Resources to support Chapter 1

Sharing Nature's Interest

Nicky Chambers * Craig Simmons * Mathis Wackernagel

ecologicalfootprint.com home page

1. Redefining Progress
2. Indicating Progress
3. Footprinting Foundations
4. Footprinting Fundamentals
5. From Activities to Impacts
6. 20 Questions about Footprinting
7. Global  and National Footprints
8. Regional Footprinting
9. The Impacts of Organizations & Services
10. Footprinting for Product Assessment
11. Footprinting Lifestyles
12. Next Steps

Chapter 1: Links & Resources

Why Bigger Isn't Better: The Genuine  Progress Indicator - 1999 Update http://www.rprogress.org/pubs/pdf/gpi1999.pdf

mail the authors with your own suggested useful links for Chapter 1

Chapter 1: Summary

Our understanding of what constitutes real progress is changing. In this chapter we have explored the meaning of sustainability and identified its key components – environment, society, and economy and their relationship to one another. Furthermore, we have distinguished the aim of sustainability from the process of achieving sustainable development.

Using the IPAT formulation we have also introduced the role that population, lifestyle (or affluence), technology and consumption play in the measurement of environmental impact.

The authors have presented their preferred definition of sustainability which can be summarized as ‘delivering quality of life for all within the means of nature’. This, and similar, definitions neatly capture the tension between these two key sustainability goals.

Defining in detail what constitutes a sufficient quality of life, and how this might be measured, is outside the scope of this book though the GPI, a candidate indicator, has been presented. What we are primarily concerned with in this book is how we might quantify our use of nature, and compare this with the carrying capacity of our ecosystems, so that we can assess environmental sustainability.