Bridging the gaps for global sustainable development: A quantitative analysis

Journal of Environmental Management 90 (2009) 3700–3707

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Bridging the gaps for global sustainable development: A quantitative analysis Victor E. Udo a, *, Peter Mark Jansson b a b

Pepco Holding Inc., 401 Eagle Run Road, P.O. Box 9239, Newark, DE 19714, USA Rowan University, 201 Mullica Hill Road, Glassboro, NJ 08028-1701, USA

a r t i c l e i n f o

a b s t r a c t

Article history: Received 25 July 2006 Received in revised form 6 November 2008 Accepted 3 December 2008 Available online 5 June 2009

Global human progress occurs in a complex web of interactions between society, technology and the environment as driven by governance and infrastructure management capacity among nations. In our globalizing world, this complex web of interactions over the last 200 years has resulted in the chronic widening of economic and political gaps between the haves and the have-nots with consequential global cultural and ecosystem challenges. At the bottom of these challenges is the issue of resource limitations on our finite planet with increasing population. The problem is further compounded by pleasure-driven and poverty-driven ecological depletion and pollution by the haves and the have-nots respectively. These challenges are explored in this paper as global sustainable development (SD) quantitatively; in order to assess the gaps that need to be bridged. Although there has been significant rhetoric on SD with very many qualitative definitions offered, very few quantitative definitions of SD exist. The few that do exist tend to measure SD in terms of social, energy, economic and environmental dimensions. In our research, we used several human survival, development, and progress variables to create an aggregate SD parameter that describes the capacity of nations in three dimensions: social sustainability, environmental sustainability and technological sustainability. Using our proposed quantitative definition of SD and data from relatively reputable secondary sources, 132 nations were ranked and compared. Our comparisons indicate a global hierarchy of needs among nations similar to Maslow’s at the individual level. As in Maslow’s hierarchy of needs, nations that are struggling to survive are less concerned with environmental sustainability than advanced and stable nations. Nations such as the United States, Canada, Finland, Norway and others have higher SD capacity, and thus, are higher on their hierarchy of needs than nations such as Nigeria, Vietnam, Mexico and other developing nations. To bridge such gaps, we suggest that global public policy for local to global governance and infrastructure management may be necessary. Such global public policy requires holistic development strategies in contrast to the very simplistic north–south, developed–developing nations dichotomies. Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.

Keywords: Sustainable development Social sustainability Technological sustainability Environmental sustainability and global hierarchy of national development needs

1. Introduction About 62 years ago, the renowned psychologist Abraham Maslow proposed the hierarchy of human needs in pursuit of selfactualization. Maslow suggested his hierarchy as a pyramid of basic human needs in five levels – physiological needs, safety needs, love/ belonging needs, esteem needs, and self-actualization (Maslow, 1943). Although Maslow’s worldview may be seen as an

* Corresponding author at: Business Planning and Research, PHI Strategic Planning & Risk Management, Energy and Technology Center, P.O. Box 6066, Newark, DE 19714, USA. Tel.: þ1 302 451 5422. E-mail addresses: [email protected] (V.E. Udo), [email protected] (P.M. Jansson). 0301-4797/$ – see front matter Ó 2009 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. doi:10.1016/j.jenvman.2008.12.020

improvement in other theories of human personality and motivation, critics argue that this concept of self-actualization is difficult to operationalize. However, few students of western education, especially in the social sciences and organizational behavior, fail to refer to Maslow and the hierarchy of needs when discussing organizational formation, transformation and/or development. In this paper we will consider that ultimate organization – the global social system of nations. Is there a global hierarchy of national development needs similar to Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs? Under such a global hierarchy what may represent the self-actualized potential of nations? Without delving into the political science theories of global actors and behaviors in world affairs, we will use a comparative analysis of national development and progress data in an attempt to answer the above questions.

