This post was also published on
riomatters.org, a UN sponsored blog discussing the upcoming Rio+20 summit.
20 years after the original Rio summit began, how far along are we on
a path towards sustainable development? While there has been some
movement to back up rhetoric, much more still needs to be done –
especially in the areas of concrete agreements, implementation and
defining further knowledge required going forward. Is Rio+20 the place
where substantial progress takes place? Let us take a closer look at the
history of the summit to find out.
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| Prof William Clark |
We
have come some way from 1992: Two decades ago, it was a struggle to get
sustainability on the global agenda. Now, there is no doubt that it is a
key concern. The
types of issues,
governance discussion and our
knowledge needs
have all evolved over the last 20 years. Harvey Brooks Professor of
International Science, Public Policy and Human Development at Harvard
University’s John F. Kennedy School of Government, William Clark,
elaborated on these differences in a talk celebrating Earth Day last
month:
- Issues: Rather than just focusing on environmental
agreements (about the ozone, climate, biodiversity and forests), we are
now focusing on development agreements. Prof Clark elaborated, “The
current hot topics: jobs, energy food, water, cities and disasters are
indications of how humans are now at the center of discussions”.
- Governance: Rather than a top down spirit of
governance in the past, where the inclusion of civil society often came
belatedly, we now have to focus on polycentric governance, and
entrepreneurial green growth through public private partnerships. “Most
of the action happens at the regional level, but we what we need to
figure out is the global level tasks vs what tasks can be sorted out at
the regional and national levels,” Prof Clark explained.
- Knowledge: In the past, we focused on understanding
more about the science of how things worked, and the impacts changes in
the environment might have on us, through Earth system sciences, and
global monitoring technologies. Now, we need to build on this baseline
by pushing the edge on sustainability science, and develop decision
support systems, especially for policymakers. “This will help states to
compute the different ways they can achieve our sustainability goals,”
Prof Clark reinforced.
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| Secretary-General Ban-Ki Moon (right confers with Jens Stoltenberg, Prime Minister of Norway. UN Photo/Mark Garten |
While our views on these dimensions have evolved due to our
experience, we should also be mindful of the different levels of scale
that we can operate on. In this field, global and even regional
agreements have been very difficult to come by of late. But smaller
partnerships, for example the bilateral $1 billion partnership on
forests between Norway and Indonesia signed in 2010, can lead the way.
Individual organizations can pave the way forward as well. Walmart has
been recognized with numerous awards for its sustainability efforts,
including publishing an annual Global Responsibility Report which
highlights how its Sustainable Value Networks (SVNs) have helped
integrate sustainable practices into all parts of their business.
Another debate that is often had is whether we should consider having
fewer senior people from key institutions at Rio+20 a failure. While it
is sometimes helpful to have high profile politicians around, an
increased spotlight is not necessarily helpful. I spoke with Professor
Clark after his Earth Day talk, and he agreed with this sentiment: “We
only have to look as far back as the climate change-centered Conference
of Parties 15 in Copenhagen in 2010, which was widely expected to
conclude with a follow up to the Kyoto Protocol but did not even come
close. Especially in the case of Rio+20, where there are multiple fronts
to push forward on rather than being restricted to one particular
issue, the lower profile can be helpful. Some realistic targets and
commitments can be agreed upon, and collaboration at the working level
is more likely since less political positioning and maneuvering is
necessary.”
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| Glaciers melting as a result of climate change. UN Photo/Eskinder Debebe |
Overall, in order to have a fruitful Rio+20 summit, we must create an
environment where organizations are comfortable sharing their successes
and failures, so that others may learn and develop more informed plans
going forward. Let us also keep in mind that no initiative is too small
to appreciate – after all, much of our world has been shaped by
persistent individuals who were unafraid to pursue seemingly unrealistic
goals.
Rahul Daswani is a class of 2013 Master in Public Policy
candidate at the Harvard Kennedy School. He spent the last 2 years
working in climate change as a consultant for the governments of Papua
New Guinea and Indonesia. This summer he is working in Ethiopia, on a
project focused on scaling up farmer cooperatives.
