The Palgrave Handbook of Global

Sustainability Robert Brinkmann

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Robert Brinkmann
Editor

The Palgrave
Handbook of
Global
Sustainability
The Palgrave Handbook of Global
Sustainability
Robert Brinkmann
Editor

The Palgrave Handbook of

Global Sustainability

With 267 Figures and 128 Tables

Editor
Robert Brinkmann
Northern Illinois University
DeKalb, IL, USA

ISBN 978-3-031-01948-7 ISBN 978-3-031-01949-4 (eBook)

https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-01949-4
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Preface

Sustainability remains a contested term. Indeed, as some of the chapters of this

volume note, it can be a challenging term in academic literature because it is so
widely used and misused. However, as we face many environmental, social, and
economic problems because of the distinctly unsustainable times in which we live, it
remains a term that deserves contextualization. This book seeks to provide a degree
of definition around the concept of sustainability in order to create the structure of the
idea. While I have no doubt that we will be debating the meaning of sustainability for
decades to come, I hope that this book provides some framing of the term so we
collectively better understand significant themes.
This book has dozens of chapters, yet despite best efforts remains incomplete. For
example, there are several individuals I would have liked to have profiled, such as
Rachel Carson. However, it was surprisingly challenging to recruit authors for
particular chapters, and in some cases, authors were unable to meet deadlines due
to family or work obligations. This is totally understandable and I am sorry we were
not able to include their contributions. Nevertheless, this book serves as the largest
compendium of sustainability information ever published. For this alone, it would be
noteworthy in its scope. However, care was taken to recruit a range of senior and
emerging voices on sustainability from around the world. Thus, this volume pro-
vides a range of global thought on the topic. I am so grateful to all of the authors of
this book for their ideas and knowledge.
I think it is important to recognize that at the time of writing this, many areas of
the world were experiencing abnormally high summer temperatures. Wildfires have
broken out and there have been unprecedented floods in places like the Arabian
Peninsula and in eastern Kentucky in the United States. It seems that the pace of
climate change and its consequences is quickening. This book, then, serves as a way
for us to understand how the world sees sustainability at this important moment of
time. Are we doing enough? Have we failed future generations? Have we, as
sustainability experts, provided enough of a roadmap for moving forward into a
more sustainable future? Time will tell.
While each chapter stands alone, I believe that many of these chapters work well
together in groups for either teaching or expanding one’s knowledge base. For
example, the chapters that focus on travel and tourism provide a set of readings
that could serve as a foundation for better understanding this important sustainability

v
vi Preface

theme. Thus, as readers look to this book for information, I urge them to browse the
contents widely to find materials that may be useful in other classes or settings.
I think it is also important to recognize that the chapters in this book were written
during the global COVID pandemic. At this time, the world is currently facing a
brutal war in Ukraine and many areas of the world are experiencing significant
political turmoil. The environment is changing as sea levels rise and rain forests
disappear. As many authors have noted, we are in a time of great pessimism. I think
that the pandemic and many other world problems informed how many of these
chapters were written. As we begin to emerge from the pandemic, and as many
awake to the sustainability challenges we face, I hope that this book provides some
light and guidance for a generation left with the task of saving our planet.
A couple of years ago, I was in New York City and walked through the Manhattan
neighborhood of Greenwich Village. I ran into a group of activists in a public park
who were protesting the lack of US action on climate change. They were mainly
white academic types who were largely talking to an audience in the park who
clearly already bought into the need for climate change action. I kept thinking about
that moment as I put together this book. While I think we all need to do what we can
to advance a more sustainable world, there is a need for serious real action now that
changes the direction of key sustainability indicators. Those protesters were doing
what they felt they needed to do, but their protest had little real impact given that
New York City, particularly Greenwich Village, is a part of the world where there is
significant action and support for sustainability and climate action. I imagine that
some of these protesters went back to their comfortable middle class and upper
middle class lives (at least relative to the developing world) after the protest and did
not change themselves or their unsustainable behavior. Still the Amazon burned and
the seas got more acidic. This book highlights that there are a range of systems –
economic, environmental, and social – that make our world unsustainable. We need
to understand them in order to improve them. We need to change systems and
ourselves.
I don’t mean to overly criticize those Greenwich Village protesters. Indeed,
knowledge about the problems we face makes all of us want to protest, scream, or
otherwise erupt. We are all trying to figure out what to do as we face those
entrenched systems that keep us on an unsustainable trajectory. We have to face
the eco-grief head-on and continue to educate ourselves and others. We cannot just
protest at the converted. We need to take personal action to help transform our
families, our communities, our institutions, and our nations. This book provides a
base of knowledge that I hope helps us take the right steps forward toward action and
greater sustainable systems.

DeKalb, USA Robert Brinkmann

March 2023
Acknowledgments

I would like to thank the authors of individual chapters who contributed to this book.
In addition, I would like to thank my family who provided tremendous support –
especially Mario Gomez and Elis Vera de Gomez. I would also like to thank the
many students who provided editorial support over the last two years including Sai
Nikhil Medasani, Ryan Dobner, and Angela Patricia Bello Rodriguez. I would also
like to thank my assistant Renee Page and specialist Ellen Smith who kept me on
track. I would also like to thank the terrific editorial team at Palgrave including
Divya Rajakumar and Jacob Arun Raj. I would also like to thank Rachael Ballard
who helped me conceptualize this book and Ruth Lefevre who provided great
support along the way.

vii
Contents

Volume 1

Part I Introduction ....................................... 1

1 Defining Sustainability ................................. 3

Robert Brinkmann

Part II Energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 23

2 Global Energy Use .................................... 25

Volkan Ş. Ediger
3 Oil and Natural Gas and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 47
Alban Echchelh
4 Coal and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 67
Sanne Akerboom
5 Nuclear Power and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 87
Aviel Verbruggen and Ben Wealer
6 Solar Energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 113
Anish Modi
7 Wind Energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 129
Yi Liu and Zhenzhong Zeng
8 Geothermal Energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 147
Rosalind Archer
9 Energy Conservation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 157
Miriam Aczel
10 Ocean Energy . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 177
M. Luisa Martínez, Valeria Chávez, Víctor De la Cruz,
Octavio Pérez-Maqueo, Astrid Wojtarowski, and Rodolfo Silva

ix
x Contents

Part III Climate Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 193

11 The Science of Climate Change . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 195

Mukhtar Ahmed

12 The Evidence for Climate Change on Our Planet . . . . . . . . . . . . 223

Michael Osei Asibey and Patrick Brandful Cobbinah

13 Low-Carbon Technology and the Energy Grid .............. 239

Grazia Todeschini

14 Climate Change and the Spatial Concentration of Population . . . 255

David Castells-Quintana, Melanie Krause, and
Thomas K. J. McDermott

15 Climate Change Challenges in the Arctic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 273

Kamrul Hossain

16 The Evidence of Climate Change for Terrestrial Mammals . . . . . 285

Diane L. Saraiva and Melissa M. Grigione

17 Greenhouse Gas Management ........................... 309

Cevat Yaman

Part IV Water . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 327

18 Global Water Use . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 329

Hannes Müller Schmied, Martina Flörke, and Petra Döll

19 Water Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 345

Meena Kapahi, Roopa Rani, Ritika Choudhary, and Nikita Thakkur

20 Water Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 357

Sudhakar Madhav Rao and Nitish Venkateswarlu Mogili

21 Innovations in Water Management: Agriculture . . . . . . . . . . . . . 381

Isaac Kwadwo Mpanga, David Sewordor Gaikpa, Eric Koomson,
and Harrison Kwame Dapaah

22 Innovations in Water Management: Systems Efficiency

and Energy Applications in the Water Sector . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 405
Helena M. Ramos

23 Learning from the Past: What Cultural Heritage Can Teach

Us About Water Storage and Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 437
Carlos Hiroo Saito and Maria Manuela Morais
Contents xi

Part V Natural Resource Management ...................... 459

24 The State of the World’s Natural Resources . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 461

Gerry Nagtzaam and Ute Brady
25 Using Remote Sensing for Sustainable Forest Management
in Developing Countries . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 487
W. D. K. V. Nandasena, Lars Brabyn, and Silvia Serrao-Neumann
26 The Pantanal: A Seasonal Neotropical Wetland Under
Threat . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 509
Solange Kimie Ikeda-Castrillon, Ernandes Sobreira Oliveira-Junior,
Onelia Carmem Rossetto, Carlos Hiroo Saito, and Karl M. Wantzen
27 Ocean Ecosystem and Its Multidimensional Eco-functionality
and Significance . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 537
Susanta Kumar Chakraborty
28 Global Biodiversity: Trends and Regulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 583
Gerry Nagtzaam and Ute Brady
29 Mining and Minerals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 605
Jóżef Dubiński and Aleksandra Koteras
30 Agriculture and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 631
Amer Ait Sidhoum and Maria Vrachioli
31 Local Food, Slow Food, and the Small Farm Movement . . . . . . . 655
Hiran Roy
32 Aquaculture . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 679
Danielle Cantrell

Part VI Waste and Pollution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 703

33 An Overview of Waste Management (Fly Ash): A Life Cycle

Analysis Approach to Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 705
Aarti Singh
34 Sewage and Sewage Treatment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 719
Sonia Boudjabi, Nawal Ababsa, and Haroun Chenchouni
35 Municipal Waste and Its Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 747
Christia Meidiana, Sekito Tomoo, and Aris Subagiyo
36 Medical Waste and Its Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 761
Lynda Andeobu
37 On the Sustainability of Graveyards in Urban Milieus ........ 791
Zaheer Allam
xii Contents

38 Plastics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 807
Tony R. Walker and Eamonn McGuinty
39 Radioactive Waste . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 819
Céline Kermisch
40 Air Pollution and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 829
Wilma Subra
41 Water Pollution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 853
Linda Schweitzer
42 Nutrient Pollution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 873
Gabrielle Rabelo Quadra and Emília Marques Brovini

Part VII Sustainability and Equity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 895

43 Defining the Social Equity Issues in Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . 897

Florianna Lendai Michael and Shanti Faridah Salleh

Volume 2

Part VIII Sustainability in the Developing World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 909

44 The State of Sustainability in Developing Countries .......... 911

Karpagam Dhandapani and Hrishikesh Venkataraman
45 “Business and Human Rights” and the United Nations
Sustainable Development Goals: Complementary or
Conflicting Agendas . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 939
Jordi Vives Gabriel and Florian Wettstein
46 The Global South and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 955
Innocent Chirisa and Zebediah Muneta
47 Islands and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 969
John Connell
48 Building More Sustainable and Resilient Urban Energy
Infrastructures in Southern Africa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 985
Innocent Chirisa and Gift Mhlanga

Part IX Environmental Justice and Racism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1005

49 Background on Environmental Justice and Racism . . . . . . . . . . . 1007

Alice Kaswan
50 Social Equity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1027
Sean McCandless
Contents xiii

51 Indigenous Sustainable Development: Shaping Our Future . . . . 1041

Deborah McGregor
52 Negotiated Gender Subjectivity of Muslim Women and
Sustainability in Pakistan . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1055
Musarat Yasmin and Muhammad Safdar
53 Environmental Racism and Environmental Justice in
North America . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1073
Etsuko Kinefuchi
54 Environmental Justice in Europe . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1093
Attila Antal
55 Environmental Justice in Asia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1107
Khohchahar E. Chuluu
56 Environmental Justice in Latin America and the Caribbean . . . . 1121
Belén Olmos Giupponi
57 Stakeholder Engagement for Sustainable Communities . . . . . . . . 1143
E. Christian Wells, Gabrielle R. Lehigh, and Abby M. Vidmar

Part X Education and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1157

58 Environmental Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1159

Sally McPhee
59 Children and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1181
Ria Dunkley
60 K-8 Sustainability Education . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1197
Allison Antink-Meyer
61 Sustainability Curriculum in Secondary Education:
Two Case Studies Assess Progress . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1213
Stephanie Fattizzi and Melissa M. Grigione
62 Sustainability Education: A Review Toward Developing
Higher Education for Sustainable Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1225
Randa El Bedawy
63 Sustainability at Universities and Colleges . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1237
Leslie North and Catherine Walters