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To do this, we begin with the basic assumption that sustainable development is the self-actualization equivalent in Maslow parlance and use a quantitative conceptualization of SD to assess nations based on index of attributes and indicators. The result of this quantitative analysis is used to compare 132 nations and identify the patterns and gaps of SD among nations. Our global hierarchy of national development needs is then compared with Maslow’s hierarchy of human needs. Finally, we conclude the paper with global public policy recommendations for bridging the gaps for equitable sustainable development. 1.1. The sustainable development and sustainability debate Since the epoch-making WCED (1987) report, Our Common Future, sustainable development (SD) has come to mean several things to several people. For example, Susan Murcott of MIT listed over 50 definitions of SD as used by several organizations and individual researchers between 1979 and 1997 (Murcott, 1997). To the policy makers in the advanced nations (OECD members), SD seems to mean environmental sustainability with steady economic growth (WCED, 1987). To the people in the so-called developing nations, SD seems to mean sustained economic growth with environmental consideration and to others, it seems that SD must mean ‘‘zero growth’’ or it is an oxymoron (UNDP, 2000). Regardless of these varying perceptions, many researchers and policy makers seem to agree that SD is a multidimensional, multidisciplinary, and interdisciplinary problem of significant complexity. A majority of the literature on SD seems to acknowledge that an appropriate treatment of the issue requires covering social, economic, energy, technological and environmental issues. Several concepts and approaches have been used in the sustainability discourse including zero growth, Environmental Kuznet’s Curve (EKC), weak sustainability, strong sustainability, carrying capacity and so on (Cole, 2007; Daly, 1990; Capra and Pauli, 1995; Easterbrook, 1995; Dewan and Hasanat, 1998; Doorman, 1998; IISD, 1999). The EKCs that have been developed over the past two decades make pretty effective cases that growth in economic development among nations can often lead to a reduction in environmental pollution for specific pollutants. This econometric and pollutant modeling suggests a potential U-shaped relationship as national economies expand. When they begin to grow they emit more pollutants but after they pass a certain level of development they are able to reduce their pollutant output. Nearly all environmental–economic models for nations suggest that it is best to preserve some quantity of natural capital for subsequent future generations, and intergenerational equity, in order to achieve sustainable development goals. However, there are two different approaches supported by researchers as to how to preserve the resources for future generations. The ‘strong’ and ‘weak’ sustainability schools differ in their treatment of how resources should and can be preserved for future generations. Those who support ‘weak’ sustainability believe that the diminishment of resources by society can be replaced by technology advance and substitutions that enable economic growth to continue simultaneously. Those advocating ‘strong’ sustainability doubt the efficacy of technology and such resource substitution to maintain the quality of key aspects of the environment thus advocate limiting growth in material utilization, economic expansion, etc. These conceptual approaches differ from our project in substantive ways. The EKC approach is actually a time-series modeling, or longitudinal study, of a nation or a specific economy contrasting econometric indicators with only one or two key pollutants present in that nation or generated by that economy. Our approach, as described below, is a discrete snapshot in time of a large sample of nations to see if new insights might be developed when they are contrasted with key SD

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indicators. Weak and strong sustainability advocates favor divergent paradigms with respect to society’s and technology’s ability to directly affect the outcomes of economic expansion. With the ‘weak’ advocates stating that economic expansion may actually lead to higher sustainable development capacity and ‘strong’ opponents stating that the only way to limit these negative impacts is to constrain in some way the expansion of material and energy consumption. Our paper departed philosophically from each of these traditional approaches to SD discourse by using commonly available data to try to assess the sustainable development capacity of nations at one point in time and by focusing on social, technological1 and environmental dimensions of SD simultaneously to see if there was a correlation with SD capacity and Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. This snapshot in time approach was not intended to prove that nations do change over time as per EKC model theory, nor did the author’s directly attempt to wrestle with the issue of whether society and technology will be able to effectively preserve the desired and necessary capital for future generations to achieve their needs which is a key point of contention between ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ sustainability advocates. The model as we describe below, however, can be used in longitudinal (EKC-like) studies, though that is not the goal of this paper. Conceptually, the equitable global sustainable development problem of our contemporary world can be seen as the issue of modernity based economic growth measured progress in a military–political North–South global dichotomy of the haves and the have-nots – a global organizational system in a collision path with the earth’s carrying capacity limitation. More detailed discussion and graphical illustration of this collision path are discussed in Udo (2002) as a society, technology and environment problem that needs to be approached from a holistic global public policy perspective. Technology shaped by humans that in turn shapes humans (Feenberg, 1991), could be seen as a tool for humans to minimize scarcity in a balanced environment for sustainable development. It can also be seen as a tool for mass destruction in terms of war and a moral dilemma when considering issues such as human cloning. Sustainability therefore calls for a balanced technology–society–environment relation with a focus on replenishing the earth or there will be neither earth nor human beings to inhabit it in the long run. These relationships are complex but may be outlined logically below for simple exploration and understanding: Sustainability ¼ f (Sustainable Development, Catastrophe) where f is not necessarily a mathematical or linear causal relationship but a complex adaptive nonlinear and interactive relationship, and Catastrophe ¼ Events beyond human control Sustainable Development ¼ f (Technology, Environment, and Society) Technology ¼ f (knowledge, infrastructure, and institutions) Environment ¼ f (air, land, and water ecology) Society ¼ f (economy, polity, and culture’) culture’ ¼ Culture minus Technology Culture ¼ f (language, religion, technology, and history) For ease of exploration and understanding, these complex relationships are recombined into three research concepts –

1 Technology is ‘‘the part of culture, including ideas and hardware, that is used to reach practical goals’’ (J.M. Shepard, Sociology, 7th ed. [New York: Wadsworth, 1999], p. 533) on the other hand, it is the part of culture which is shaped by society and in turn shapes society (A. Feenberg, Critical Theory of Technology [New York: Oxford University Press, 1991]; A. Feenberg, From Essentialism to Constructivism: Philosophy of Technology at the Crossroads [2000] http://www-rohan.sdsu.edu/ faculty/feenberg/talk4.html, Last Accessed 1 March 2008).

