Sustainable development strategies address the issue of how do we have to change the structure of systems we live in to produce more of what we want (sustainable) and less of that which is undesirable (unsustainable). This question gives me a chance to recall the classic work of Donella Meadows (1941 – 2001), late research fellow at MIT. She was a pioneering American environmental scientist, teacher and writer an best known as lead author of the influential book "The Limits to Growth", which made headlines around the world. She proposed a list of places (leverage points) to intervene in complex systems in increasing order of effectiveness. Here they are (from Meadows 2009):

• 12. Numbers: Constants and parameters such as subsidies, taxes, and standards

• 11. Buffers:The sizes of stabilizing stocks relative to their flows

• 10. Stock-and-Flow Structures: Physical systems and their nodes of intersection

• 9. Delays: The lengths of time relative to the rates of system changes

• 8. Balancing Feedback Loops: The strength of the feedbacks relative to the impacts they are trying to correct

• 7. Reinforcing Feedback Loops: The strength of the gain of driving loops

• 6. Information Flows:The structure of who does and does not have access to information

• 5. Rules: Incentives, punishments, constraints

• 4. Self-Organization: The power to add, change, or evolve system structure

• 3. Goals:The purpose or function of the system

• 2. Paradigms: The mindset out of which the system—its goals, structure, rules, delays, parameters—arises.

• 1. Transcending Paradigms

As you can see the most effective leverage points are paradigms and trascending paradigms, very difficult to change but the most effective for a really sustainable change. In the words of Donella "the shared ideas in the minds of society, the great big unstated assumptions, constitute that society’s paradigm, or deepest set of beliefs about how the world works. These beliefs are unstated because it is unnecessary to state them—everyone already knows them. Money measures something real and has real meaning; therefore, people who are paid less are literally worth less. Growth is good. One can “own” land. Those are just a few of the paradigmatic assumptions of our current culture, all of which have utterly dumbfounded other cultures, who thought them not the least bit obvious". Notice, however, that most of the current sustainability research, even the most advanced on complex systems, instead, is focused on the least effective leverage points like the economical aspects likely because decision makers and politicians believe that sustainability is mainly an economic problem (welfare) and it is more approachable in this way (i.e., GDP as a welfare measure). So, "Numbers" like constants and parameters such as subsidies, taxes, and standards become the main focus. This happens for sustainability in environmental protection science too, by just providing numbers, standards, thresholds for pollutants that should not be trespassed, and for species diversity too. However this is a quite myopic viewpoint and I doubt that it can lead to real sustainability ever.

Here is the link for Donella's work www.thesolutionsjournal.com/node/419.

Hello Bassam,

Thanks for answer!

I'm working with welfare like a dimension of sustainability. In this path, the welfare is either integrated by the right to energy acess.

By this way, i'm trying to develop a theory that explains how the energy use by the citizens (to move, information acess, confort, etc.), in an artificial environment (like urban areas), is a necessary dimension of the sustainable development.

Do you think that is possible?

If we are talking about general economic transition, then yes, welfare and sustainability have to be an important part of sustainable development strategies. If they were not - how could the government convince people to follow their lead? Maybe the current politics of economic transition in Ecuador are a good example for a combination of wellfare, wellbeing and sustainability - here: http://plan2009.senplades.gob.ec/web/en

Thanks Philipp,

In my vision, we really are talking about general economic transition.

But in Brazil, currently, we have a lot of problems to overcome this question, specially in the judicial system, where she is faced superficially like a war between humans and nature (anthropocentric X biocentric).

However, the question is more complex than this. And to arrive a reasonable answer, I'm thinking in a theory based in the concepts of "political and economic convergence" (Giddens, A. The Politics of Climate Change, Cambridge: Polity, 2009) directed to welfare policies.

Do you see problems in this construction?

Hi Ricardo,

You ought to do some digging into the relationships between happiness and sustainable development. I am of the belief that happiness could be an alternative objective for an aspect of urban development. My doctoral work and current research is based on this premise. After spending several years looking into it, I have come to see that happiness accounts for so many things that are influenced by our communities, including social connections, employment, connections with nature, a sense of purpose, something to believe in and more. I am happy to talk more with you about some great resources. Good luck!

Scott

Thaks Scott,

This is a good way. Welfare and hapiness are complementary things.

May you send me you doctoral work?

Thanks again.

Ricardo.

Ricardo

My research is looking at social / affordable housing. Both welfare and sustainability are key complementary aspects. So yes, welfare and sustainability do work together, but maybe through the agency of home and the affordance given by secure, affordable, well-located and supported homes?

Paull

Paull,

Thanks for answer.

