What is most commonly understood by the term "sustainable development", that hides an internal contradiction. Therefore, we first need to clarify what do we mean by development? Once we agree the meaning of development, than we can discuss whether it is sustainable or not.

Sustainable development might work if it only chooses to use green technology.

Probably a good start will be to focus on nature first and then on development. Usually is tho opposite, and "sustainable" development projects tned to "force" the nature into their own porpuses. If you understad the ecological balance of the environment where you are planning to run some project, you might be able to design projects that will fulfill both goals.

Sustainability means meeting our own needs without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. In addition to natural resources, we also need social and economic resources. Sustainability is not just environmentalism. Embedded in most definitions of sustainability we also find concerns for social equity and economic development. Supply chain is also an important vertical of sustainability

Peter asks a very fundamental question; as the previous 4 replies have demonstrated everything depends on definitions. It has to be approached in a multi-disciplinary manner because it relates to human societies and their aspiration for the habitat in which they live. A whole book could be written on the subject, and then a second book which takes a different slant because it anticipates a different type of political/social society. However, given the two COPs this year, I will just make 3 points.

1. Climate change is an international challenge which affects both 'nature' and human societies. Many parts of the planet are experiencing its effects on changes in existing 'balances' between human aspirations and nature. Are such changes acceptable or not?

2. There are huge concerns about the loss of biodiversity on all scales - local, national and inter-national. Can any 'balance' ever be found that can tolerate such losses?

3. A factor which is so often forgotten is the planet's soil resource. To achieve any kind of sustainability, the productivity of soils needs to be maintained Soils are, after all, the foundation for terrestrial plant growth on which all animal life depends. Protection of the soil ecosystem - including its microbial, fungal, plant and animal components - is all too often neglected. The soil is essential if any kind of 'balance' is to be achieved, but does 'sustainable development' ever really consider this finite resource?

It's an excellent reflection that I fully share. Precisely, it is this word "balance" which is no longer natural. Man's action has turned everything upside down and to achieve it it takes enormous sacrifices on the part of those who think that economies must develop in order to earn more and more without any real need.

I think reducing carbon foot prints is the only option

Reducing the human population by encouraging smaller families is the long term solution.

The term "balance of nature" is ambiguous and unhelpful, Hicham Chaffai. Better to regard the natural systems of the planet Earth as the source of both non-renewable resources (minerals, stone, fossil fuel etc) and renewable goods and services arising from ecological processes. (Soil has some characteristics of both).

The capacity of the Earth to yield both is limited by the laws of nature (building upon the laws of thermodynamics), and these are inviolate – cannot be altered by human dictate.

Any extraction by a human population affects the resources available to other forms of life, so part of the answer to your question lies in deciding how much extraction can proceed without exceeding the limits of the ecosystem to renew itself. For example, how many fish can be taken from a fishery before the remaining stocks cannot reproduce quickly enough to replace the fish taken. A fishery can decline rapidly after this point, the sustainable yield, is exceeded.

This question of sustainable yield is largely a scientific question. It has both local and global dimensions. The answer for a fishery is specific to that ecosystem service and that locality. It is very difficult to give a global answer to that question because resources can be transported from one location to another, so human populations can continue to expand even if they exceed the capacity of their local ecosystems. But a global answer can be calculated – if the natural ecosystems can no longer produce enough renewable water, food and fuel to supply the human population with basic material sustenance and comforts, then the balance of nature has been exceeded..

There is credible scientific evidence that the tipping point was exceeded in the 1970s and that the current human population is maintained primarily by drawing down stocks of nonrenewable fuel, so it is no longer in balance.

Another part of the answer to your question is sociological or philosophical: how much wilderness should be sacrificed to allow a higher human population. Does wilderness have inherent value beyond its capacity to provide humans with resources?

These fundamental questions are not economic in nature. Economics is a human construct superimposed upon the laws of nature by the society that runs that economy.

I would like to add some thoughts to my previous answer. Applied within an ecosystem, the concept of a "balance of nature" makes some sense. Plants and animals, predators and prey, producers and consumers, living organisms and decomposers….etc form some kind of equilibrium which is more or less stable over time (except for episodic natural disasters and climate change, see below). The relationships can be extraordinarily complex but they are effective, and they are amenable to discovery by experiments.

But the concept of a "balance" between nature and human-caused development makes no sense because there is no end to the ambition of humans to alter their environment and to extract resources from it. While textbooks of economics state that the discipline of economics is the study of scarce resources, that means scarce within a particular market where the principles of supply and demand operate. But economics does not recognise absolute, global scarcity and does not accept that the resources of the planet are finite. So there is no inherent brake in the principles of economics to limit the demand that development places upon the natural capital of the planet. In other words, economics holds that different forms of capital (natural, human, manufactured) are transferable using the price mechanism. In other words, resources will be found somewhere if the price is right.

You may have seen diagrams in some textbooks showing three overlapping circles – environment, society, economy – with "sustainability" being the condition where the three circles overlap. These diagrams are nonsense. Human society is totally dependent upon the natural environment and the economy is totally a construct of the society where it operates. The only diagram that makes sense is three fully enclosed circles.

Another matter to keep in mind is that all natural ecosystems will be affected by climate change. It's another stressor. Many populations of animals or plants or even whole ecosystems will collapse. In most countries, there are no longer sufficient corridors of natural habitat that can allow species to migrate. So the "balance" of nature within each ecosystem will shift.

There is no such thing as "sustainable development". Development is a process of conversion of existing natural capital do something more intensive. By its very nature it cannot continue indefinitely and is not cyclical, so cannot be sustainable, which means continuing indefinitely without drawing down capital stocks of resources.

Could I recommend this book review and link to the New Yorker? It is a powerful article correlating the rapacious early Dutch East Indies Co (VOC) to the capatilistic denial of resource sustainability.

“Soon after the massacre, the V.O.C. became, by some measures, the largest company in human history, worth more than ExxonMobil, Apple, and Amazon combined,” notes philosopher Olufemi Taiwo, writing about the Dutch East India Company’s actions in the Banda Islands in 1621. Taiwo reflects on the long relationship between plunder and biosphere collapse in his review of Amitav Ghosh’s The Nutmeg’s Curse. (The New Yorker | 8 min read) https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2021/11/01/our-planet-is-heating-up-why-are-climate-politics-still-frozen-colonialism-environment?utm_source=Nature+Briefing&utm_campaign=1b7ea2be98-briefing-dy-20211230&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_c9dfd39373-1b7ea2be98-45014377