Publication Review

Earth Summit 2002 – A New Deal * Second Edition *

Including additional chapters on Freshwater and Energy.

Earth Summit 2002 – A New Deal, represents the drawing together of ideas, experiences and expectations in preparation for the 10 year review of the first Earth Summit in Rio, 1992.  The book offers analysis on critical issues on the International Sustainable Development Agenda as well as inviting key major group representatives to look at the reasons for slow progress so far in addressing those issues.  A New Deals purpose is to focus attention on the Summit and to engage a wider global community around the summit in 2002 in an effort to advance the sustainable development agenda.

The book opens with an interesting look at ‘Roadblocks to Implementation’ of the Agenda 21 process.  At this stage, the issues are addressed from a stakeholder perspective, with chapters from representatives of Government, The UN, Trade Unions, NGOs, Women’s Groups and Local Government.  This first section introduces the reader to the International Sustainable Development agenda from a ‘lessons learned’ angle, drawing on experiences since Rio in 1992, where Sustaianbility began.

Thereafter A New Deal looks at a range of issues in two sections dealing with existing over-riding concerns and emerging issues.  These two sections cover a wide range of economic, social and environmental concerns around the issues being addressed.  And it is in this central section of the book that A New Deal offers the reader its main conclusions. 

It is not so much that the issues being dealt with are done so in a significantly innovative manner, nor that the book provides an opportunity for new horror stories about the bleak state of the world.  What is significant is that all the issues are dealt with in a common forum around a common theme.  For the first time since Rio in 1992, these issues are brought back together for an honest review of what has been achieved.  The innovation is that this time the issues are being addressed with a degree of hindsight.  Many pairs of eyes have kept sustainable development under scrutiny over the last 8 years and this is reflected by the authors analysis.  Each chapter offers policy options on the way forward and the role the 2002 summit can take in this process.  And here lies the Editors triumph in bringing a diffuse international community covering a broad range of issues together around the Earth Summit process.  With political will a constant waning factor, the opportunity presented by the 2002 summit to focus attention is almost too good to miss.  The editors success is in seizing this expectation and harnessing its energy.

Indeed in the final section of the book on Reforming International Institutions, the editor carries on from the various chapter authors to suggest frameworks and machinery for the advancement of the sustainable development agenda by the governments and stakeholders alike. Where previously the various international agencies and organisations had been looked at individually in terms of how they might be restructured, in this chapter the editor looks at how these bodies might be reformed in an integrated manner.  With streamlining and programme delivery in-mind, this final section completes the 2002 picture.  A New Deal offers the first holistic policy and process package for Earth Summit 2002, and this time, not just for the policy wonks.

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Earth Summit 2002 - A New Deal is a UNED Forum publication. For more information email gledivellec@earthsummit2002.org