This is a arduous question. Generally well-located homes are not affordable.

So, to make viable the social housing, in my vision, will be necessary a arranged public policy that provides financial assistance to low income people.

In Brazil this is justified in the legal/judicial dimension by the social function of property principle.

Ricardo, I'm curious, for your research purposes how do you define and measure 'welfare'?

I like Bassam's response because it focuses on "sustainable practices in the development process, entails a more efficient way of resource use, better and less polluted productive techniques,..." as part of the overall considerations in sustainable development strategies.

From my perspective, all too often, companies engaged in the supply chain for sustaining our society do not place considerable currency in ensuring that their business practices are truly sustainable in any number of ways. Granted this is a sweeping statement, and let me concentrate on specific examples to bring this point home, in which I go no further as highlighting some lessons learned from the news.

1. We have the chemical company in WVA in which lax regulatory oversight and even more lax regulatory controls from within the company caused a near disaster to occur with the leakage of toxic chemicals into the municipal water supply. The lesson here - you can't proclaim your company is practicing sustainability while you allow environmental and health issues to be created.

2. We also have the midwest grain factory I believe, in which uncontrolled dust may have been the cause of an explosion that caused considerable damage. Dry dust in such environments is always a concern due to the buildup of static electricity in which there could be a catastrophic outcome, that needs to be adequately controlled by the facility managers.

3. On a lighter note, the owners of MetLife Stadium (the venue for this year's SuperBowl) have made it a point to proclaim their facility has achieved green status for its commissary's recycling efforts, yet, they fail to point out that there has been some concern about the recycled and shredded tires used on the field, which could generate some toxics.

more on this later.

Here's an article that sums up my points succinctly...

http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2014/01/27/chemical-spills-federal-laws/4794647/

Did not have a chance to continue...with this news link, here are my thoughts on the question raised: One or an entire organization cannot view sustainability as an action-item without taking into context the entire picture - not only what the organization uses/makes/distributes/sells, but about all of the consequences related to what it offers in the way of products/services. It's not enough to say, "we are sustainable, we have green teams, we locally source, and the entire litany of "sustainable" catch phrases, how about, have we evaluated all the risks associated with our actions, and how do we address them to sustain our enterprise, economically, environmentally, socially, and with proper governance? It would seem with these few examples I have taken from the news, some companies - as is the US government - are taking their eye off the ball, and allowing catastrophes to occur at an alarming rate.

Or, on a different plane, why aren't beverage companies doing more to make their carbonated soft drinks more healthy so as not to contribute to increased obesity and other health concerns among the millions who consume these beverages daily? How "sustainable" can these companies be if they don't take some preemptive action in this regard? Some bottlers are keenly aware of water shortages in some of their global locations and do take proactive steps to introduce new sources of potable water for their local neighbors to compensate them for taking some of their precious water resources. That's at least one positive step, but so far, I have yet to see positive steps to increase the nutritional value of some of their most popular soft drinks.

To summarize, then, for an organization to be considered truly sustainable, all facets of their operations need to be taken into consideration, as well as looking way out of their comfort zone to identify where a number of hidden sustainable nuggets can be found.

Gabriele,

I agree your affirmations, particularly considering the "green publicity" generally made by the corporations.

But in this case, I'm talking about sustainability from citizen's welfare perspective: the rigth to the energy acess like a dimension of the quality of life.

Thanks.

Ricardo.

How do you define Welfare? Analyse the word, it is composed of two words Well + Fare = Well Happening or Well turned out. Both meanings really say it all and relate well to Sustainability, how well will things happen in the future, this goes hand in hand with the definition of sustainability by Bruntland Commission; "Development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.“ May I add that it is not only the future generations that need to have their needs met, but the current generation as well, those that are becoming older, more infirm and require care and support.

According to Oxford Dictionary the primary meaning of Welfare is “1. the health, happiness, and fortunes of a person or group.” Next we need to look at both sides of the discussion. Person or a Group (potentially business), both have different targets, a group will be happy when their fortunes (stock, profits, turn-over; these also define a healthy Group) are faring well. The person will on the other hand will fare well when they can be happy, safe, supported by friends and family as well as cared for in their own surroundings.

Well designed, located and energy efficient developments are not sustainable if they do not allow the residents to continue to live there when they start to age, depend on medication, care or when their buying power alters (retirement). Modularity of design to change the volume used, or even better sharing of premises has demonstrated only to have benefitted the elderly but the visitor living with them (see http://homeshare.org/faq/ or http://www.housingcare.org/service/type-30-homesharing.aspx ), whether this will be easily administered or implemented in other countries, I am not sure of, but certainly it would be good to implement.