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sustainable development, local–global governance, and E-infrastructure management (Udo, 2002). Sustainable development is explored as a global goal and basis for resource allocation and public policy in the limited and vulnerable planet. Such a goal requires global cultural transformation. As shown in the above complex relationships, sustainable development can be represented in terms of technological sustainability, environmental sustainability and social sustainability. The two other aspects of culture have been grouped into two human derived concepts that can facilitate sustainable development – local to global governance and infrastructure management (Udo, 2002). The three concepts are adaptively coupled to human survival and progress performance indicators. For the purpose of this inquiry therefore, using the conceptual symbol 5 to represent Adaptive Coupling (AC)2 in the sense of a complex, adaptive organizational system, the following conceptual definitions are adopted: Sustainable Development 5 AC{Social, Technological & Environmental Sustainability Indicators} Local–Global Governance 5 AC{Governance Globalization, & Empowerment Indicators}

Localization,

and E-Infrastructure Management 5 AC{Public Communication, Energy/Power & Transactional Infrastructure Indicators} where Udo (2002) sought to establish that: Sustainable Development 5 Local–Global Governance 5 EInfrastructure Management 5 Sustainable Development i.e., the three concepts are adaptively coupled and that local– global governance and E-infrastructure management are necessary (but not sufficient) conditions for sustainable development. For this paper, we focused on the quantitative analysis of the SD capacity of nations. 2. An alternative quantitative conceptualization of sustainable development We conceptualized SD in terms of social, technological, and environmental sustainability indications. Although a significant portion of sustainability literature tends to emphasize environmental sustainability,3 we have adopted the more holistic approach to include key social and technological variables. Therefore, SD is defined in this analysis as an appropriate paradigm of social, technological, and environmental progress that enables intra- and intergenerational equity through sound governance and infrastructure management.4 We will thus measure SD capacity of a nation as a relative performance score

2 The notion of Adaptive Coupling is used here instead of cause–effect relationship since such relationships do not necessarily hold in complex human systems. But the mutual impacts the indicators have on each other are intuitively obvious. 3 See, WEF, 2000b and 2001 for example, World Economic Forum, Pilot Environmental Sustainable Index: An Initiative of the Global Leaders for Tomorrow Environmental Task Force, a paper presented at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland (January 2000) and 2001 Environmental Sustainability Index: An Initiative of the Global Leaders for Tomorrow Environmental Task Force, a paper presented at the annual meeting of the World Economic Forum, Davos, Switzerland (January 2001). 4 See Udo (2002) for a more detailed discussion on the interrelationships between infrastructure management, governance and sustainable development.

on aggregated social, technological, and environmental variables. Several adaptively coupled human survival and progress input, output, and impact variables are selected and aggregated such that: Sustainable development capacity 5 AC{social, technological, and environmental sustainability capacity indicators} where the designation 5 AC{...} suggests an adaptive coupling between the variables versus a simple causal relationship. Therefore, the above three indicators are assumed to be adaptively coupled such that: Social 5 Technological 5 Environmental 5 Social The breakdown of the three indicators of sustainable development, the attributes used in quantifying them, specific definition and/or the proxy for each attribute and the source of data are summarized in Table 1. Also included in Table 1 (in the final column within brackets) is the mathematical processing of the original data. Detailed description, analysis and justification for selecting the attributes can be found in the dissertation of one of the authors (Udo, 2002). The three capacity indicators are an adaptive coupling of various attributes summarized below. 2.1. Social sustainability capacity indicator As a first and primary indicator of a nation’s SD capacity we considered social sustainability. Social aspects of human progress and survival, including political, economic, and legal variables have therefore been used to quantify this dimension of SD. Let us define the social sustainability capacity indicator as the cultural and political–economic aspects of public policy that support a nation’s progress toward equitable overall human well-being. To this end, each nation is measured in terms of its performance on human rights, human transparency, human development, human survival, income equity, and human freedom such that: Social sustainability 5 AC{global human rights, human transparency, human development, human survival, income equity, and human freedom attributes} To compare the 132 nations in equal basis, the above social sustainability attributes were selected based on availability of objective data on these important parameters from recognized and respected international organizations. 2.2. Technological sustainability capacity indicator We assumed that a socially sustainable nation is capable of technological invention, innovation (Jansson, 2003) or importation of required technology to equitably meet the sustainable development needs of its populace. Technology can become a tool of destruction in anarchical, tyrannical or unstable society where there are no laws, regulations nor positive cultural norms. Therefore, technological sustainability can be considered as secondary to social sustainability in the hierarchy of national developmental needs at the global level. To compare the 132 nations on an equal footing then, technological sustainability attributes were selected based upon widely accepted indicators of technological advancement (R&D assets, use of advanced energy technology, efficiency in energy use, access of populace to basic resources like food and clean water, etc.). The sources for this data were unbiased, respected and recognized

