As I read the postings on this list, I am stuck by how far afield many of them are from the issues that were raised in OUR COMMON FUTURE, the UN report which launched the sustainability movement and the reason why the UN designated this decade January 2005 to December 2015 the Decade of Sustainable Education. Although many people quote the reports definition of sustainable development as being meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. I'm curious how many people who are interested in sustainability have actually read the report?
Our Common Future-How common?
Sign in or Sign up to comment
...
Thanks for your comment Richard. I was not aware the UN named 2005 to 2015 the Decade of Sustainable Education. I also have not read Our Common Future but I am somewhat familiar with some basic tenets of Brundtland Report and the Kyoto Accords as they relate to energy and climate change, as this is the area in which I work - Transportation. I think these came out of the same Commission? Are you willing to expand on what you wrote? Perhaps some specifics to illustrate how or why the postings are so far afield from the issues raised in Our Common Future. Personally, I subscribe to the Fostering Sustainable Behavior list serve in hopes of learning about what other professionals are struggling with - and finding successess with - when they work to inch the perceptions, attitudes and behaviors of everyday people in everyday lives progress to sustainable enlightenment. Even those postings having nothing to do with transportation teach me something about new and effective ways to foster change and even more importantly for my daily work, to measure and quantify that change. Sustainable behavior is not a commodity with an easily measured and assigned economic benefit. Most if not all of modern business (and govt believe it or not) operates in the monetary economy. We have to find bettter and more sophisticated ways of measuring behavior changes, doing lifecycle costing, etc., if we want to convince businesses and individuals change is needed. I welcome any suggestions for improving our efforts in this realm.
Barbara