Lately there has been a lot of talk of fuel poverty with many people caught in the trap of old inefficient homes http://www.energybillrevolution.org/fuel-poverty/, methods and initiatives were put forward, some very unsuccessful like Green Deal in UK. Who does this fuel poverty affect, the vulnerable people, those that are elderly, infirm and in financial restraints of pensions. Welfare really needs to tackle those problems for vulnerable people.

Organisations claiming green, sustainable credentials look at a very narrow band of their function and frequently disregard the long-term impact. Gabriele asking why are they not doing more…..perhaps it is for reasons of their welfare.

see also

ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY IS SOCIAL POLICY - SOCIAL POLICY IS ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY: TOWARD SUSTAINABILITY POLICY (Springer 2013)

The above has contributions from various fields to show how fusing social policy with environmental policy will be a must to realize sustainability.

Isidor Wallimann

Sustainable development strategies address the issue of how do we have to change the structure of systems we live in to produce more of what we want (sustainable) and less of that which is undesirable (unsustainable). This question gives me a chance to recall the classic work of Donella Meadows (1941 – 2001), late research fellow at MIT. She was a pioneering American environmental scientist, teacher and writer an best known as lead author of the influential book "The Limits to Growth", which made headlines around the world. She proposed a list of places (leverage points) to intervene in complex systems in increasing order of effectiveness. Here they are (from Meadows 2009):

• 12. Numbers: Constants and parameters such as subsidies, taxes, and standards

• 11. Buffers:The sizes of stabilizing stocks relative to their flows

• 10. Stock-and-Flow Structures: Physical systems and their nodes of intersection

• 9. Delays: The lengths of time relative to the rates of system changes

• 8. Balancing Feedback Loops: The strength of the feedbacks relative to the impacts they are trying to correct

• 7. Reinforcing Feedback Loops: The strength of the gain of driving loops

• 6. Information Flows:The structure of who does and does not have access to information

• 5. Rules: Incentives, punishments, constraints

• 4. Self-Organization: The power to add, change, or evolve system structure

• 3. Goals:The purpose or function of the system

• 2. Paradigms: The mindset out of which the system—its goals, structure, rules, delays, parameters—arises.

• 1. Transcending Paradigms

As you can see the most effective leverage points are paradigms and trascending paradigms, very difficult to change but the most effective for a really sustainable change. In the words of Donella "the shared ideas in the minds of society, the great big unstated assumptions, constitute that society’s paradigm, or deepest set of beliefs about how the world works. These beliefs are unstated because it is unnecessary to state them—everyone already knows them. Money measures something real and has real meaning; therefore, people who are paid less are literally worth less. Growth is good. One can “own” land. Those are just a few of the paradigmatic assumptions of our current culture, all of which have utterly dumbfounded other cultures, who thought them not the least bit obvious". Notice, however, that most of the current sustainability research, even the most advanced on complex systems, instead, is focused on the least effective leverage points like the economical aspects likely because decision makers and politicians believe that sustainability is mainly an economic problem (welfare) and it is more approachable in this way (i.e., GDP as a welfare measure). So, "Numbers" like constants and parameters such as subsidies, taxes, and standards become the main focus. This happens for sustainability in environmental protection science too, by just providing numbers, standards, thresholds for pollutants that should not be trespassed, and for species diversity too. However this is a quite myopic viewpoint and I doubt that it can lead to real sustainability ever.

Here is the link for Donella's work www.thesolutionsjournal.com/node/419.

A great discussion. In my view, it is important to separate out, at least analytically means, goals and outcome. Welfare, if it means the health and well-being of the population, is a series of outcomes, attainable by sustainable practice but by other means too. Sustainability is a goal which it likely we can slowly move towards through the means of, among other things, regulatory intervention and changing behaviour. We all know how difficult such change is when dominant value-sets across most societies are individualist and acquisitive. It might be that some of the best practices come from behavioural economics. It might be worth checking out John Gaudy's paper in Ecological Economics 2005.

this book also addresses the issue

Thank you all for a stimulating sharing of ideas on this important issue. As ecologist I am not very familiar with the psychology of change, I am currently trying to become more familiar with it. Like professor Zurlini I am a fan of Donella Meadows and her paper on leverage points in which to intervene in a system to effect change is brilliant. What we need to do is integrate the psychology of change into Meadows' model so that we can use the high leverage points rather than the low level ones which our politicians are very good at doing. There is a lot of action for the public to see but the effect is minimal. Real systemic change is not achieved, so our problems remain. I am hoping that increasing our knowledge about the psychology of change will enable we humans to use paradigm shifts or beyond to effect real change in transforming our societies and economies to sustainable use of the environment.