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Table 1 Sustainable Development Quantification Variables and Data Sources. #

Indicators

Attributes

Definition and/or Proxy

Data Source (Processing)

1

Social Sustainability Capacity

Human rights protection

Level of participation in global conventions and press freedom Level of corruption, graft (World Bank) Index based on GDP, life expectancy, education % of people not expected to survive to the age of 60 Gini Index (deviation of income distribution from perfect equity)

USA Dept. of State 1999 Country Report; 2001 World Audit.Org Democracy Audit WEF ESI 2001 Annex 6 Variable Number 55 (Z-Score) UNDP HDR 2000, pp. 157–160 UNDP HDR 2000, pp. 186–189 WDR 2000/2001, pp. 282–283

Civil liberties and political liberties Renewable energy as % of total energy usage Billions of Btus per millions of GDP dollars % of GPD value with added by each sector: service, agriculture, manufacturing, and industry. Science and technology investment and publications

Freedom House: www.freedomhouse.org WEF ESI 2001 Report Dataset Variable Number 52 (Z-Score) WEF ESI 2001 Annex 6 Variable Number 51 (Z-Score) WDR 2000/2001, pp. 296–297 (Absolute value of deviation from average) WEF ESI 2001 Annex 4, p. 53

Access to drinkable water and caloric supply No. of people killed by single worst disaster Air quality and air pollution reduction Water availability, quality, and pollution Land usage and population pressure Threat on biodiversity and forest preservation Footprint deficit and waste/consumption pressure Healthy human environs and clean water supply

WEF ESI 2001 Annex 4, p. 51 UNDP HDR 2001, pp. 251–253 (log10 [#killed/pop. density]) WEF ESI 2001 Annex 4, pp. 41, 46 WEF ESI 2001 Annex 4, pp. 42, 43, 47 WEF ESI 2001 Annex 4, pp. 45, 50 WEF ESI 2001 Annex 4, pp. 44, 48 WEF ESI 2001 Annex 6, Var. 63 (Z-Score), & Annex 4 p. 49 WEF ESI 2001 Annex 4, p. 52 & Annex 6, Var. 32 (Z-Score)

2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9

Technological Sustainability Capacity

Human Human Human Income

transparency development survival equity

Human freedom Renewable energy Energy efficiency Industrial balance

10

Research and development assets

11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18

Basic human sustenance Disaster management Clean air Water management Land preservation Ecosystem protection Resource usage Sanitary Health

Environmental Sustainability Capacity

Source: Udo (2002) compilation of data sources used to quantify SD. Note. WDR ¼ World Bank’s World Development, 2000/2001 Report; WEF ¼ World Economic Forum Environmental Sustainability Index (ESI) 2000 Report; THF ¼ The Heritage Foundation Index of Economic Freedom (IEF) 2001 Report; HDR ¼ UNDP’s Human Development 2000 Report.

international organizations. Let us define this dimension of SD5 as those aspects of a nation’s culture including human–physical systems and tools that ensure basic sustenance and provide for an effective use of the nation’s natural resources to protect and advance its populace such that: Technological sustainability 5 AC{renewable energy, energy efficiency, industrial balance, research and development assets, basic human sustenance, and disaster management attributes}

2.3. Environmental sustainability capacity indicator SD covers much more than environmental and ecological issues as previously established. For this quantitative analysis we defined environmental sustainability in terms of those aspects of a nation’s activities that seek to preserve and/or restore the natural ecology for meeting the needs of the present inhabitants without compromising the capacity of the future inhabitants to meet their needs for equitable overall human progress and well-being. Again, to compare the 132 nations on an equal basis, environmental sustainability attributes were selected based on availability of data from relatively known international organizations. Therefore, the environmental sustainability capacity indicator in a given nation is measured in terms of six key attributes: clean air, water usage, land preservation, ecological protection, resource usage, and sanitary health. Data obtained from the WEF 2001 Environmental Sustainability Index6 were used to quantify this dimension of SD capacity such that:

Environmental sustainability 5 AC{ clean air, water usage, land preservation, ecology protection, resource usage, and sanitary health attributes}. Again, details of the above attributes are summarized in Table 1 and discussed in detail in Udo (2002).