Part XI International Benchmarking and National

Sustainability Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1253

64 The Sustainable Development Goals . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1255

Marzia Traverso and Rose Nangah Mankaa
xiv Contents

65 International Organization for Standards ISO 26000 . . . . . . . . . 1279

Matjaž Mulej and Anita Hrast
66 Human Development Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1303
Simona Šarotar Žižek, Matjaž Mulej, and Nomi Hrast
67 National Sustainability Planning: Australian National
Strategy for Ecologically Sustainable Development . . . . . . . . . . . 1319
Michael Howes
68 National Sustainability Planning in Malaysia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1331
Florianna Lendai Michael and Shanti Faridah Salleh
69 National Sustainability Planning: China’s Experiences and
Lessons . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1351
Jingyuan Xu and XiaoHu Wang

Part XII Urban and Regional Planning and Sustainability . . . . . . . 1371

70 Background on Urban and Regional Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1373

Constance Carr
71 Urban Approaches to Sustainability: Transportation . . . . . . . . . 1387
Michelle Oswald Beiler
72 Urban Approaches to Sustainability: Transportation and
Walkability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1399
Adriane Hoff
73 Urban Approaches to Sustainability: Food . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1411
Leticia Canal Vieira
74 Urban Approaches to Sustainability: Zoning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1429
Thomas Skuzinski
75 Urban Approaches to Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1439
Jenni Cauvain
76 Resiliency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1451
Mathilde Tomine Eriksdatter Giske and Rómulo Pinheiro
77 Green Building . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1465
Dat Tien Doan, Binashi Kumarasiri, and Ali GhaffarianHoseini
78 Green Infrastructure . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1479
Ian Mell
79 Regional Planning . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1499
Eva Purkarthofer
80 Tiny Homes, Co-housing, and Community Land Trusts . . . . . . . 1511
Elizabeth Strom
Contents xv

81 Proximity-Based Planning and the “15-Minute City”:

A Sustainable Model for the City of the Future . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1523
Zaheer Allam, Carlos Moreno, Didier Chabaud, and Florent Pratlong
82 Individual Carbon and Environmental Footprints . . . . . . . . . . . . 1543
Miriam Aczel
83 Low-Consumption Lifestyles and Well-Being . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1571
Kasey Lloyd
84 Intentional Communities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1585
Paula Escribano

Part XIII Economics and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1597

85 Introduction to Economics and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1599

Éloi Laurent

Part XIV Business and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1609

86 Sustainable Business Management . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1611

Juan Castañeda-Ayarza
87 The Circular Economy and Planned Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . 1629
David Gibbs
88 Supply Chain Management and Procurement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1647
Andrea Caccialanza
89 Green Fashion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1665
Luis Almeida
90 Green Investing and Financial Services: ESG Investing for a
Sustainable World . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1683
Artie Ng
91 Green Information and Communications . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1695
Quang N. Nguyen
92 Just-in-Time Production and Eco-efficiency . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1717
Francisco Moreira
93 Zero-Emission Delivery for Logistics and Transportation . . . . . . 1729
Janfizza Bukhari, Abhishek G. Somanagoudar, Luyang Hou,
Omar Herrera, and Walter Mérida
94 Greenwashing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1751
Riccardo Torelli
95 Business Ethics . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1763
John Nkeobuna Nnah Ugoani
xvi Contents

Volume 3

Part XV Economic Development and Sustainability ........... 1783

96 Background on Economic Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1785

Aaron Deslatte
97 The Meaning of Place and Space in Research & Development
for Sustainability: A Case Study of Special Economic Zones in
Zimbabwe, Post-2000 . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1799
Tafadzwa Mutambisi, Percy Toriro, and Innocent Chirisa
98 Economic Development and Equity . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1815
Jacob Dahl Rendtorff
99 Green Entrepreneurship . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1835
Ada Domańska
100 Global Sustainability in the Presence of Green Technology
Transfer . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1851
Festus Fatai Adedoyin
101 Green Economic Incentives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1863
Razvan Hoinaru
102 Microcredit . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1881
Elisabete Gomes Santana Félix

Part XVI Regulations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1897

103 A Proposal for the Crypto-Funding of Climate Change

Mitigation and Conservation Efforts . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1899
Zaheer Allam, Can Biyik, and Yusra Raisah Takun
104 Introduction to Environmental Regulation . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1913
Jason M. Walter
105 The EPA and Its Regulations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1925
Aaron A. Elrod
106 Environmental Regulation in Asia . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1945
Haeyeon Yoon
107 Environmental Injustice and Disposal of Hazardous Waste
in Africa . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1957
Workineh Kelbessa
108 Protecting Water and Wetlands . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1977
Josephine Gillespie
Contents xvii

Part XVII Culture, Travel, Tourism, and Recreation and

Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1991

109 Culture and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1993

John Clammer
110 Ecotourism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2007
Valeriya Shapoval
111 Green Conventions and Events . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2025
Hung-Che Wu
112 Green Restaurants . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2043
Dayanne da Costa Maynard, Renata Puppin Zandonadi, and
Raquel Braz Assunção Botelho
113 Cruise Ships and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2067
Daniela Buzova
114 Sport Ecology and the Environmental Sport Movement . . . . . . . 2079
Brian P. McCullough and Jessica R. Murfree
115 Green Media . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2091
Rizanna Rosemary

Part XVIII Consumerism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2117

116 Impacts of Consumption and the Role of Business . . . . . . . . . . . . 2119

N. Bocken, L. Niessen, and A. Tukker
117 Critical Reflection on Discourses of Sustainable Development . . . 2137
Talia Stough

Part XIX Tools in Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2153

118 A Right to an Age-Friendly Environment with a Focus on

the Rural Nordic Arctic . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2155
Shahnaj Begum and Kamrul Hossain
119 Community Engagement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2169
Christopher V. Hawkins

Part XX Human History and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2179

120 History of the Environmental Movement . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2181

László Erdös
121 Prehistoric Human Development and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . 2195
Bastiaan van Dalen and Patrick Roberts
xviii Contents

122 The Archaeology of Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2235

Lynne Goldstein
123 Sustainability in the Neolithic and the Bronze Age Through
the Lens of Archaeobotany . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2249
Anna Maria Mercuri, Assunta Florenzano, and Eleonora Clò
124 Sustainability and the Industrial Revolution . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2263
C. M. Vivek, P. Ramkumar, and P. K. Srividhya

Part XXI Great Figures of the Sustainability Field . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2273

125 Carl Sauer’s Contributions to Historical Geography and

Human Ecology . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2275
Emilie J. Raymer
126 Henry David Thoreau and Modern Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . 2283
Jake A. McGinnis
127 Marjory Stoneman Douglas and an Everglades
Environmentalism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2291
Laura Smith
128 Gro Harlem Brundtland . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2305
Anneke Ribberink
129 Michael Mann . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2325
Joanne Muller, Charles Paxton, Jennifer Collins, and Yi-Jie Zhu
130 Al Gore: Unpacking the Inconvenient Truths of Gore’s
Celebrity Activism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2341
P. David Marshall, Glenn D’Cruz, and Sharyn McDonald
131 Speculating Sustainability: Framing Octavia E. Butler’s
Science Fiction Writing Within Sustainability Issues . . . . . . . . . . 2361
Lisa-Marie Pierre
132 Bill McKibben’s Contributions to Organizing, Activism, and
Environmental Thought . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2369
Nicholas A. Poggioli
133 Francia Márquez’s Soul Mining: Recovering Ecology in
Afro-Indigenous Activism . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2379
Ellen W. Gorsevski
134 Vandana Shiva: Biodiversity Campaigner of the
Global South . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2391
Manisha Rao
135 Jan Gehl . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2397
Charles Musselwhite
Contents xix

136 Wangari Maathai . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2407

Etsuko Kinefuchi
137 Paul Watson of the Sea Shepherd Conservation Society from
Activist to Iconoclast . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2417
Gerry Nagtzaam
138 Jane Goodall’s Work for Animals, Nature, and the Human
Environment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2429
László Erdös
139 Dr. Robert D. Bullard . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2441
Michael W. Murphy
140 Edward Abbey’s Misanthropic Vision of Sustainability . . . . . . . . 2447
Alexander Menrisky
141 Ray Anderson . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2459
Jerry A. Carbo
142 Agnes Denes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2475
Clarissa Chevalier
143 Greta Thunberg . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2491
Emily D. Ryalls and Sharon R. Mazzarella

Part XXII International Organizations . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2501

144 Contribution of United Nations in Fostering Global

Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2503
Atul Alexander
145 The Emergence of Greenpeace as a Global Eco-Advocate . . . . . . 2511
Meredian Alam
146 Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2525
James J. A. Blair
147 Good, Fair and Clean Food for All . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2533
Michele F. Fontefrancesco

Part XXIII National, Regional, or Local Organizations . . . . . . . . . . 2543

148 Passive House Institute and US Green Building Council . . . . . . . 2545

Alejandro Moreno-Rangel
149 Philanthropic Organisations and the Global Circulation
of Urban Resilience Practices – The Case of 100 Resilient
Cities . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2557
Alessandro Coppola and Wolfgang Haupt
xx Contents

150 Entrenching Nature-Oriented Sustainability in Africa: Lessons

for Today and the Future from the Green Belt Movement of
Wangari Maathai of Kenya . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2575
Christine Chivandire and Innocent Chirisa
151 The Uniqueness of National Park Attributes as the Tourism
Competitive Advantage: A Perspective from the Indonesia
National Parks . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2587
Bhayu Rhama
152 World Heritage Sites . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2597
Thomas E. Jones
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 2609
About the Editor

Robert Brinkmann is the Dean of the College of

Liberal Arts and Sciences at Northern Illinois Univer-
sity. He is also a Professor of Earth, Atmosphere, and
Environment. He was born in 1961 in rural Wisconsin
and was greatly influenced by his experiences growing
up in a quaint, small-town environment. As a child he
spent many hours in nature hiking, fishing, and canoe-
ing, especially in the wilderness of northern Wisconsin.
In 1979, he entered the Geology program at the Univer-
sity of Wisconsin at Oshkosh. There, he earned a Bach-
elor of Science with a focus on lithology, mineralogy,
and field geology. During this period, he traveled
throughout North America and participated in a geology
field school in the Yukon. His first publication, on the
formation of the Berlin Rhyolite, was published in 1982.
After graduation, Brinkmann attended the University
of Wisconsin-Milwaukee where he earned an MS in
Geology in 1986 and a PhD in Geography in 1989.
During this period, he worked in diamond exploration,
ice crystallography, and soil chemistry. It was while
conducting fieldwork in diamond exploration that
Brinkmann began to be influenced by sustainability
issues. He found the surface of the world so altered,
that it was difficult to obtain undisturbed samples for
detailed analysis. He started to take courses with the late
Forest Stearns, one of the first ecologists to call for
research on urban ecosystems, and the late Robert
Eidt, a soil scientist noted for his definition and inter-
pretation of anthrosols, or humanly modified soils.
Brinkmann began to study a number of topics including
heavy metal geochemistry of garden soils in cities,
pre-Islamic agricultural soils in the Arabian Peninsula,
and soil and sediment erosion in mountainous regions.
Brinkmann also took courses with cave and karst expert,
xxi
xxii About the Editor

Michael J. Day, and noted archaeologist, Lynne

Goldstein.
In 1990, Brinkmann became an Assistant Professor
at the University of South Florida where he continued
his research on urban sustainability, particularly as asso-
ciated with soil and sediment pollution in urban and
suburban areas. He became a Full Professor in 2000
and the first Chair of USF’s Department of Environmen-
tal Science and Policy. He also served as Chair of the
Department of Geography and as Interim Associate
Dean for Faculty Development in the 2000s. He arrived
at Hofstra University in 2011 to start a new Sustainabil-
ity Studies Program and eventually became Vice Pro-
vost for Research and Dean of Graduate Studies.
Over the years, he designed a number of courses,
including classes on sustainability management, wet-
lands, and community-based sustainability. He has
been involved in a number of projects over the last
several years including analysis of sustainability efforts
in post-hurricane Long Island, evaluation of interna-
tional sustainability planning with the United Nations,
and research on sustainability in sports.
He also served two terms as Chair of the Board of the
National Cave and Karst Research Institute and has
served as the Co-Editor of the Southeastern Geographer
and Associate Editor for the Journal of Cave and Karst
Studies. He has served as an elected officer with a
number of national, regional, and local organizations.
Brinkmann is also active with human rights issues and
sat on the Tampa/Hillsborough Human Rights Task
Force that seeks to protect the human rights of all
citizens in the Tampa region.
Brinkmann is the author of many articles and books
including several on sustainability, the only book on the
science, policy, and management of urban street sweep-
ing (with Graham Tobin), and the definitive book on
sinkholes in Florida. His most recent book, Practical
Sustainability: A Guide to a More Sustainable Life, was
published in 2022. He has appeared in a variety of media
outlets including CBS News and CNN. His blog, On the
Brink (www.bobbrinkmann.blogspot), is one of the
most popular sustainability blogs on the Internet.
Contributors

