Brundtland and After

Dianne Bolton () and Terry Landells ()
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Dianne Bolton: Swinburne University of Technology
Terry Landells: Swinburne University of Technology

A chapter in The Palgrave Handbook of Corporate Social Responsibility, 2021, pp 149-175 from Springer

Abstract: Abstract The Brundtland Report responded to an urgent call by the United Nations General Assembly to frame a global agenda for change toward advancing sustainable development by the year 2000 and beyond. It would articulate ways in which concern for the environment could translate into action across developed and developing nations and demonstrate interlinkages between people, resources, environment, and development. This chapter suggests that post-Brundtland it is useful to conceptualize the progress of sustainable development agendas as a trajectory of increasing “commitment” to defined sustainable development goals and emergent “capability” to implement them. It traces a trajectory of progressing sustainable development agendas under the auspices of the General Assembly, the UN’s Economic and Social Council, the Commission on Sustainable Development, and the High-Level Political Forum. Specific attention is given to post-Brundtland summits that demonstrate the synergy between reaffirmation of commitments, the taking of considered action, and the development of capability through praxis. The Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, the 2002 Johannesburg World Summit on Sustainable Development, the 2012 Rio+20 UN Conference on Sustainable Development, the 2015 UN Sustainable Development Summit at which the Sustainable Development Goals were adopted, and the outcomes of the High-Level Political Forum subsequent to that summit are explored to this end. Reflections on these summits suggest changes over time to institutional structures, implementation of agendas, and capability building. Conclusions highlight the skills needed to progress agendas, arguing that Brundtland’s promotion of integrated thinking and knowledge generation multilaterally remains foundational to facilitating ongoing action.

Keywords: Brundtland Commission; Sustainable development; Multilateralism; Collaboration; Stakeholder interactions; Praxis; Garbage can model of decision-making; Complexity (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2021
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:spr:sprchp:978-3-030-42465-7_9

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DOI: 10.1007/978-3-030-42465-7_9

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