3. Method of ranking and comparing nations This paper is based on the results of a cross-sectional comparative research study using a sample of 132 nations as documented in Udo (2002). Several indices based on a scale of 100 are used to rank and compare the relative performance of nations. Secondary data available as of the autumn of 2001 were used in the analysis. The following four steps were used in this process. Step 1: Data from the sources shown in Table 1 were used directly as proxy values for the attributes shown, or the data were used to calculate a value for the attribute. For example, in some cases, further mathematical manipulation such as deviation from sample average or per unit calculation were done. Once this initial data processing was completed, the numerical values that were used to aggregate the three SD capacity indicators (social, technological and environmental sustainability) were obtained using Equation (1). The individual national polity performance data based on the sources listed on Table 1 are used to calculate each attribute as a relative performance index in the sample using the general formula:

Attribute Index ¼ 5

See IISD, Indicators for Sustainable Development; National Research Council Board on Sustainable Development, Our Common Journey1999; NRCBSD, 1999; World Business Council for Sustainable Development, Signals of Change: Business Toward Sustainable Development ([WBCSD], 1997), available online at www.wbcsd. ch/publications/signals.htm; and Building a Better Future: Innovation Technology and Sustainable Development, a Progress Report (Geneva, Switzerland: Author, 2000). 6 This report is probably one of the most comprehensive empirical measurements of environmental sustainability among nations thus far.

N 1 X ðNPPDi  WPDISiÞ  N i1 ðBPDISi  WPDISiÞ

(1)

where N ranges from 1 to 4 representing the number of variables used to define the attribute and NPPD ¼ Available National Polity Performance Data in the sample WPDIS ¼ Worst Performance Data in the Sample BPDIS ¼ Best Performance Data in the Sample.

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Step 2: Once each nation was given a relative performance score on the attribute, the three SD capacity indicators were calculated as:

Total Indicator Score ¼

N X

Attributei

(2)

i¼1

where N ¼ 6 as seen in Table 1. Step 3: Similarly, Equation (3) was used to calculate the aggregate SD capacity of each nation.

SD Capacity ¼

3 X

TISi

(3)

i1

where TISi ¼ Total Indicator Score from Equation (2). Step 4: Using Equation (3) we obtained the overall SD capacity index of each nation as the sum of the three sustainability indicator scores. To simplify the assessment, we grouped the scores based on three qualitative relative performance values: high, medium, and low. This assignment of qualitative values to each of the three indicators and overall SD capacity index was based on the following percentile scoring: 90th percentile and above ¼ High: e.g., Norway 60th percentile and above ¼ Medium: e.g., Russia Below 60th percentile ¼ Low: e.g., Egypt

environmental activism may actually be indicative of social and technological sustainability. Social sustainability gives people the voice to express their concerns while technological sustainability provides the means and capability to move toward national and global SD which apparently has yet to be maximized in this nation. The United States on the other hand, though in the first pentad or ranked 21st on the overall SD capacity index, is shown as a medium–medium country primarily due to 1) the huge gap in income levels which drove down its social sustainability score; 2) frequency and impacts of disasters which drove down technological sustainability; and; 3) high level of consumerism and consumption which results in a relatively low 77th rank on environmental sustainability performance – see Udo (2002) for a more detailed discussion and analysis of the results. It should, however, be noted that technological sustainability is not equivalent to technological infrastructure management capacity for which the industrialized nations would rank the highest (Udo, 2002). Social sustainability should also be differentiated from governance capacity of nations for which United States and other advanced democracies would also rank the highest (Udo, 2002). With these differentiations we can then focus our analysis on the SD capacity distribution pattern among nations and compare our findings with Maslow’s hierarchy of needs at the individual level. 4.1. Sustainable development capacity distribution patterns

With these quantitative and qualitative assessments, we were able to evaluate the global performance gaps and pattern through both a linear ranking shown in Fig. 1 and two-dimensional matrix shown in Fig. 2. For the linear distribution or ranking, the 132 nations in the research sample were grouped into five tables (see Udo (2002)) called performance pentads – four of which are shown in Fig. 1. The last performance pentad was rejected in further analysis due to data problems (Udo, 2002). Fig. 2 is used to summarize the results of the distribution patterns and suggest how they are analogous to Maslow’s five levels of human needs. Note that only one of the three two-dimensional matrices (Social Sustainability Versus Technological Sustainability) is presented herein. The other two and more detailed discussion of the relative strengths and weaknesses of the analysis are documented in Udo (2002).