Nawal Ababsa Laboratory of Natural Resources and Management of Sensitive

Environments “RNAMS”, University of Oum-El-Bouaghi, Oum-El-Bouaghi,
Algeria
Department of Ecology and Environment, Faculty of Nature and Life Sciences,
University of Khenchela, Khenchela, Algeria
Miriam Aczel California Institute for Energy & Environment (CIEE), University of
California, Berkeley, CA, USA

Festus Fatai Adedoyin Department of Computing and Informatics, Bournemouth

University, Poole, UK

Mukhtar Ahmed Department of Agronomy, Pir Mehr Ali Shah Arid Agriculture
University, Rawalpindi, Pakistan
Department of Agricultural Research for Northern Sweden, Swedish University of
Agricultural Sciences, Umea, Sweden

Amer Ait Sidhoum Department of Agricultural Production and Resource Econom-

ics, Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany
Sanne Akerboom Faculty of Geosciences, Utrecht University, Utrecht,
The Netherlands
Meredian Alam Sociology and Anthropology Department, Universiti Brunei
Darussalam, Gadong, Brunei

Atul Alexander The West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences, Kol-
kata, West Bengal, India
Zaheer Allam Chaire Entrepreneuriat Territoire Innovation (ETI), Groupe de
Recherche en Gestion des Organisations (GREGOR), IAE Paris – Sorbonne Busi-
ness School, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris, France
Live+Smart Research Lab, School of Architecture and Built Environment, Deakin
University, Geelong, VIC, Australia

xxiii
xxiv Contributors

Luis Almeida School of Engineering, Textile Department, University of Minho,

Guimaraes, Portugal
Lynda Andeobu Central Queensland University, Melbourne, Victoria, Australia
Attila Antal Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest, Hungary
Allison Antink-Meyer Illinois State University, Normal, IL, USA
Rosalind Archer Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia
Michael Osei Asibey Kwame Nkrumah University of Science and Technology,
Kumasi, Ghana
Shahnaj Begum Centre of Excellence in Research on Ageing and Care
(CoEAgeCare), University of Helsinki, Helsinki, Finland
Can Biyik Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and Natural
Sciences, Ankara Yıldırım Beyazıt University, Ankara, Turkey
James J. A. Blair California State Polytechnic University, Pomona, Pomona, CA,
USA
N. Bocken School of Business and Economics, Maastricht Sustainability Institute
(MSI), Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
Sonia Boudjabi Department of Nature and Life Sciences, Faculty of Exact Sci-
ences and Nature and Life Sciences, University of Tebessa, Tebessa, Algeria
Laboratory “Water and Environment,” Faculty of Exact Sciences and Nature and
Life Sciences, University of Tebessa, Tebessa, Algeria
Laboratory of Natural Resources and Management of Sensitive Environments
“RNAMS”, University of Oum-El-Bouaghi, Oum-El-Bouaghi, Algeria
Lars Brabyn Geography Programme, School of Social Sciences, University of
Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand
Ute Brady Arizona State University, Tempe, AZ, USA
Raquel Braz Assunção Botelho University of Brasilia, Brasilia, Brazil
Robert Brinkmann Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY, USA
Emília Marques Brovini Universidade Federal de Ouro Preto, Ouro Preto, Minas
Gerais, Brazil
Janfizza Bukhari MeridaLabs, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver,
BC, Canada
Daniela Buzova University of Valencia, Valencia, Spain
Andrea Caccialanza Department of Business and Social Sciences, Università
Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Piacenza, Italy
Contributors xxv

Danielle Cantrell California Department of Fish and Wildlife, Marine Region,

Monterey, CA, USA
Jerry A. Carbo The Grove College of Business, Shippensburg University,
Shippensburg, PA, USA
Constance Carr University of Luxembourg, Luxembourg, Esch-sur-Alzette,
Luxembourg
Juan Castañeda-Ayarza Pontifícia Universidade Católica de Campinas, São
Paulo, Brazil
David Castells-Quintana Department of Applied Economics, Univ Autonoma de
Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
Jenni Cauvain Department of Social and Political Sciences, Nottingham Trent
University, Nottingham, UK
Didier Chabaud Chaire Entrepreneuriat Territoire Innovation (ETI), Groupe de
Recherche en Gestion des Organisations (GREGOR), IAE Paris – Sorbonne Busi-
ness School, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris, France
Valeria Chávez Instituto de Ingeniería, UNAM, Mexico City, Mexico
Susanta Kumar Chakraborty Department of Zoology, Vidyasagar University,
Midnapore, India
Haroun Chenchouni Laboratory of Natural Resources and Management of Sen-
sitive Environments “RNAMS”, University of Oum-El-Bouaghi, Oum-El-Bouaghi,
Algeria
Department of Forest Management, Higher National School of Forests, Khenchela,
Algeria
Clarissa Chevalier University of California San Diego, San Diego, CA, USA
Art History Department, Savannah College of Art and Design, Savannah, Georgia
Innocent Chirisa Department of Demography Settlement & Development, Faculty
of Social & Behavioral Sciences, University of Zimbabwe, Harare, Zimbabwe
Department of Urban and Regional Planning, University of the Free State, Bloem-
fontein, South Africa
Christine Chivandire Department of Architecture and Real Estate, University of
Zimbabwe, Harare, Zimbabwe
Ritika Choudhary Department of Chemistry, Manav Rachna University, Farida-
bad, Haryana, India
Khohchahar E. Chuluu Institute for Advanced Studies on Asia, The University of
Tokyo, Tokyo, Japan
John Clammer O.P. Jindal Global University, Sonipat, India
xxvi Contributors

Eleonora Clò Laboratory of Palynology and Palaeobotany, Department of Life

Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy
Patrick Brandful Cobbinah The University of Melbourne, Parkville, VIC,
Australia
Jennifer Collins University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA
John Connell School of Geosciences, University of Sydney, Sydney, NSW,
Australia
Alessandro Coppola Politecnico di Milano, Milan, Italy
Glenn D’Cruz Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, Australia
Harrison Kwame Dapaah Akenten Appiah-Menka University of Skills Trianing
and Entrepreneural Development, Ashanti-Mampong, Ghana
Víctor De la Cruz Instituto de Ingeniería, UNAM, Mexico City, Mexico
Aaron Deslatte Indiana University Bloomington, Bloomington, IN, USA
Karpagam Dhandapani Smart Transportation Research Group, Indian Institute of
Information Technology (IIIT), Sri City, Andhra Pradesh, India
Dat Tien Doan Department of Built Environment Engineering, School of Future
Environments, Auckland University of Technology, Auckland, New Zealand
Petra Döll Institute of Physical Geography, Goethe University Frankfurt, Frankfurt
am Main, Germany
Senckenberg Leibniz Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre (SBiK-F), Frankfurt
am Main, Germany
Ada Domańska Maria Curie-Sklodowska Univeristy, Lublin, Poland
Jóżef Dubiński Central Mining Institute, Katowice, Poland
Ria Dunkley School of Education, University of Glasgow, Glasgow, UK
Alban Echchelh Brunel University London, Uxbridge, UK
Volkan Ş. Ediger Center for Energy and Sustainable Development, Kadir Has
University, Istanbul, Turkey
Randa El Bedawy The American University in Cairo, New Cairo, Egypt
Aaron A. Elrod The University of the South, Sewanee, TN, USA
László Erdös MTA-DE Lendület Functional and Restoration Ecology Research
Group, Debrecen, Hungary
Paula Escribano Universidad de Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain
Stephanie Fattizzi Department of Biology, Pace University, Pleasantville, NY,
USA
Contributors xxvii

Elisabete Gomes Santana Félix CEFAGE-UÉ, Management Department, Univer-

sity of Évora, Évora, Portugal
Assunta Florenzano Laboratory of Palynology and Palaeobotany, Department of
Life Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy
Martina Flörke Engineering Hydrology and Water Resources Management, Ruhr-
University Bochum, Bochum, Germany
Michele F. Fontefrancesco University of Gastronomic Sciences, Bra, Italy
Department of Anthropology, Durham University, Durham, UK
David Sewordor Gaikpa Rijk Zwaan Breeding B.V, Fijnaart, The Netherlands
Department of Biological, Physical and Mathematical Sciences, University of Envi-
ronment and Sustainable Development, P.M.B, Somanya, Ghana
Ali GhaffarianHoseini Department of Built Environment Engineering, School of
Future Environments, Auckland University of Technology, Auckland, New Zealand
David Gibbs Department of Geography, Geology and Environment, University of
Hull, Hull, UK
Josephine Gillespie School of Geosciences, The University of Sydney, Sydney,
NSW, Australia
Mathilde Tomine Eriksdatter Giske Norwegian Institute of International Affairs,
Oslo, Norway
Lynne Goldstein Department of Anthropology, Michigan State University, East
Lansing, MI, USA
Ellen W. Gorsevski School of Media & Communication, Bowling Green State
University, Bowling Green, OH, USA
Melissa M. Grigione Department of Biology, Pace University, Pleasantville, NY,
USA
Wolfgang Haupt Leibniz-Institute for Research on Society and Space, Erkner,
Germany
Christopher V. Hawkins School of Public Administration, University of Central
Florida, Orlando, FL, USA
Omar Herrera MeridaLabs, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC,
Canada
Adriane Hoff Streets For All, Los Angeles and President of the Wilshire Center
Koreatown Neighborhood Council, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Wilshire Center Koreatown Neighborhood Council, Los Angeles, CA, USA
Chair of the Sustainability & Beautification Committee and Transportation & Public
Safety Committee, Los Angeles, CA, USA
xxviii Contributors

Razvan Hoinaru Queen Mary University of London, London, UK

Kamrul Hossain Northern Institute for Environmental and Minority Law, Arctic
Centre, University of Lapland, Rovaniemi, Finland
Luyang Hou MeridaLabs, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC,
Canada
Michael Howes School of Environment and Science, Cities Research Institute,
Griffith University, Gold Coast, QLD, Australia
Anita Hrast IRDO – Institute for the Development of Social Responsibility,
Ljubljana, Slovenia
Nomi Hrast Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Maribor, Maribor,
Slovenia
Solange Kimie Ikeda-Castrillon Graduate Program in Environmental Sciences,
Mato Grosso State University, Cáceres City, MT, Brazil
Thomas E. Jones Ritsumeikan Asia Pacific University, Beppu, Oita, Japan
Meena Kapahi Department of Chemistry, Manav Rachna University, Faridabad,
Haryana, India
Alice Kaswan University of San Francisco School of Law, San Francisco, CA,
USA
Workineh Kelbessa Addis Ababa University, Addis Ababa, Ethiopia
Céline Kermisch Ecole polytechnique de Bruxelles, Universite Libre de Bruxelles,
Brussels, Belgium
Etsuko Kinefuchi The University of North Carolina at Greensboro, Greensboro,
NC, USA
Eric Koomson Hans Ruthenberg Institute for Tropical Agriculture, Section Agron-
omy in the Tropics/ Subtropics (490e), University of Hohenheim, Stuttgart,
Germany
Aleksandra Koteras Central Mining Institute, Katowice, Poland
Melanie Krause Department of Economics, Leipzig University, Leipzig, Germany
Binashi Kumarasiri Department of Building Economics, University of Moratuwa,
Moratuwa, Sri Lanka
Éloi Laurent OFCE/Sciences Po, PSIA/Sciences Po, Ponts Paris Tech, Stanford
University, Stanford, CA, USA
Gabrielle R. Lehigh University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA
Yi Liu School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Southern University of
Science and Technology, Shenzhen, China
Contributors xxix

