Session 3/DL Colloquium/Spring 2006

January 23 - January 29

Sustainability I: Introduction to Global Environmental Problems

"If we do not succeed in putting our message of urgency through to today's parents and decision makers, we risk undermining our children's fundamental right to a healthy, life-enhancing environment. Unless we translate our words into a language that can reach the minds and hearts of people young and old, we shall not be able to undertake the extensive social changes needed to correct the course of development."

--Gro Harlem Brundtland, Chairwoman World Commission on Environment and Development

Reading

You have challenging and technical reading this week as we gain an overview of the complexity of "interlocking crises" and the seriousness of environmental problems. The concept of sustainability is introduced. Consult your schedule to see that we will be reading "State of the World 2005" for the next 2 weeks. Your reading is for understanding and to prepare to write your next paper. Write down questions and comments as you read to post on the WebBoard for this week's discussion.

Please read for this week:

"State of the World 2005" -Forward, xvii - xviii, Preface, xix - xxi, State of the World: A Year in Review, xxiii - xxvii, then ONE chapter of your choice to base your paper on.

...and read the following:

The "World Summit on Sustainable Development" (WSSD) was held in Johannesburg, Africa in 2002. Two professors from FGCU, Dr. Peter Corcoran, founding Colloquium coordinator, and Neil Wilkinson, a Professor of the Colloquium since 1997 and second coordinator, attended the summit...

(Reprinted from a news clip) Aug. 26, 2002- Tens of thousands of officials, environmentalists and advocates for the poor converged on (Johannesburg) this old mining city today to devise an ambitious blueprint to promote development while protecting natural resources. Participants from all over the world flocked to the United Nations' World Summit on Sustainable Development in flowing African robes, Indian saris and pinstriped suits. They celebrated the spirit of global solidarity and vowed to hammer out a plan to protect rain forests, to clean polluted air and to help millions of people escape from poverty. More than 100 presidents and prime ministers, including most European leaders, will attend this summit meeting to show their commitment to their new pledges. But many here are expressing doubts about the developed nations' sincerity and are especially critical of the fact that President Bush, the leader of the world's biggest economy and its largest polluter, has decided not to attend. American officials here today said they were committed to the meeting's agenda and would soon announce investments of more than $970 million in projects to provide access clean water to Africa and other developing nations. They said they want to focus on offering concrete support for specific projects instead of getting mired in debates about the targets and time frames for foreign aid that the developing nations are seeking. But as participants gathered in the gleaming convention center here, nearly everyone was haunted by the failures of the past.

Ten years ago, the world's leaders left the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro with an ambitious agenda that is mostly remembered by the participants here as a string of broken promises and squandered opportunities. In his opening speech today, President Thabo Mbeki of South Africa said pointedly that the world had stood by and allowed environmental degradation and deepening poverty to threaten the future of the Earth. Mr. Mbeki said leaders had failed to muster the political will to reduce poverty and to protect natural resources despite the promises made in Rio de Janeiro. He urged officials to develop a plan during this 10-day meeting to rescue a world increasingly characterized by dying lakes, retreating forests, global warming and desperately poor people. "Poverty, underdevelopment, inequality within and among countries, together with the worsening global ecological crisis, sum up the dark shadow under which most of the world lives," Mr. Mbeki said in his speech. "It is no secret that the global community has, as yet, not demonstrated the will to implement the decisions it has freely adopted." "We need to take stock of the inertia of the past decade and agree on very clear and practical measures that will help us to deal decisively with all the challenges that we face," he added. "This is the central task of this summit."

 

What does "sustainability" mean to others? Click on butterfly to read.