4. Results and analysis – SD capacity comparisons among nations On the overall SD ranking, Norway scored highest, at 1533 out of a possible 1800 points. Angola had the lowest score of 170 whereas the sample average of 998 was scored by Uzbekistan ranked at the beginning of the 40th percentile. South Africa and Albania were the two median (1037) nations with scores of 1039 and 1036 respectively. Of significant interest is the Netherlands, which is usually viewed as one of the most environmentally progressive nations. The Netherlands performed at the 50th percentile on the environmental sustainability capacity indicator but at the 90th on the overall sustainable development capacity index. The Netherlands’ relatively lower performance on the environmental sustainability indicator was interesting. While the Netherlands had the highest ranking when it came to international environmental agreements signed it achieved one of the lowest rankings in the indicators of clean air and natural resource usage. This performance seems to suggest that what is typically advertised as high environmentalism may actually be the social and technological capacity that allows the populace to demand better environmental standards. It further suggests that a high degree of

A few patterns are observable from Fig. 1. Primarily, there is no clear line of demarcation between the ‘‘North’’ and ‘‘South’’ or the developed and developing nations. In general nations with a low social sustainability capacity indicator seem also to have low technological and environmental sustainability capacity indicators. Social sustainability and technological sustainability capacity indicators seem to co-vary with the former leading the later. This seems to confirm that social sustainability is a prerequisite for sustainable development capacity. A stable and sustainable society is more capable, in general, than an unstable society to develop and deploy new technologies in the long run. In general, most of the European and the other OECD nations are the best performers on the SD capacity index. This relatively higher performance as a group is driven primarily by their relatively high performance on social and technological sustainability capacity indicators. It also seems that the South American nations are good performers in general on environmental sustainability capacity indicators. They seem to have more balanced performance among the three indicators. OECD nations are more global, while South America is regional. A majority of the OECD nations are European and have the longest history of independence and stable societies while, relatively speaking, South American nations are not. However, many of the South American nations outperformed some of the European nations. There are two global public policy lessons to be gained from these observations. The first lesson is that there seems to be the need for a balanced and regional approach for closing the SD gap equitably. The second lesson is focused around understanding the developmental stage and needs of individual nations in contrast to combining them into simplistic dichotomies. Although there are similarities among nations, there are also significant differences warranting individual treatment versus aggregation into generic dichotomies such as north–south or developed–developing. 4.2. Comparison of Maslow’s with global hierarchy of national development needs Fig. 2 shows a pattern suggesting five major clusters of the nations. Although related, these five clusters are clearly not the

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Linear Distribution of SD Capacity Performance Among 112 Nations Norway Sweden Finland Canada Switzerland Australia Austria New Zealand Denmark France Slovenia United Kingdom Germany Netherlands Ireland Portugal Spain Japan Italy Uruguay United States Hungary Israel Slovakia Greece Belgium Costa Rica Lithuania Croatia Chile Estonia Argentina Czech Republic Armenia Poland Latvia Panama Bulgaria Brazil Bolivia South Korea Sri Lanka Jamaica Colombia Paraguay Moldova, Rep. of Romania Dominican Morocco Peru Venezuela Ecuador Turkey Russia Singapore El Salvador Egypt Honduras Nicaragua Jordan Belarus Ghana Philippines Mexico Kyrgyzstan South Africa Albania Tunisia India Thailand Guatemala Malaysia Ukraine Kazakhstan Indonesia Nepal Macedonia, TFYR Uzbekistan Kuwait Botswana Papua N. Guinea Mongolia Algeria Pakistan Pakistan Bangladesh Lebanon Iran Azerbaijan Mali Madagascar Syria Zimbabwe Senegal Cameroon China Central Africa Uganda Kenya Tanzania Mozambique Malawi Viet Nam Zambia Saudi Arabia Burkina Faso Nigeria Togo Rwanda Benin Burundi Lesotho Haiti

11st Pentad: 1st to 28th Ranked Ranked Nations Nations on on SD SD Index Index

2nd Pentad Perf ormance: 29th to 56th Rank on SD 3rd Pentad Perf ormance: 57th to 84th Rank on SD 4th Pentad Performance: 85th to 112th Rank on SD

0

500

1000

1500

2000

2500

3000

Cumulative Score Cumulative % Index Index Score Social Social Sustainability Sustainability

Technological Technological Sustainability Sustainability

Environmental Environmental Sustainability Sustainability

Sustainable Sustainable Development Development Index Index

Fig. 1. SD Capacity Ranking of the top 112 Nations in the 132 Nations Sample.

same as the linear pentads in Fig. 1. The first cluster consists of the best-performing nations in the high–high cell in Fig. 2. The second cluster is made up of the medium–high and high–medium performers. The third cluster consists of the medium–medium performers. The fourth cluster is the medium–low and low– medium performers. The fifth cluster consists of the low–low performers. Norway, Sweden, Finland, Australia, and New Zealand are best-performing nations (high–high).