Kasey Lloyd Tweed Coast, Australia

P. David Marshall Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, Australia
M. Luisa Martínez Instituto de Ecología, A.C, Xalapa, Mexico
Dayanne da Costa Maynard University of Brasilia, Brasilia, Brazil
Sharon R. Mazzarella James Madison University, Harrisonburg, VA, USA
Sean McCandless School of Public Management and Policy, University of Illinois
Springfield, Springfield, IL, USA
Brian P. McCullough Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA
Thomas K. J. McDermott Discipline of Economics, University of Galway, Gal-
way, Ireland
Sharyn McDonald Charles Sturt University, Bathurst, Australia
Jake A. McGinnis University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN, USA
Deborah McGregor Osgoode Hall Law School and Faculty of Environmental and
Urban Change, York University, Toronto, ON, Canada
Eamonn McGuinty School for Resource and Environmental Studies, Dalhousie
University, Halifax, NS, Canada
Sally McPhee Science on the GO!, Griffith University, Gold Coast, Queensland,
Australia
Christia Meidiana Department of Regional and Urban Planning, Faculty of Engi-
neering, Brawijaya University, Malang, Indonesia
Ian Mell Department of Planning & Environmental Management, School of Envi-
ronment, Education & Development, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK
Alexander Menrisky University of Connecticut, Storrs, CT, USA
Anna Maria Mercuri Laboratory of Palynology and Palaeobotany, Department of
Life Sciences, University of Modena and Reggio Emilia, Modena, Italy
Walter Mérida MeridaLabs, The University of British Columbia, Vancouver, BC,
Canada
Gift Mhlanga Department of Economics and Development, University of Zimba-
bwe, Harare, Zimbabwe
Florianna Lendai Michael Institute of Sustainable and Renewable Energy,
Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, Kota Samarahan, Malaysia
Faculty of Cognitive Sciences and Human Development, Universiti Malaysia Sara-
wak, Kota Samarahan, Sarawak, Malaysia
xxx Contributors

Anish Modi Department of Energy Science and Engineering, Indian Institute of

Technology Bombay, Mumbai, Maharashtra, India
Nitish Venkateswarlu Mogili Department of Biotechnology, National Institute of
Technology Andhra Pradesh, Tadepalligudem, India
Maria Manuela Morais Institute of Earth Sciences – ICT; Water Laboratory,
University of Évora, Évora, Portugal
Francisco Moreira ALGORITMI/University of Minho, Braga, Portugal
Carlos Moreno Chaire Entrepreneuriat Territoire Innovation (ETI), Groupe de
Recherche en Gestion des Organisations (GREGOR), IAE Paris – Sorbonne Busi-
ness School, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris, France
Alejandro Moreno-Rangel ImaginationLancaster, Lancaster Institute of Contem-
porary Arts, Faculty of Arts and Social Science, Lancaster University, Bailrigg, UK
Isaac Kwadwo Mpanga Cooperative Extension, University of Arizona, Camp
Verde, AZ, USA
Matjaž Mulej Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Maribor, Mari-
bor, Slovenia
IRDO – Institute for the Development of Social Responsibility, Ljubljana, Slovenia
IASCYS International Academy for Systems and Cybernetic Sciences, Pau, France
Joanne Muller Florida Gulf Coast University, Fort Myers, FL, USA
Hannes Müller Schmied Institute of Physical Geography, Goethe University
Frankfurt, Frankfurt am Main, Germany
Senckenberg Leibniz Biodiversity and Climate Research Centre (SBiK-F), Frankfurt
am Main, Germany
Zebediah Muneta Department of Architecture and Real Estate, University of
Zimbabwe, Harare, Zimbabwe
Jessica R. Murfree Texas A&M University, College Station, TX, USA
Michael W. Murphy Occidental College, Department of Black Studies, Los
Angeles, CA, USA
Charles Musselwhite Psychology Department, Aberystwyth University, Wales,
UK
Tafadzwa Mutambisi Department of Demography Settlement and Development,
University of Zimbabwe, Harare, Zimbabwe
Gerry Nagtzaam Faculty of Law, Monash University, Melbourne, VIC, Australia
Contributors xxxi

W. D. K. V. Nandasena Geography Programme, School of Social Sciences, Uni-

versity of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand
Department of Geography and Environmental Management, Faculty of Social
Sciences and Languages, Sabaragamuwa University of Sri Lanka, Belihuloya, Sri
Lanka
Rose Nangah Mankaa Institute of Sustainability in Civil Engineering, RWTH
Aachen University, Aachen, Germany
Artie Ng Global Centre for ESG Education and Research, The Hong Kong Man-
agement Association, Central, Hong Kong
Quang N. Nguyen Faculty of Science and Engineering, Waseda University, Tokyo,
Japan
HCL Vietnam, HCL Technologies, Hanoi, Vietnam
L. Niessen School of Business and Economics, Maastricht Sustainability Institute
(MSI), Maastricht University, Maastricht, The Netherlands
Leslie North Department of Earth, Environmental & Atmospheric Sciences, West-
ern Kentucky University, Bowling Green, KY, USA
Ernandes Sobreira Oliveira-Junior Graduate Program in Environmental Sci-
ences, Mato Grosso State University, Cáceres City, MT, Brazil
Belén Olmos Giupponi University of Portsmouth, Portsmouth, Hampshire, UK
Michelle Oswald Beiler Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering,
Bucknell University, Lewisburg, PA, USA
Charles Paxton Channelside Weather LLC, Cocoa Beach, FL, USA
Octavio Pérez-Maqueo Instituto de Ecología, A.C, Xalapa, Mexico
Lisa-Marie Pierre Division of Workforce Development & Continuing Education,
Bronx Community College/CUNY, The Bronx, NY, USA
Rómulo Pinheiro Department of Political Science & Management, University of
Agder, Kristiansand, Norway
Nicholas A. Poggioli Walker College of Business, Appalachian State University,
Boone, NC, USA
Florent Pratlong Chaire Entrepreneuriat Territoire Innovation (ETI), Groupe de
Recherche en Gestion des Organisations (GREGOR), IAE Paris – Sorbonne Busi-
ness School, Université Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne, Paris, France
Eva Purkarthofer Aalto University, Espoo, Finland
Gabrielle Rabelo Quadra Universidade Federal de Juiz de Fora, Juiz de Fora,
Minas Gerais, Brazil
xxxii Contributors

P. Ramkumar Kalasalingam Academy of Research and Education, Virudhunagar,

Tamil Nadu, India
Helena M. Ramos Civil Engineering, Architecture and Georesources
Departament, CERIS, Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, Lisbon,
Portugal
Roopa Rani Department of Chemistry, Manav Rachna University, Faridabad,
Haryana, India
Manisha Rao Department of Sociology, University of Mumbai, Mumbai, India
Sudhakar Madhav Rao Department of Civil Engineering, Indian Institute of
Science, Bengaluru, India
Emilie J. Raymer Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
Jacob Dahl Rendtorff Department of Social Sciences and Business, Roskilde
University, Roskilde, Denmark
Bhayu Rhama University of Palangka Raya, Palangka Raya, Indonesia
Anneke Ribberink Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, Amsterdam, The Netherlands
Patrick Roberts Max Planck Institute for the Science of Human History, Jena,
Germany
Rizanna Rosemary Universitas Syiah Kuala, Banda Aceh, Aceh, Indonesia
Onelia Carmem Rossetto Graduate Program in Geography, Federal University of
Mato Grosso-UFMT, Cuiabá, MT, Brazil
Hiran Roy International School of Hospitality, Sports, and Tourism Management,
Fairleigh Dickinson University, Vancouver, BC, Canada
Emily D. Ryalls California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo, CA,
USA
Muhammad Safdar Sialkot Campus, University of Management and Technology,
Sialkot, Pakistan
Carlos Hiroo Saito Department of Ecology, Institute of Biological Sciences, Uni-
versity of Brasilia, Brasilia, DF, Brazil
Global Water Partnership-South America, Montevideo, Uruguay
Shanti Faridah Salleh Institute of Sustainable and Renewable Energy, Universiti
Malaysia Sarawak, Kota Samarahan, Malaysia
Faculty of Engineering, Universiti Malaysia Sarawak, Kota Samarahan, Sarawak,
Malaysia
Diane L. Saraiva Pace University, Pleasantville, NY, USA

Sudhakar Madhav Rao has retired.

Contributors xxxiii

Linda Schweitzer Southern University Agriculture and Extension Center, Baton

Rouge, LA, USA
Silvia Serrao-Neumann Environmental Planning Programme, School of Social
Sciences, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand
Cities Research Institute, Griffith University, Brisbane, Australia
Valeriya Shapoval Rosen College University of Central Florida, Orlando, FL,
USA
Rodolfo Silva Instituto de Ingeniería, UNAM, Mexico City, Mexico
Aarti Singh FORE School of Management, New Delhi, India
Thomas Skuzinski Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL, USA
Laura Smith University of Exeter, Exeter, UK
Abhishek G. Somanagoudar MeridaLabs, The University of British Columbia,
Vancouver, BC, Canada
P. K. Srividhya Periyar Maniammai Institute of Science and Technology,
Thanjavur, Tamil Nadu, India
Talia Stough Faculty of Management, Open University, Heerlen, The Netherlands
Faculty of Economics and Business, KU Leuven, Brussels, Belgium
Elizabeth Strom University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA
Aris Subagiyo Department of Regional and Urban Planning, Faculty of Engineer-
ing, Brawijaya University, Malang, Indonesia
Wilma Subra Subra Company and Louisiana Environmental Action Network,
New Iberia/Baton Rouge, LA, USA
Yusra Raisah Takun GMF Consulting Engineers Group, Quatre Bornes,
Mauritius
Nikita Thakkur Department of Chemistry, Manav Rachna University, Faridabad,
Haryana, India
Grazia Todeschini King’s College London, London, UK
Sekito Tomoo Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering, University of
Miyazaki, Miyazaki, Japan
Riccardo Torelli Department of Economic and Social Sciences, Univeristà
Cattolica del Sacro Cuore, Piacenza, Italy
Percy Toriro Municipal Development Partnership for Eastern and Southern Africa,
Harare, Zimbabwe
Marzia Traverso Institute of Sustainability in Civil Engineering, RWTH Aachen
University, Aachen, Germany
xxxiv Contributors

A. Tukker Institute of Environmental Sciences (CML), Leiden University, Leiden,

The Netherlands
Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO), The Hague, The
Netherlands
John Nkeobuna Nnah Ugoani Department of Management Sciences, College of
Management and Social Sciences, Rhema University, Aba, Nigeria
Bastiaan van Dalen Archaeology, University of Exeter, Exeter, UK
Hrishikesh Venkataraman Smart Transportation Research Group, Indian Institute
of Information Technology (IIIT), Sri City, Andhra Pradesh, India
Aviel Verbruggen University of Antwerp, Antwerp, Belgium
Abby M. Vidmar University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA
Leticia Canal Vieira University of Bologna, Bologna, Italy
C. M. Vivek Periyar Maniammai Institute of Science and Technology, Thanjavur,
Tamil Nadu, India
Jordi Vives Gabriel Institute for Business Ethics, University of St Gallen, St.
Gallen, Switzerland
Maria Vrachioli Department of Agricultural Production and Resource Economics,
Technische Universität München, Munich, Germany
Tony R. Walker School for Resource and Environmental Studies, Dalhousie
University, Halifax, NS, Canada
Jason M. Walter NEP/cUniversity of Tulsa, Tulsa, OK, USA
Catherine Walters Department of Earth, Environmental & Atmospheric Sciences,
Western Kentucky University, Bowling Green, KY, USA
XiaoHu Wang Department of Public Policy, City University of Hong Kong, Hong
Kong, P. R. China
Karl M. Wantzen UNESCO Chair River Culture – Fleuves et Patrimoine, CNRS
UMR 7324 CITERES, University of Tours, Tours, France
CNRS UMR 7362 LIVE, University of Strasbourg, Strasbourg, France
Ben Wealer Technical University Berlin, Berlin, Germany
E. Christian Wells University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA
Florian Wettstein Institute for Business Ethics, University of St Gallen, St. Gallen,
Switzerland
Astrid Wojtarowski Colegio de Veracruz, Xalapa, Mexico
Hung-Che Wu Kaohsiung City, Taiwan
Contributors xxxv

Jingyuan Xu Institute for Global Public Policy, Fudan University, Shanghai, P. R.

