A Portal on Sustainability

Social and Environmental Justice

04.05.2005 · Research Group on the Global Future

Today, it is commonly acknowledged that not all communities are affected equally by economic and environmental policies. To an increasing extent, communities realize that economic and environmental success depend on agreeing on a common and balanced vision for the future and policies that draw on their local strengths, i.e. on a communal level, and work on creating a society that is both socially and environmentally just.

UN Human Development
Human development is about creating an environment in which people can develop their full potential and lead productive, creative lives in accord with their needs and interests. People are the real wealth of nations. Development is thus about expanding the choices people have to lead lives that they value.
The Human Development Report is an independent report on global, national and regional human development. It is commissioned by the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) and is the product of a selected team of leading scholars, development practitioners and members of the Human Development Report Office of UNDP.

The Pacific Institute has launched a program on community strategies regarding sustainability and justice, which aims to improve the understanding of environmental justice issues and of the components necessary to build sustainable and just communities. The program documents and analyzes critical community issues, identifies mechanisms to overcome obstacles to more inclusive community participation in natural resource and economic development policies, and informs decision makers about the potential of community-based strategies.

There is an article by Dr. Bullard, a sociologist from Clark Atlanta University, on the correlation between environmental pollution and the race of the affected people, which is an excerpt from his book "Dumping in Dixie: Race, Class, and Environmental Quality".

The Foundation for the Rights of Future Generations (SRZG), Germany, is a non-partisan and independent organization managed by younger people predominantly under the age of 30. The objective of the foundation is intergenerational justice and sustainability in all areas, which affect the relationship of the generations. In its mission, the organization states that it wants to work on a variety of problems, for example, the progressive destruction of the environment, youth unemployment, exceedingly high national debts, and the crisis of education, rights of children and the disadvantageous treatment of the young generation in the current pension schemes. The foundation's aim is to change all that.

A study carried out at Keele University, Staffordshire, UK, found that the objectives of social justice and of sustainability are theoretically compatible - not in all aspects but in many. However, can (social) justice really be done to all societies and all populations in the world now and at some point of time in the future? Most ideas of sustainable development, while focusing on the future, are most interested in doing justice to poor people in the current generation. Is this goal still compatible with sustainability as defined by the Brundtland Commission?

Michel Camdessus, former Managing Director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) held a speech in 1998, dealing with the problem of social justice on a global scale in regards of poverty and debt-relief. He outlines how the IMF can serve the poor and contribute to a socially just global society.