A majority of the nations in the low–low cell are classified as severely indebted, low life expectancy, low GDP, low educational development, and least developed nations by the Bretton Woods Institutions (see (UNDP, 2000) for example). As in the linear analysis in Fig. 1, there is no clear demarcation between the so-called Northern and Southern nations. Nevertheless, the level of development and standard of living in the nations in each of these clusters is commonly known. A majority of the low–low performing

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Technological Sustainability (Right-Hand -Side of the “-”) High – Low

High - Medium

High – High

Canada

Norway; Sweden; Finland;

Ireland

Switzerland; Australia;

Belgium

Austria; New Zealand; Denmark; United Kingdom;

S o c i a l S u s t a i n a b i l i t y

Germany; Netherlands

Medium – Low

Medium - Medium

Medium - High

Estonia; Latvia; Bolivia; Jamaica; Romania;

Portugal; Spain; Italy; Uruguay;

France

Venezuela; Ecuador; Jordan; Mexico; South Africa;

United States; Hungary; Israel;

Slovenia

India; Thailand; Ukraine; Kuwait; Mongolia

Slovakia; Greece; Lithuania;

Japan

Croatia; Chile; Argentina; Czech Costa Rica Republic; Poland; Panama; Bulgaria; South Korea; Sri Lanka; Dominican; Republic; Morocco; Singapore; El Salvador; Philippines

Low – Low

Low - Medium

Low - High

Colombia; Peru; Russia; Nicaragua; Belarus; Ghana; Armenia; Brazil; Paraguay; Kyrgyzstan; Tunisia; Malaysia; Kazakhstan;

Moldova, Turkey; Egypt;

Indonesia; Macedonia; Uzbekistan; Botswana; Papua Honduras; Albania; Guatemala; N. Guinea; Algeria; Bangladesh; Iran; Azerbaijan;

Nepal; Pakistan; Lebanon; Syria;

Mali; Madagascar; Zimbabwe; Senegal; Cameroon;

Uganda

China; Central Africa; Kenya; Tanzania; Mozambique; Malawi; Viet Nam; Zambia; Saudi Arabia; Burkina Faso; Nigeria; Togo; Rwanda; Benin; Burundi; Lesotho; Haiti

Fig. 2. Two-Dimensional Matrix of Social Sustainability Versus Technological Sustainability of Nations.

nations have worse living standards than the nations on the three cells from medium–medium to high–high performers. The high– high nations have the highest SD capacity while the low–low nations have the lowest as can be seen in Fig. 1. Using Table 2, we suggest this performance distribution of nations reveal a pattern of progress from survival needs to

sustainability needs among nations which is similar to Maslow’s pyramid from physiological needs to self-actualization needs for individual humans. Noting that even in Maslow parlance, the pyramid is relative at one point in time, we may assume the same for the global hierarchy of national development needs. In other words, human physiological needs today are neither what they

Table 2 Maslow’s Human and Global National Development Hierarchy of Needs. #

Examples of Countries

Two-Dimensional Matrix Placement – Fig. 2

Global National Development Needs, Maslow’s Hierarchy

Global National Developmental Needs Similarities – Not necessary a generalization

1

Nigeria, Rwanda

Low–Low

Viable to Surviving, Physiological Needs

2

South Africa, Brazil

Medium–Low or Low–Medium

3

Greece, Uruguay

Medium–Medium

4

France, Japan, Canada

Medium–High or High–Medium

Surviving to Developing, Safety Needs Developing to Developed, Love/Belonging Needs Developed, Esteem Needs

5

Finland, Norway

High–High

Colonial exploitation and/or relative lack of cultural majority for democratic consensus – class, tribal or religious fightings for SURVIVAL Viable but barely stable countries with improving governance and infrastructure capacities – SAFE for foreign investment Relatively stable countries with reasonable governance and infrastructure – BELONGING in International Organizations More stable governance and good infrastructure capacities – pushing for national ESTEEM in global affairs Relative homogenous culture, long history of self-governance, stable population – closer to national SELF-ACTUALIZATION

Developed toward Sustainable, Self-actualization?