China,
Cevat Yaman I. Abdulrahman Bin Faisal University, Dammam, Saudi Arabia
Musarat Yasmin University of Gujrat, Hafiz Hayat Campus, Gujrat, Pakistan
Haeyeon Yoon School of Economics, University of Bristol, Bristol, UK
Renata Puppin Zandonadi University of Brasilia, Brasilia, Brazil
Zhenzhong Zeng School of Environmental Science and Engineering, Southern
University of Science and Technology, Shenzhen, China
Yi-Jie Zhu University of South Florida, Tampa, FL, USA
Simona Šarotar Žižek Faculty of Economics and Business, University of Maribor,
Maribor, Slovenia
 Part I
Introduction
Defining Sustainability
1
Robert Brinkmann

Contents
1 Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 4
2 The Brundtland Report . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 5
3 The Three E’s . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 6
4 Greenwashing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 7
5 Measuring Sustainability and Sustainability Assessment . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 8
6 United Nations Sustainability Assessment: The Sustainable Development Goals . . . . . . . . 9
7 Sustainability and Sustainable Development . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 10
8 Sustainability and Environmental Justice . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 11
9 Sustainability in Business . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 12
10 The Two Paths of Sustainability and the Middle Ground . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 13
11 Sustainability and the Anthropocene . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 15
12 Activism and Sustainability . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 16
13 Summary . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 18

Abstract
Sustainability has emerged as one of the most powerful social movements in the
last 40 years. However, for many, it is difficult to clearly articulate the meaning of
sustainability because of its diverse applications. Many definitions of sustainabil-
ity have been printed since it became a major theme of social and scientific
inquiry after the publication of the United Nations’ Brundtland Report in 1987.
The unifying focus of the field is to try to take action now to ensure that future
generations are able to thrive and have access to resources. A further clarifying
aspect of sustainability is that it encompasses the three E’s of environment, equity,
and economics. By encompassing issues of social equity and economics the field
is far broader than the environmental movement that preceded it. In application,
however, sustainability remains rather disjointed. Sustainability in developed

R. Brinkmann (*)
Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY, USA
e-mail: rbrinkmann@niu.edu

© The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer Nature Switzerland AG 2023 3

R. Brinkmann (ed.), The Palgrave Handbook of Global Sustainability,
https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-01949-4_1
4 R. Brinkmann

countries tends to focus on actions that make small changes in existing behavior
patterns rather than foundational societal change. For example, moving to electric
cars or implementations of plastic bag bans do not put a check on high consump-
tion rates which underlie the unsustainable patters seen in the west. In contrast,
sustainable development in developing countries seeks to make improvements in
settings where there are distinct limits to human development such as access to
basic water services. Even though there are different applications of the term
sustainability, the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals are helping to
unify a worldwide approach to advancing national and global sustainability. The
goal of this chapter is to highlight some of the key themes of sustainability that
have surfaced in the last several decades in a variety of applications.

Keywords
Sustainability · Natural resources · Brundtland Report · Globalization ·
Environment · Environmental justice · Greenwashing · Sustainability
assessment · Sustainable Development Goals · Activism

1 Introduction

Sustainability is a term that focuses on sustaining of Earth’s planetary resources for

future generations. The broad concept of sustainability is not new. As a species, we
have always been concerned about resources throughout human history. The mag-
nitude of our impacts on the environment may have changed, but we always
modified the environments we occupied as we strove to get food, water, and shelter.
We have also sought to collect consumer goods such as exotic beads and shells,
Italian paintings, and smart phones. Archaeologists have shown us that while there
are great differences in human cultures across space and time, there are also these
basic similarities: the need for basic survival and the desire for consumer goods. Of
course, what we define as necessary for survival has changed. Housing, food, and
water needs in London or Mexico City are very different from those in rural
Romania, China, or Mali – especially over time. The same is true of consumer
goods like clothing, jewelry, transportation, and other objects that we desire. For
people, in say, ancient Egypt, the failure of the annual flood was a real sustainability
issue that could impact whether or not a family had enough food for the year.
However, what makes sustainability especially poignant and important at this
moment is that there are serious questions as to whether we can maintain our existing
global culture into the future at our current rate of resource use. While sustainability
still matters locally, the global scale of our sustainability challenges makes our
current era distinctly different. In the past, specific cultures were concerned about
their own specific sustainability conditions. Now, we are much more focused on our
global culture and how we are altering our planet. We know that unless we change
our ways, we will have significant problems that will inhibit the long-term sustain-
ability of our planet.
1 Defining Sustainability 5

2 The Brundtland Report

The first widespread discussion of global sustainability emerged in the 1980s with a
United Nations Report called Our Common Future (Brundtland 1987). At that time,
there was significant concern over the industrial release of chlorofluorocarbons
(CFCs) into the atmosphere and what it was doing to the ozone layer (Gardiner
and Shanklin 1986). Scientists had confirmed years before that CFCs destroyed the
ozone molecule (O3) and that the presence of CFC’s in the atmosphere would harm
the ozonosphere. Researchers outlined the reason for concern: the ozonosphere
shields the planet from harmful ultraviolet rays from our sun that can cause signif-
icant health risks to humans and other organisms. Due to our unique planetary
atmospheric conditions, the greatest risk to the ozonosphere was at the poles. By
the 1980s there was growing evidence of emerging health concerns due to the
thinning of the ozonosphere (Kripke 1988).
The only way that the thinning of the ozone layer could be fixed was for
industrialized nations of the world to reduce and eliminate the use of CFCs. The
chemicals were widely used (and in some cases are still being used) in a variety of
ways, particularly as refrigerants and aerosol propellants in spray products like hair
spray. Due to the widespread use of CFC’s it was a daunting task to try to tackle this
vexing global problem.
At the same time that the world was focused on CFCs, it also recognized that the
acceleration of globalization created a variety of emerging global sustainability
problems. Globalization is the integration of separate national processes into a
more international system. What this means is that globalization allows a variety
of cultural ideas, from business to entertainment, to take on more of a global scale. A
national cultural phenomenon, like K-pop, can become a global sensation very
quickly to impact the entire world. While many globalization trends can be good,
such as the international effort to wipe out malaria (Ecki 2014), some can be
problematic. For example, globalization has resulted in expansion of consumption
and destruction of environments in a quest for consumer goods (Faber and McCarthy
2003). Plus, multinational companies on the lookout for cheap labor have exploited
local labor forces and transformed local communities (Otero 2011). Certainly free
trade and the flow of money have benefited many people around the world and raised
the standard of living in many poor countries (Mustapha and Adetoye 2020).
However, globalization is a double-edge sword. The recent global coronavirus
epidemic highlights one of the more challenging aspects of living in a globalized
world (Lukasz 2020).
It was in the 1980s, however, that the problematic aspects of globalization were
clearly outlined for the world by the United Nations in the Brundtland Report. The
issues were framed within the idea of interdependence of places around the world.
The document clearly asserted that what happens in one place can impact the whole
planet. For example, as consumer goods for paper or wood products increases
globally, local forest ecosystems can be destroyed. Indeed, the report highlighted
that global destruction of ecosystems was increasing rapidly. There was abundant
6 R. Brinkmann

evidence that globalization was creating new problems that humans have not faced
before.
It is important to note that prior to the Brundtland Report, the environmental
movement focused largely on protecting air, water, soil, and ecosystems (Gottlieb
2005). Having emerged, at least in the United States, from the writings of Thoreau
and Muir (Thoreau 1906; Muir 2019), the focus was largely on preserving an
unaltered space to preserve nature as it was without human impacts. In the 1960s,
particularly after the publication of Rachel Carson’s ground breaking book, Silent
Spring (Carson 1962), as the real toll of the industrial revolution was being felt
around the world, environmentalists took action to promote the development of laws
to protect the environment that resulted in a range of new national environmental
laws. These laws, such as the Clean Water Act in the United States, created
regulations that protected particular aspects of the environment from the harms
inflicted on it by local activities (Welborn 1988). The Brundtland Report took this
one step further by noting that the environment is not separate from the social and
economic sectors of society and that in order to solve serious global environmental
problems we need to think deeper by linking social, economic, and environmental
systems in our solutions.

3 The Three E’s

Out of this idea emerged one of the key themes of sustainability: the three E’s which
stand for environment, economy, and equity (Paden 2000). The environmental
theme of the three E’s is really what the traditional environmental movement focused
on for years. This theme includes air, water, soil, ecosystems, and all of the ways that
we impact them (Goodland 1995). The economic E of the three E’s is focused on
enhancing economic conditions and striving for economic fairness (Foy 1990). This
E has taken on many forms and will be discussed in more detail later in this
handbook. However, there are two main themes in the economic E. There is one
theme that encompasses economic development under difficult conditions in devel-
oping countries and another theme that seeks to advance green economic develop-
ment in developed countries (James et al. 1989). For example, the economic aspect
of sustainability can just as easily focus on micro credit initiatives in rural Africa
(Mondal 2009) as it can on sustainability planning for large international companies
like Unilever (Lawrence et al. 2019). Certainly the initiatives and scopes are different
but the point is that there are a range of economic initiatives that enhance our global
sustainability. The three E’s have been repackaged within the business world as the
three P’s, or people, planet, and profits (van Marrewijk and Were 2003). In this form,
businesses strive to earn a profit while limiting the impact that they have on the
environment and while seeking to improve the conditions of customers and workers
and the communities in which they reside.
Finally, the equity E of the three E’s concentrates on removing great social
disparities that we face around the world. The equity component is very much
concerned with environmental justice which strives to share the benefits and burdens
1 Defining Sustainability 7

of environmental decision-making (Schlosberg 2007). In addition, the equity E also

focuses on ensuring that laws to protect people and the environment are applied
equitably (Kaswan 2013). The equity part of sustainability emerged in part from
community activism that highlighted environmental disparities as well as from
researchers like Robert Bullard, author of Dumping in Dixie (Bullard 2000), who
detailed environmental racism via research studies that showed the impacts of
environmental decision making on particular groups of people. In our era of wide-
spread globalization, there is increasing economic disparity (Collins et al. 2020). At
the same time, we are also seeing improvements in the standard of living in many
parts of the world. Under these conditions, it is easy for societies to become
complacent when inequalities emerge. For example, the 2019 fires in Brazil helped
to reveal great disparities between wealthy landowners who were trying to develop
the Amazon rainforests and indigenous populations who were trying to preserve the
forests (Klinger and Mack 2020). We have also seen a great increase in human
trafficking of individuals from poorer nations to developed nations (Bloom 2020).
The world is not a fair place, but the equity E of the three E’s focuses on trying to try
to make it fairer.

4 Greenwashing

One of the challenges associated with sustainability is that everyone likes being
green. However, truly changing personal or organizational activities to accomplish
sustainability goals takes work. Many individuals and organizations unfortunately
do not want to put in the hard work to make green decisions. Greenwashing is the
deliberate or unintentional use of environmental language or imagery to infer a
commitment to the environment or sustainability (Testa et al. 2018). The problem
with greenwashing is that it leads to a broad distrust of individuals or institutions. For
example, an egg company that produces eggs under factory farm conditions could
place their eggs in cartons with traditional images of a small farm. Those interested
in finding eggs produced under non-factory farm conditions end up with a greater
distrust of food systems overall due to the lack of clear representation.
Many companies utilize greenwashing as a marketing tool. For example, many of
us have seen large fossil fuel or car companies use environmental imagery in their
advertisements. The images make people feel okay about using the products even
though we all know they are bad for the environment. Governments and politicians
can use greenwashing as well by highlighting relatively small environmental gains
while implementing policies that do significant environmental damage. Even indi-
viduals can greenwash their lives. For example, the use of a hybrid or electric car
does not fully compensate for the environmental costs of highly consumptive
lifestyles.
Because of the pervasiveness of greenwashing, the sustainability field has
embraced the use of assessment and measurement in order to ensure that sustain-
ability goals are truly being met.
8 R. Brinkmann

5 Measuring Sustainability and Sustainability Assessment

One of the most important developments associated with the growth of the sustain-
ability movement after the 1980s was the expansion of sustainability measurement,
assessment, and benchmarking. Being “green” was very popular and many individ-
uals and organizations embraced a green image in order to join in the with the green
cultural movement of the moment. Companies marketed products as “natural” and
organizations used images of nature to try to align themselves with the vibe of the
times. These attempts to align with the green movement were met with much
derision, particularly when used by companies or organizations that were notori-
ously anti-environmental or whose products were damaging to the environment. As
a result, there was a big push for authentication of real impacts via measurement of
change (Laufer 2003).
The efforts toward authenticity that emerged in the 1990s and that continue to our
present time were greatly aided by the growth of the Internet and our ability to easily
work with large sets of data (Hilty et al. 2005). We could, for instance, easily
measure our own annual environmental footprint by assessing our energy and
water use and the impacts from our food consumption, housing choices, and
transportation uses over a year (Lin 2016). Indeed, it became relatively easy during
this period to conduct assessments like this of businesses, buildings, schools,
government operations, and a variety of other activities (Pope et al. 2004). Once a
baseline of a particular environmental condition is assessed, one can then set goals or
targets to reach within a particular time period (Singh et al. 2009). For example, a
baseball team could seek to cut its energy consumption within a stadium by 10%
within a 5-year time period. Or, a car manufacturer could set a goal of reducing the
energy costs of shipping by 5% within a period of time.
The setting of benchmarks allows individuals and organizations to establish goals
for the future. Once the goals are set, plans can be developed to meet the goals.
Sustainability assessment can then be done at regular intervals (often within an
annual timeframe) to report back to stakeholders about the progress toward achiev-
ing goals (Kaatz et al. 2005). The goals can be regularly reassessed to ascertain if
new strategies need to be developed to meet goals or if new goals need to be created.
Thus, the development of a base condition allows an organization to compare
progress toward achieving goals.
One of the great aids in assessing and measuring sustainability is the vast amount
of public data that are available online (Feiock et al. 2014). Governments, compa-
nies, schools, and a variety of nonprofits all share tremendous amounts of data that
can be used to measure sustainability. Many organizations now regularly report
sustainability statistics via annual reports and large databases of data are maintained
by international groups like the United Nations, by national governments, by
nonprofit groups, and by state and local governments (see, e.g., the Florida Green
Building Coalition’s Green City Program (2020). Over the last few decades, many
data sources, like the US Census (2020), have become standardized so that there is
trust that they can be used for analysis. Certainly, not all sustainability data is easily
available and some data must be mined or created. For example, when assessing
1 Defining Sustainability 9

energy usage of schools within a particular state, a researcher would need to collect
data for individual schools as this type of data is not typically available to the public.

