ENVIRONMENT AND

DEVELOPMENT
THE CONCEPT OF SUSTAINABLE HUMAN DEVELOPMENT
 MAJOR POINTS

• Defining ecology and environment

• Importance of the ecological dimension in development studies
• History of theioretical and political interest in the issue
• The economic dimension and the five controversail issues
• The political dimesion
• UN Sustainable Development Goals
 IMPORTANCE OF THE ISSUE

• The political debate

• Contribution of scientists and think tanks:
Practical demonstration:
Global warming
• Natural disasters: man-made or completely the work of nature?
• Impact of droughts in Africa: East and West.
 THE ECONOMIC DIMESNION

• Sources of environmental threats to the development process:

• Water scarcity
• Deforestation
• Desertification
• Shrinking biological diversity
• Global warming
• Water,air and soil pollution
 FIVE CONTROVERSAIL ISSUES

• Poverty,poor-environment connection
• Causes other than poverty of environmental problems,
• Economic growth and environmental problems,
• The concept of sustainable development.
 POLITICAL DIMENSION

• First at national and regional levels:

• Disparity of ecological conditions as a source of inter-group conflict
• Securitization of water scarcity
• Political consequences of natural disasters,namely political instability and revolutions.
• At the international level:
• A major concern for global civil society
• An important item on agenda of international organizations and a source of
international disputes.
 ENVIRONMENTAL ISSUES AN OBJECT OF PUBLIC
POLICY 1
• First : management of natural resources:
Who should manage them?
At what conditions?
• Is natural resources abundance a curse or a blessing?
• The concept of natural rent:
its economic,social, cultural and political dimesnions
Natural rent and democracy
 ENVIRONMENT AND PP.2

• Water management as a special case.

• Resources scarcity and North-South Relations

• Second: Human resources:

Quantitative and qualitative aspects
• Quality as a substitute for natural resources scarcity
• Youth Bulge: A blessing or a curse?
 PUBLIC POLICIES: INTERNATIONAL DIMESNION

• 1-Dispute about appreciation of the gravity of environmental conditions

• 2-Disputes about responsibility for the degradation of environmental
conditions,
• 3-Dispute about the distribution of the cost of dealing with environmental
problems
• 4-Disputes about how to deal with some environmental issues.
 READINGS

• UNDP.Arab Human Development Report.No.5.2009.Read chapter on

environment and human security.
• UN General Assembly.Transforming our World.