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used to be yesterday nor what they will be in the future. Similarly, survival needs of a nation yesterday are not the same today nor will it be the same in the future. Given this clarification we can use Table 2 to identify examples of countries in the progress trajectory and compare the global hierarchy of national development needs with Maslow’s five levels. The low–low cell seems to represent nations that are least developed or stable and mostly thriving at the basic survival level. The medium–low and low–medium performers seem to represent nations transitioning from survival to developing. The medium– medium performers seem to represent nations that are transitioning from developing to developed nations. The high–medium and medium–high performance seem to represent nations transitioning from well developed toward higher performance in terms of sustainable development capacity. The high–high performers seem to represent nations that appear closest to being sustainable when compared with the rest of the nations. 5. Conclusions and recommendations Based on the observations in Table 2 and Figs. 1 and 2, it seems that social sustainability capacity is a prerequisite to technological sustainability capacity for the progress toward sustainable development among nations. In turn, both social sustainability and technological sustainability seem to be important aspects of the cultural basis for facilitating environmental sustainability. As illustrated in Fig. 1, the higher a nation tended to perform on one of the indicators, the higher it also tended to perform on at least one of the other two indicators. In addition, no nation had a high performance on social sustainability and simultaneously had a low performance on technological sustainability or vice versa, as was demonstrated in Fig. 2. However, some nations had low and high performances on technological sustainability and environmental sustainability. There were also some nations with low and high performances on social sustainability and environmental sustainability and therefore overall sustainable development. These observations seem to lead to the conclusion that simultaneous social sustainability and technological sustainability will inevitably facilitate environmental sustainability in the long run assuming good governance and infrastructure management capacities. The three indicators of SD capacity do seem to co-vary among the nations. Historically, some of the best-performing nations in the overall sustainable development index are socially and technologically more sustainable than the rest of the nations. Many of them used available global resources and colonial power to reach this level of performance. To ensure global environmental sustainability, the poorly performing nations cannot exploit the remaining global resources as had been done historically by the best-performing nations. The best performers cannot reverse the history of global human progress through performance retrogression. On the other hand, the poor performers cannot be allowed to stagnate at their various dismal levels of SD capacity performance. In some ways, the five groupings of nations in this SD capacity analysis seem similar to Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Maslow’s Selfactualization seems to compare with the high–high performers while the initial stage in Maslow’s hierarchy (basic needs) seems to compare well with the low–low performers mostly the developing polities that usually demand aid (financial, economic and otherwise) when the challenge of global sustainability is debated. Like in

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Maslow’s human need for safety, the national polities in the low– medium/medium–low groups must meet their basic needs before moving to more advanced needs such as environmental sustainability. Thus they focus on the safety needs of their polities while the esteem needs are delayed. The medium–medium polities can be compared with the love needs of Maslow’s hierarchy, which is clearly the middle of the road in both parlances. As to implications for global public policy this work suggests that contemporary North–South blanket programs will not lead to equitable global sustainable development since many polities are at various individual levels of progress thus requiring specific rather than blanket – ‘‘one size fits all’’ programs. Further study and analysis regarding individual national governance and infrastructure management capacities are recommended. Such analysis may show where global resources such as debt forgiveness, foreign aid, resource transfer and resource sharing may be directed to maximize the impact of closing the widening gap in global sustainable development. However, an equitable sustainable development global public policy requires international governance infrastructure management structure. In today’s globalizing world, the United Nations under a clear leadership of the United States is potentially the only framework for such global public policy praxis. Perhaps, the structure and programs of the United Nations will require significant transformation themselves in order to ensure global public policies are created that can more equitably and effectively bridge sustainable development capacity gaps among nations. References Capra, Fritjof, Pauli, Gunter (Eds.), 1995. Steering Business Toward Sustainability. United Nations University Press, New York. Cole, Matthew A., 2007. In: Atkinson, Giles, Dietz, Simon (Eds.), Economic Growth and the Environment in Handbook of Sustainable Development. Edward Elgar Publishing, Cheltenham and Northampton, London, pp. 240–252 (Chapter 15). Daly, Herman, 1990. Sustainable Growth: An impossibility theorem. Development– A Journal of the Society for International Development 3 (4), 45–47. Dewan, M.D., Hasanat, Abul, 1998. Measuring sustainable development: problems and prospects. PhD dissertation, University of Texas at Austin. Doorman, Frans, 1998. Global Development: Problems, Solutions, Strategy – a Proposal for Socially Just, Ecologically Sustainable Growth. International Books, Utrecht, The Netherlands. Easterbrook, Gregg, 1995. A Moment of Earth: the Coming Age of Environmental Optimism. Viking Penguin, New York (Chapter 4) (pp. 54–64) and Chapter 15. Feenberg, Andrew, 1991. Critical Theory of Technology. University of California Press. IISD (International Institute for Sustainable Development), 1999. Indicators for Sustainable Development: Theory, Method and Applications. A Report to the Balaton Group by Hartmut Bossel. Jansson, Peter, 2003. An Empirical Approach to Invention and Technology Innovation in Electricity. Doctoral Dissertation, Department of Engineering, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, England. Maslow, A., 1943. A theory of human motivation. Psychological Review 50, 370–396. Murcott, S., 1997, February. Definitions of sustainable development. In: A Compilation for American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) Annual Conference. International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis (IIASA) Sustainability Indicators Symposium, Seattle, WA Retrieved August 25, 2000, from. http://www.sustainableliving.org/appen-a.htm (accessed 1.3.2008). Udo, V.E., 2002. Exploring Patterns of Sustainable Development, Governance and E-Infrastructure Capacities of Nations for Global Equity Praxis. Doctoral Dissertation, School of Urban Affairs and Public Policy, University of Delaware, Newark, Delaware. UNDP (United Nations Development Program), 2000. The Human Development Report. WCED (World Commission on Environment and Development), 1987. Our Common Future. Oxford University Press, New York.