6 United Nations Sustainability Assessment: The Sustainable

Development Goals

One of the most important sustainability assessment tools that emerged in recent
years is the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) (United
Nations 2020). These goals evolved from the Millennium Development Goals
(MDGs) that sought to enhance the development of underdeveloped nations at the
close of the last millennium (World Health Organization 2020). The MDGs focused
heavily on education, health, and poverty in order to reduce misery in lesser
developed countries. The MDGs, while not fully realized, are widely thought to be
a successful endeavor that improved the lives of millions (Lomazzi et al. 2014).
However, while the world was focused on them, it was becoming ever more evident
that the worldwide growth of consumption and the economic divide between rich
and poor individuals and nations was creating conditions of unsustainability
(Alvaredo and Gasparini 2015). At the same time, evidence for global climate
change was growing (Fankhauser and Schmidt-Traub 2011). More and more scien-
tific evidence, particularly through a number of reports produced by the International
Panel on Climate Change (, IPCC 2014, 2018), demonstrated that our climate was
changing and that the world’s ecological and economic systems were going to
fundamentally change in the coming decades unless we acted rapidly to reduce
greenhouse gases and find new ways to sequester carbon. The world needed to bring
forward a strong vision of how to change its ways in order to improve sustainability
for everyone on the planet.
The MDGs sought to find ways to benchmark sustainability initiatives in all
corners of the planet. While the MDGs were focused heavily on the lesser developed
countries, the SDGs sought to enhance global sustainability in all nations of
the world. Indeed, many of the causes of global unsustainability were driven by
the developed countries and they needed to be part of any solution. While many of
the goals of the MDGs, such a reduction in poverty and enhanced education, are part
of the SDGs, the SDGs are much more inclusive and include things like efforts to
reduce climate change, improvements to marine and terrestrial ecosystems, and
sustainable food production.
In 2015, 17 SDGs were established by the United Nations with a goal of reaching
them by 2030. Each goal has several targets and each of these targets has measurable
indicators that can be assessed over distinct periods of time (Table 1). For example,
Goal 14, which is focused on life under water, seeks to “. . .conserve and sustain-
ability use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable development.” This
goal has seven targets. Target 3, for example, is focused on how to “. . .minimize and
address the impacts of ocean acidification, including through enhanced scientific
cooperation at all levels.” The indicator for this target is the “. . .average marine
acidity (pH) measured at agreed suite of representative sampling stations. . .” With
10 R. Brinkmann

Table 1 The Sustainable Development Goals

Goal Focus
Goal 1 End poverty in all its forms everywhere
Goal 2 End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition and promote sustainable
agriculture
Goal 3 Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages
Goal 4 Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote lifelong learning
opportunities for all
Goal 5 Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls
Goal 6 Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and sanitation for all
Goal 7 Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable and modern energy for all
Goal 8 Promote sustained, inclusive and sustainable economic growth, full and productive
employment and decent work for all
Goal 9 Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable industrialization and
foster innovation
Goal Reduce inequality within and among countries
10
Goal Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient and sustainable.
11
Goal Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns
12
Goal Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts
13
Goal Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources for sustainable
14 development
Goal Protect, restore and promote sustainable use of terrestrial ecosystems, sustainably
15 manage forests, combat desertification, and halt and reverse land degradation and halt
biodiversity loss
Goal Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable development, provide access
16 to justice for all and build effective, accountable and inclusive institutions at all levels
Goal Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the global partnership for
17 sustainable development

all 17 goals having multiple targets and each target having specific indicators, the
amount of data collection involved with assessing the SDGs is extremely daunting.
However, each year, many countries report back to the United Nations at annual
meetings to share their progress toward achieving their goals.

7 Sustainability and Sustainable Development

One of the main areas of focus of sustainability is sustainable development. Sus-

tainable development was defined by the Brundtland Report in 1980s as
“. . .development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the
ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” However, since that definition
was published, the term is used more specifically to mean enhancing the lifeways of
1 Defining Sustainability 11

individuals in developing countries. Sustainable development often focuses on

agricultural, energy, water, and health related projects in the developing world.
Thus, electrifying a region of South America would fall under the realm of sustain-
able development as would a program to eradicate tropical diseases in Africa.
One of the challenges of sustainable development, of course, is how to develop
without creating unsustainable conditions (Kopnina 2016). Some development
initiatives have been widely criticized for not truly creating sustainable conditions.
For example, a project to change from subsistence agricultural activities in a region
to commercial crops can leave local populations dependent on outside institutions
and dependent on a globalized market. Likewise, the development or water resources
in a region can solve short-term water shortages but create long-term problems for
water management. Nevertheless, sustainable development has clearly improved the
situation for many people around the world. At the same time, sustainable develop-
ment can have unintended consequences that can lead to unsustainable conditions.
It must be noted that sustainable development can sometimes be seen as a western
intrusion akin to colonialism. Some regions of the world have had bad experiences
with western nonprofit organizations or governments seeking to solve local sustain-
ability problems. The best sustainability initiatives utilize local knowledge and talent
to solve local problems (Magni 2017).

8 Sustainability and Environmental Justice

The modern sustainability movement embraces environmental justice and equity.

Environmental justice issues have long been problems throughout time and space
but it has only been in the last few decades that environmental justice has emerged as
a significant theme of academic inquiry and social concern. The ideas around
environmental justice began to emerge with the work of Robert Bullard, author of
Dumping in Dixie, a book which highlighted inequities in the citing of hazardous
waste sites in the American South (Bullard 2000); and the activism of Hazel
Johnson, a community organizer in Chicago who sought greater awareness of the
public health challenges associated with community infrastructure and housing
(Pellow 2004). In addition, the work of Cesar Chavez in advocating for safe
environmental conditions for migrant farm workers also brought the environmental
justice topic forward within the realm of workers’ rights (McGregor et al. 2000).
Globally, the inequities in the environmental burdens and benefits also came into
focus as globalization advanced in the late twentieth century and early twenty-first
century. Major environmental disasters like the gas leak in Bhopal, India, that killed
thousands and injured hundreds of thousands people in 1984 (Broughton 2005) and
the massive oil spills in Ecuador between the 1960s and 1990s (Rochlin 2011)
highlighted how external organizations can impact local communities within a
globalized economy. More recently, the conflict between agricultural interests in
Brazil who seek to expand beef production for the global market and indigenous
people who are striving to protect the Amazon rainforest has led to several deaths
12 R. Brinkmann

and widespread deforestation of one of the world’s most important ecosystems

(reference).

9 Sustainability in Business

The business community has embraced the idea of sustainability in a variety of ways.
At the very basic level, many businesses have fully embraced the key idea of
sustainability: ensuring that we utilize resources wisely in order for future genera-
tions to thrive. While some businesses have denied the need for action on sustain-
ability, particularly within the realm of global climate change, others have
recognized that the business activities as practiced in the past using unsustainable
practices can no longer continue. For example, in 2020, BlackRock, one of the
world’s largest investment firms, fully embraced a global sustainability agenda and
recognized that it was inappropriate to invest in businesses that detracted from sound
sustainability tenets (Fink 2020). Indeed, the company acknowledged that the
infrastructure in cities around the world, and many cities themselves, were at risk
due to changes in the planet’s climate. The costs associated with mitigating the risks
are tremendous and it makes much more sense to solve the world’s sustainability
problems before they happen.
BlackRock is but one of many companies that are embracing the idea of sustain-
ability. Perhaps the most important early advocate of sustainability was Ray Ander-
son who was the head of Interface Carpeting, the largest carpet manufacturing
company in the world (Anderson 2011). After reading The Ecology of Commerce
by Paul Hawken (1993), he realized he needed to make a fundamental change to his
company’s business model in order to make it much more environmentally sustain-
able. He realized that the products produced by Interface could be made much more
sustainably using renewable materials and with chemicals that were not harmful to
the environment. In addition, he focused much more on the people involved with the
company at all levels – from workers to suppliers. Overall, he became the leading
advocate for focusing on the triple bottom line: people, planet, and profits.
Anderson became an advocate for assessing and measuring sustainability within a
business context. Many major companies began measuring their impacts using a
variety of assessment tools and also began publishing regular sustainability reports
that highlighted progress toward attaining particular sustainability goals. Walmart,
for example, became a leader in developing sustainability guidelines within their
supply chain and also focused on creating a greener footprint for their buildings
(Gielens et al. 2018). They have a large team focused on sustainability and also
conduct regular sustainability training for people who wish to do business with the
company.
A range of initiatives emerged to help businesses advance their sustainability
goals using third-party verification. The Rainforest Alliance, for example, will
certify that agricultural products like coffee and chocolate are produced using
standardized sustainability guidelines (Pinto et al. 2014). Even the venerable Inter-
national Organization for Standardization has produced sustainability metrics that
Another random document with
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the Atlantic ocean, 2,000 feet in thickness, were elevated above the
waters, and became dry land.”
We have alluded to the undulating character of the downs, so “well
known,” as Mantell says, that “local details are unnecessary.” How
correct this is may be seen in the following drawing, which
represents a portion of Royston Heath.

All over this heath is found the “Royston crow,” during the winter
months. This fine bird migrates hither from Norway, to avoid its
severe winters, and is scientifically known as the “Hooded-crow,
corvus cornix.” On its first arrival, when it is in its best plumage, it is
comparatively tame, allowing the sportsman to approach very near;
but as the season advances, acquaintance with the gun makes it very
knowing and shy. It associates freely with the other crows, but its
nest has never yet been found in England. About March the hooded-
crow wholly disappears. The head, throat, and wings are black; the
back and breast a “clear smoke-grey.” Norman, the bird-stuffer of
this town, has always several fine specimens on hand.
As, in the case of the Carboniferous system, we ventured to say to
the reader that it was not all coal, so in the Cretaceous system, we
would remind him that it is not all chalk; but without going minutely
into the subdivisions which the chalk formation has received,
because this unpretending elementary treatise does not profess to
teach geology, but simply aims, as we have ventured again and again
to repeat, to infuse into the mind a desire of acquaintance with the
marvels and truths of this science, we will just indicate the leading
divisions and nomenclature of this deposit. First, there is the green
sand; that is, first, beginning at the bottom or lower part of the
formation: this may be well seen and studied in the neighbourhood
of Cambridge, where we have procured many of its characteristic
fossils, including several vertebræ and teeth of the otodus, a fish
allied to the shark family, such as are figured in the opposite
diagram.
 FOSSIL TEETH OF FISHES:

FROM UPPER GREEN SAND,

CAMBRIDGE.

1. OTODUS.
2. CARCHARIAS.
3. CORAX.
4. OXYRHINA.
5. NOTIDANUS.
6. LAMNA.
7. PTYCHODUS.
 FOSSILS FROM THE GAULT,
FOLKSTONE.

