sustainability science and global change:

Master's degree at the IATEUR - Urban, Regional Planning and Sustainability Science Institute, Reims University, France
M.Sc. "Sustainability Science and Policy" at Maastricht University - ICIS, The Netherlands
M.Sc. "Global Change Ecology" at the University of Bayreuth, Germany
M.Sc. "Global Change Management" at the University of Applied Sciences Eberswalde, Germany
M.Sc. "Environmental Studies and Sustainability Science" at the University of Lund, Sweden
"Global Change Ecology" at the University of California, Irvine, USA
"Master of Development Practice Degree Program" at the University of Minnesota, USA
"Graduate Program in Sustainability Science" at the University of Tokyo, Japan
"Lund University's International Master's Programme in Environmental Studies and Sustainability Science" at Lund University, Sweden.
"Master`s Degree in Creative Sustainability" at Aalto University, Finland
"Sustainability Specialization" at Michigan State University, USA
M.Sc./Ph.D "Building Science and Sustainability" in the Department of Architecture at the University of California, Berkeley, USA
M.Sc. "Strategic Leadership towards Sustainability" at Blekinge Institute of Technology, Karlskrona, Sweden

In 2010 a compendium of basic papers in this new discipline was published by Robert Kates as: Readings in Sustainability Science and Technology - an introduction to the key literature of sustainability science

External links

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