1. AMMONITE DENTATUS.
2. AM. LAUTUS.
3. AM. SPLENDENS.
4. AM. CRISTATUS.
5. AM. DENARIUS.
6. CATILLUS SULCATUS.

At Potton and Gamlingay in Bedfordshire, and in the

neighbourhood, this green sand is highly ferruginous, and the roads
and fields present that peculiarly dark-red colour which is first
singular and then wearisome to the eye. In the case of the Potton
beds, the red colour is caused by oxidization or rust of iron; in the
neighbourhood of Cambridge, &c., where there is the green sand,
this is owing to the influence of “chloritous silicate of iron.” Then we
have the galt or gault, a local term of which we cannot trace the
etymology. The gault, however, is not of great thickness, but is likely
to be the most interesting department of the Chalk to the beginner,
on account of the abundance and peculiar appearance of its fossils. A
ramble under the cliffs at Folkstone,[106] where the gault may be seen
in perfection, will amply repay any one for toil, dirt, and a few slips
and bruises. He will there find evidences of a prolific and prodigal
bestowment of life in the innumerable fragments of organic remains
every where observable; and if he be patient,—if he won’t go running
on from spot to spot, saying, as some do, “Oh, there’s nothing here;”
if he will just persevere in a minute examination of every spot where
organic remains may be detected, he will not come away without his
reward in ammonites, hamites, and other cephalopodous mollusks,
and most of them with that peculiar nacreous or mother-of-pearl
lustre upon them which renders the fossils of this period so beautiful
and attractive. Only we caution the explorer not to buy of the so-
called guides. At Dover and Folkstone the rogues have a knack of
getting a lump of gault, and sticking into it one or two common
pyrites, which are very abundant in the cliff, bits of shell, ammonites,
&c.; they then offer this conglomerate for sale, all rounded and
smooth, assuring you upon their “sacred honour,” the honour of men
who always draw upon their imagination for their facts, that they
would not ask so much for it, only on account of its excessive rarity.
As good economists always avoid cheap houses, and go to the best
shops, so let the young geologist always go to the best shop: let him
go to the cliff with his hammer, and work for himself. We picture a
few fossils from the gault, only regretting that it is out of the power of
our artist to convey their lustrous colours, as well as their curious
forms.
1. NATICA CANICULATA.

2.} VENTICRULITES.
3.}

4.} ROSTELLARIA MARGINATA.

5.}

6.}
7.} CATILLUS CRISPI.
8.}
 Then comes, lastly, the Chalk: that is, the white chalk, divided into
lower and upper; the lower being harder and mostly without flints,
and the upper characterised by layers and bands of flint, sometimes
nodular, as in Cambridgeshire, and sometimes flat almost as a
pancake, as in the neighbourhood of Woolwich.
Above are some of the most characteristic fossils of the Chalk. No.
1 is a pecten, or oyster, called the “five-ribbed,” or quinque costatus;
No. 2 is the plagiostoma spinosa, so called on account of its spines, a
shell found frequently in our chalk or lime-pits; No. 3 is the
intermediate hamite (Lat. hamus, a hook), “hamites intermedius;”
No. 4 is the spatangus cor-anguinum, a very common fossil echinus
in the chalk; No. 5 is the ananchytes ovata, found frequently in the
Brighton and Ramsgate cliffs; No. 6 is a scaphite (Gr. skaphē, a skiff
or boat); and the last is our old friend the belemnite, who has
survived so many of this earth’s changes, and now finds himself a
contemporary of the cretaceous inhabitants of the globe.
In many respects, the Chalk presents us with remarkable
anomalies: we have sand, the green sand, but unlike in colour and in
texture the sand of the old and new red sandstone, where we find it
compressed and hardened into solid and compact masses of stone;
we have clay, argillaceous beds such as the gault, but it is not clay
hard and pressed into slaty rocks, but soft and compressible; and we
have carbonate of lime, the chalk constituting the calcareous beds of
this formation; but where we have met with it before it has been hard
and solid limestone, and marble, not pliable and soft as in the
Cretaceous system; and yet apparently it is all the same material as
we have found in the earlier stages of the earth’s crust—the washings,
degradations, and deludations of older and harder rocks, along with
the secretions and remains of organized animals that once peopled
this ancient earth; thus affording us, on a large scale, another
illustration of the economy observable in all the works of God.

FOSSIL FISH FROM LEWES.

Having spoken of the fossil fishes of the Chalk, we here give

drawings of two procured from the neighbourhood of Lewes, the
famous fossil fishing-ground of the late Dr. Mantell; and it is due to
the name and memory of the Chalk historian and geologist, to inform
the reader that Dr. M. was the first who succeeded, by skilful removal
of the surrounding chalk, in procuring a perfect ichthyolite from the
cretaceous formation of England. The British Museum is now
enriched by Dr. Mantell’s collection of fossil fishes, that once so
much excited the admiration of Agassiz, when he saw them at
Brighton.

FOSSIL FISH (ICHTHYOLITE) FROM LEWES.

Here let us again advert to the Deluge theory, not because our own
minds are not satisfied on the point, but because theology and
science alike demand a true statement of the facts of the case. We
believe, as we said in a previous chapter, in the plenary inspiration of
nature, just as we believe that the Scriptures were given by
inspiration of God; and we are quite sure that both books, if they are
not misinterpreted, will declare the glory of God in one common
speech, and elevate the mind of man, to whom they speak, up to a
more adoring trust and a profounder reverence. With Dr. Hitchcock
we say, “It seems to me that the child can easily understand the
geological interpretation of the Bible and its reasons. Why, then,
should it not be taught to children, that they may not be liable to
distrust the whole Bible, when they come to the study of geology? I
rejoice, however, that the fears and prejudices of the pious and the
learned are so fast yielding to evidence; and I anticipate the period,
when on this subject the child will learn the same thing in the
Sabbath school and in the literary institution. Nay, I anticipate the
time as not distant when the high antiquity of the globe will be
regarded as no more opposed to the Bible, than the earth’s revolution
round the sun, and on its axis. Soon shall the horizon, where geology
and revelation meet, be cleared of every cloud, and present only an
unbroken and magnificent circle of truth.”[107] But to return; this
Deluge theory refers all existing fossils to “Noah’s flood,”—to that
violent diluvial action, the graphic account of which is in the book of
Genesis. Now, it is impossible to believe this if we look at a fossil:
look, for instance, at this terebratula, and observe how perfectly
uninjured it is, frail as is its shelly covering; or at this plagiostoma
spinosa, and mark how susceptible it is of injury, and yet that its
brittle spines are all unbroken; or at this inoceramus or catillus, and
observe its delicate flutings, still in exquisite preservation, without
fracture or distortion; or these specimens of echinites, the
ananchytes ovata, or the spatanguscor-anguinum, and see the
markings on the shell, the apertures of the mouth and stomach still
perfect; who can see all this and not come to the conclusion, that
these creatures, and thousands such as these, endured not only no
violence in death, such as a deluge would suppose, but that at death
they subsided quietly to the bottom of the sea, there to find a fitting
sepulchre of soft cretaceous matter prepared for them, which in
process of time was lifted up, to exhibit in a hard chalky bed their
forms of pristine beauty?
In the upper chalk every one has seen the layers of flint, and
marked their singular distribution, in layers; and here we would add,
that the existence of flint in chalk is one of those hard nuts which
geology has not yet cracked. The geologist, the chemist, and the
zoologist have all puzzled themselves in vain to find a truly
satisfactory origin for these nodules of siliceous matter. We have
heard it suggested that they may be coprolites; but no one who
examines the texture of a flint, can hold that theory, to say nothing of
the idea that the coprolites have been preserved, while the animal
remains have perished. We may sum up all we have to say about
flints in the following words, from that useful little book, Chambers’s
“Rudiments of Geology:”
“The formation of flint, within a mass so different in composition
as chalk, is still in some respects an unsolved problem in geology. It
occurs in nodular masses of very irregular forms and variable
magnitude; some of these not exceeding an inch, others more than a
yard in circumference. Although thickly distributed in horizontal
layers, they are never in contact with each other, each nodule being
completely enveloped by the chalk. Externally, they are composed of
a white cherty crust; internally, they are of a grey or black silex, and
often contain cavities lined with chalcedony and crystallized quartz.
When taken from the quarry they are brittle and full of moisture, but
soon dry, and assume their well-known hard and refractory qualities.
Flints, almost without exception, enclose remains of sponges,
alcyonia, echinida, and other marine organisms, the structures of
which are often preserved in the most delicate and beautiful manner.
In some specimens the organism has undergone decomposition, and
the space it occupied either left hollow, or partially filled with some
sparry incrustation. From these facts, it would seem that flints are as
much an aggregation of silex around some organized nucleus, as
septaria are aggregations of clay and carbonate of iron. This is now
the generally received opinion; and when it is remembered that the
organisms must have been deposited when the chalk was in a pulpy
state, there can be little difficulty in conceiving how the silex
dissolved through the mass would, by chemical affinity, attach itself
to the decaying organism. Chalk is composed of carbonate of lime,
with traces of clay, silex, and oxide of iron; flint, on the other hand,
consists of 98 per cent. of pure silex, with a trace of alumine, oxide of
iron, and lime. Silex is quite capable of solution: it occurs in the hot-
springs of Iceland and most thermal waters; has been found in a
pulpy state within basalt; forms the tabasheer found in the cavities
of the bamboo, and the thin pellicle or outer covering of canes, reeds,
grasses, &c.; and siliceous concretions are common in the fruits and
trees of the tropics. All these facts point to a very general diffusion of
silex in a state of solution; and whatever may have caused its
abundance in the waters during the deposition of the upper chalk,
there can be little doubt respecting the mode in which it has been
collected around the organic remains of these early seas.”
At Scratchell’s Bay in the Isle of Wight, it will be seen that the flints
are in a vertical position; and to the most casual observer the
perpendicular arrangement of these flints will supply the strongest
evidence of disturbance by upheaval from below. The bay in front,
called Scratchell’s Bay, is a small but romantic indentation in the
coast of the south side of the island, in which are the famous
Needles. In the face of the cliff is a noble archway between 200 and
300 feet high, which has been created by the constant action of water
eating and wearing away the lower beds; while the Needles
themselves are only isolated masses of chalk, separated or eroded
from the main land by the same erosive action. “To the late Sir Henry
Inglefield belongs the merit of having first observed and directed
attention to the highly interesting phenomena of vertical chalk
strata, occasioned by the disruption and elevation of the eocene and
cretaceous formations, which are so remarkably displayed in the Isle
of Wight, where the vertical position of the strata, and the shattered
condition of the flint nodules, thought still embedded in the solid
chalk, may be conveniently studied in the cliffs in the neighbourhood
of Scratchell’s Bay.”[108]
With the study of the Chalk formation, we close what has been
appropriately termed the “secondary period, or middle epoch of the
ancient world;” of which it has been well said, “In reviewing the
characters of the Cretaceous group, we have evidence that these
varied strata are the mineralized bed of an extensive ocean, which
abounded in the usual forms of marine organic life, as algæ, sponges,
corals, shells, crustacea, fishes, and reptiles. These forms are
specifically distinct from those which are discovered in the tertiary
strata; in many instances, the genus, in all the species, became
extinct with the close of the Cretaceous period. It affords a striking
illustration of creative power, that of the hundreds of species which
composed the Fauna and the Flora of the Cretaceous group, not one
species passed into the succeeding epoch.”[109]
Of that old ocean with its countless tenants we have already
spoken, and conclude by applying to it the well-known lines of
Montgomery, in his celebration of the coral insect in his “Pelican
Island:”—
Millions of millions here, from age to age,
With simplest skill, and toil unweariable,
No moment and no movement unimproved,
Laid line on line, on terrace, terrace spread,
To swell the heightening, brightening gradual mound,
By marvellous structure climbing towards the day.
Omnipotence wrought in them, with them, by them;
Hence what Omnipotence alone could do,
Worms did.
WALTONIAN AND MANTELLIAN FISHERMEN.
 CHAPTER XII.
THE TERTIARY SYSTEM.

“And God made the beast of the earth after his kind.”
Moses.

In our rapid sketch of the materials constituting the crust of the

earth, we first of all, in that imaginary section which we supposed to
have been laid bare to us, studied the characters of the hypogene
rocks,[110] that make up the Azoic period, in which, with the exception
of a few zoophytes, all nature was void of animal, life and possessed
only by the genius of dread silence. Rising higher, we surveyed the
Palæozoic or primary rocks, where the fishes of the Old Red
Sandstone convinced us of progress in the forms of life, and taught
us our first lesson in the ascending scale of those types of life with
which Palæontology has now made us familiar. Leaving this period at
the Carboniferous era, we entered upon the Mesozoic,[111] or
Secondary period, ushered in amidst strange convulsions that must
again and again have rendered the earth “without form and void;”
and here we found ourselves in company with the strange and
gigantic remains of a higher order of vertebrated animals, the
saurians, the crocodile-kings of a bygone period; and as we pondered
these hieroglyphics of past generations, our souls “were seized the
prisoners of amaze;” and now, in our upward ascent, leaving behind
us the scenes
“Where eldest Night
And Chaos, ancestors of nature, held
Eternal anarchy,”

we come to the Cainozoic,[112] or Tertiary Rocks, where other and

higher types of life are found. Huge mammals, beasts of prodigious
size, are now found inhabitants of the earth, the precursors of man—
reasoning, intelligent, responsible man, who is presently to make his
appearance on this great theatre of life, “made a little lower than the
angels,” to have dominion over the works of Jehovah’s power.
Sir H. de la Beche proposes, for tertiary, the term
“supercretaceous;” it is, however, of little consequence which term is
adopted, the meaning in each case being the same, that all the rocks
or strata lying above the chalk are to be considered as belonging to
the tertiary system or series. Confessedly, it is a dark period in the
history of those successive creations which have been engaging our
attention, for we can trace no near connexion between the secondary
or older, and tertiary or newer formations. That is to say—and the
bare statement appears so sufficient and final a refutation of what
has been termed the “development hypothesis,” now recognised as
contradictory to fact and to Scripture—that there are not known to
exist in any of these newer strata the same beings, or the descendants
of the same beings, that were found upon the earth at the
termination of the chalk deposit.
Nor is this all; not only are none of the old fossils found in any one
of the three divisions of this system, but we are introduced at once to
so many new ones, that their species and genera are almost endless;
and he is not only a geologist of mark, but a most singularly
accomplished geologist, who thoroughly understands their minute
subdivisions, and can appropriately classify the fossils of this most
fossiliferous era. To make the matter as simple as possible, let us add
that “the broad distinction between tertiary and secondary rocks is a
palæontological one. None of the secondary rocks contain any fossil
animals or plants of the same species as any of those living at the
present day. Every one of the tertiary groups do contain some fossil
animals or plants of the same species as those now living.”[113]
Having alluded to the threefold division of this series of rocks, we
shall proceed to notice them, dwelling a while upon each, and
showing the principle on which each is based, as originated and
enunciated by Lyell. Of the three divisions, the first is called Eocene
(ēōs, the dawn, and kainŏs, recent), by which term is represented the
oldest or lowest of this tripartite series. Then we have the Miocene
(meiōn, less, and kainŏs, recent)—a name, we think, not the most
appropriate, and likely to mislead the beginner, because really it
represents a series of beds, more and not less recent than the
Eocene; but the idea of the name is this (and it must be carefully
borne in mind), that although it is more recent than the series of
beds below, it is less recent than those above; it is nearer the “dawn”
of our present era than the Eocene, but not so near the dawn as the
Pliocene. This last term, the Pliocene (from pleiōn, more, and kainŏs,
recent), is applied to the newest of the beds of the tertiary series in
which there are found many more recent than extinct shells. The
Tertiary system or series, then, is divided into these three sections:
viz. 1. The older Tertiary or Eocene; 2. The middle Tertiary or
Miocene; and 3. The newer Tertiary or Pliocene.
We used a term just now, in quoting from Mr. Juke’s most useful
manual, which we will explain; we said, the “distinction between the
secondary and tertiary rocks is wholly a palæontological one;” that
is, it is a distinction founded not on the character of the rocks, but on
the character of the organic remains found in the rocks. “This
character,” says Sir Charles Lyell, “must be used as a criterion of the
age of a formation, or of the contemporaneous origin of two deposits
in different places, under very much the same restrictions as the test
of mineral composition.
“First, the same fossils may be traced over wide regions, if we
examine strata in the direction of their planes, although by no means
for indefinite distances.
“Secondly, while the same fossils prevail in a particular set of
strata for hundreds of miles in a horizontal direction, we seldom
meet with the same remains for many fathoms, and very rarely for
several hundred yards, in a vertical line, or a line transverse to the
strata. This fact has now been verified in almost all parts of the globe,
and has led to a conviction, that at successive periods of the past, the
same area of land and water has been inhabited by species of animals
and plants even more distinct than those which now people the
antipodes, or which now coexist in the Arctic, temperate, and
tropical zones. It appears that, from the remotest periods, there has
been ever a coming in of new organic forms, and an extinction of
those which pre-existed on the earth, some species having endured
for a longer, others for a shorter time; while none have ever
reappeared after once dying out. The law which has governed the
creation and extinction of species seems to be expressed in the verse
of the poet—
‘Nature made him, and then broke the die;’

and this circumstance it is which confers on fossils their highest

value as chronological tests, giving to each of them, in the eyes of the
geologist, that authority which belongs to contemporary medals in
history. The same cannot be said of each peculiar variety of rock; for
some of these, as red-marl and red sandstone for example, may occur
at once upon the top, bottom, and middle of the entire sedimentary
series; exhibiting in each position so perfect an identity of mineral
aspect, as to be undistinguishable. Such exact repetitions, however,
of the same mixtures of sediment, have not often been produced, at
distant periods, in precisely the same parts of the globe; and even
where this has happened, we are seldom in any danger of
confounding together the monuments of remote eras, when we have
studied their imbedded fossils and relative position.”[114]
Let us now briefly explain the very simple but satisfactory basis on
which this threefold division of the Tertiary rocks rests, and then
proceed to a brief explanation of each. The reader will already have
noted a statement on a preceding page, to which we shall be
pardoned, if, a second time, we ask attention to it. In imparting
elementary instruction on geology we have always found our classes
more or less puzzled by the tertiary system, on account of its
nomenclature and minute subdivisions, and we have learnt from
experience the importance of presenting this statement over and
over again. We have remarked that in the secondary rocks—that is,
up to the end of the chalk system—there are no organic remains
found precisely similar to any species existing at the present day; but
when we come to the tertiary rocks, although we find many
strangers, we find also a good many organic remains of the same
kind and character as the shells, that are now found on our shores. In
one part of the Tertiary the number of fossils that belongs to existing
genera is many, in another more, in another more still; and upon this
simple idea of positive, comparative, and superlative, the present
division is based. Taking the percentage principle as a guide, Sir
Charles Lyell and a distinguished French geologist, M. Deshayes,
have ascertained that in the lowest beds of this system there were
only 3½ per cent. of fossil shells similar to existing species, and this,
for “the sake of clearness and brevity,” says Sir Charles, “was called
the Eocene period, or the period of the dawn, the dawn of our
modern era so far as its testaceous fauna are concerned.” Rising
higher in the examination of these rocks, certain strata were found
containing 18 per cent. of fossil shells, similar to shells found now;
and to this was given the name of Miocene, the puzzling name
already spoken of, because it means less recent, whereas it is in
reality more recent, and is to be understood in relation to the series
below, and not to the series above. A step higher up in this system
revealed deposits of a coralline and craggy character, in which 41 per
cent. of fossil shells like those of the present era were found; and to
this the name of Pliocene, or more recent still, was given; and
latterly, in Sicily chiefly, a series of strata has been discovered,
referable to the Tertiary, in which 95 per cent. of recent species of
shells have been found, and to this series the name of Post-Pliocene,
or Pleistocene, has been given. Before our description of each of
these divisions, let us add, that “the organic remains of the system
constitute its most important and interesting feature. The fossils of
earlier periods presented little analogy, often no resemblance, to
existing plants and animals; here, however, the similitude is
frequently so complete, that the naturalist can scarcely point out a
distinction between them and living races. Geology thus unfolds a
beautiful gradation of being, from the corals, molluscs, and simple
crustacea of the grauwacke—the enamelled fishes, crinoidea, and
cryptogamic plants of the lower secondary—the chambered shells,
sauroid reptiles, and marsupial mammalia of the upper secondary—
up to the true dicotyledonous trees, birds, and gigantic quadrupeds
of the tertiary epoch. The student must not, however, suppose that
the fossils of this era bring him up to the present point of organic
nature, for thousands of species which then lived and flourished
became in their turn extinct, and were succeeded by others long
before man was placed on the earth as the head of animated
existence. Of Plants, few marine species have been detected; but the
fresh-water beds have yielded cycadeæ, coniferae, palms, willows,
elms, and other species, exhibiting the true dicotyledonous structure.
Nuts allied to those of the cocoa and other palms have been
discovered in the London clay; and seeds of the fresh-water
characeæ, or stoneworts, known by the name of gyrgonites (Gr.,
gyros, curved, and gonos, seed), are common in the same deposit. Of
the Radiata, Articulata, and Mollusca, so many belong to existing
genera, that this circumstance has suggested the classification of
tertiary rocks according to the number of recent species which they
contain.”—Chambers’ Outlines, p. 147.
Let us now begin the Eocene period. The most remarkable
formations of this period are the London and Hampshire basins. Of
the London basin we have already spoken in a previous chapter; a
few additional remarks will be sufficient. The diagrams 4 and 5, p.
25, will explain these tertiary deposits better than any verbal
explanation; and when it is remembered that this bed of clay is
probably a thousand feet in thickness, we get a passing illustration of
the folly of those puerile reports which a few years since were
industriously circulated about a coming earthquake in London. Poor,
uneducated people took up the alarm rather anxiously, never
dreaming of what any tyro in science would have told them—that
supposing there was a subterranean chimney on fire down below,
there was a wet blanket under their feet composed of a thousand feet
of sodden and solid clay, a blanket of the material they may see in the
deep cuttings of the Great Northern Railway in and about London,
that would most effectually have put out any fire, or checked the
progress of any earthquake, just as a cannon-ball is stopped dead by
a woolsack.
A run down the river Thames will take any one who has a day to
spare to the isle of Sheppey, where he will be amply rewarded by
seeing, on the north side of the island, an exposure of this formation
in the cliff laid bare to the height of 200 feet, and which pleasure trip
will be amply rewarded by the discovery in situ of the fossil tropical
plants, &c., that once flourished in the neighbourhood of our cold
and foggy London. “At the entrance of the Thames, the London clay
extends on both sides of the river, and is admirably exhibited in the
isle of Sheppey, which consists entirely of this stratum. The cliffs on
the north side of the island are upwards of 200 feet high, and are cut
down vertically by the action of the sea; they have long been
celebrated for the remarkable abundance and variety of the organic
remains obtained from them, amongst which, perhaps, the most
interesting are the fruits, berries, and woody seed-vessels of several
hundred species of plants. From the same locality there have also
been obtained the remains of upwards of fifty species of fish, and a
considerable number of crustaceans, and many other invertebrata;
besides some remarkable bones which have been described by
Professor Owen, and which indicate the former existence in this
island of large serpents, and of such birds as prey upon small reptiles
and mammalia. Many of these fossils, especially those of plants, are
very difficult to preserve, owing to the great tendency of the iron
pyrites, which enter largely into their composition, to effloresce and
be destroyed by exposure to the atmosphere.”[115]
Passing from the London basin to the Hampshire basin or Barton
beds, we shall first give a group of the shells found here; and we wish
our readers could look at them as they lie before us in their condition
of most exquisite preservation, so exquisite, that those who have
seen them have involuntarily and frequently exclaimed, “But these
can’t be fossils!” I know of no picture-painting of past history so
touching, and yet so true, as these lovely specimens of the shells of
the pre-Adamite condition of England in all their native simplicity.
To those who see in them shells, and only shells, why, in the name of
the prophet, give them figs, while we again remember Wordsworth’s
hero,—
“A primrose on the river brim,
A yellow primrose was to him,
And it was nothing more.”

To us they speak a wondrous story, replete with the knowledge that

maketh glad the heart of man, because it is purifying, elevating
knowledge; and though it does not teach the peculiar truths of
theology, and we heartily wish that geology had been allowed to tell
only its own tale of Creation—for here, as elsewhere,
“Nature, when unadorned,
Is then adorned the most”—

instead of being put to the rack, and made to suggest the special
truths of Revelation,[116] with which it has nothing to do;—although,
we say, it does not teach the peculiar and special truths for which a
Revelation was needed, it everywhere throws light on the boundless
treasures of wisdom and care and beneficent Providence of the God