The Age of Sustainable Development

Citation

Sachs, J. D. (2015). The Age of Sustainable Development. Foreword by Ban Ki-moon. Columbia University Press.

Chapter Summary

The book has fourteen chapters and runs to xvi + 543 pages, with a foreword by the then UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, a preface, a bibliography and an index. The publisher describes it as based on Sachs's years directing Columbia's Earth Institute and advising the UN on the Millennium Development Goals, and on a popular online course in which he presented the same ideas; companion material was published alongside it. Sachs treats sustainable development both as a way of analysing the interactions of economy, society and environment and as a normative goal. The chapters move from definitions and global inequality (1–2), through the history and causes of uneven development and the end of extreme poverty (3–5), to planetary limits (6), a run of sector chapters (7–13) and the Sustainable Development Goals (14). Udo E. Simonis, reviewing the book in the International Journal of Social Economics (2017), found every chapter well documented and illustrated with global graphs and statistics.

Chapter 1: Introduction to Sustainable Development

Sachs starts from a crowded planet: a population roughly nine times that of 1750 and a world economy vastly larger than before industrialization, whose growth now threatens the environment on several fronts at once. He defines sustainable development as an analytical approach and as a normative framework with four objectives: economic prosperity, social inclusion, environmental sustainability and good governance.

Chapter 2: An Unequal World

The chapter surveys inequality between and within countries, including urban–rural gaps, and the difficulty of measuring well-being. Simonis notes its comparison of rankings by income per head and by the Human Development Index, which can diverge sharply.

Chapters 3–5: A Brief History of Economic Development; Why Some Countries Developed While Others Stayed Poor; Ending Extreme Poverty

These chapters examine convergence and divergence between economies: the history of economic development, why some countries developed while others stayed poor, and how extreme poverty can be ended. Sachs argues that the tools for doing so in education, health, agriculture, energy, transport and finance are stronger than ever, and calls for "clinical economics", a diagnosis fitted to each country's history, geography and economic structure, an approach also applied in the Millennium Villages Project.

Chapter 6: Planetary Boundaries

Drawing on the work of Johan Rockström and colleagues, Sachs asks whether continued growth can be reconciled with environmental limits. He answers that it can only if the world economy develops in a fundamentally different way, discusses energy and food systems as examples, introduces the idea of decoupling growth from resource use and environmental impact, and argues for voluntary reductions in fertility that respect human rights.

Chapters 7–11: Social Inclusion; Education for All; Health for All; Food Security; Resilient Cities

A sequence of sector chapters, each documented with statistics and giving attention to the role of the United Nations, its declarations and covenants, and the Millennium and Sustainable Development Goals. The cities chapter considers what makes cities sustainable and resilient, including infrastructure, water and waste, with photographs of urban smog, earthquake damage and blackout.

Chapters 12–13: Climate Change; Saving Biodiversity and Protecting Ecosystem Services

Chapter 12 covers the basic science and consequences of human-induced climate change, mitigation, adaptation and the politics of decarbonization. Chapter 13 treats threats to biodiversity, forests and oceans, uses the term "sixth great extinction", and reviews international responses from the Convention on Biological Diversity onward.

Chapter 14: Sustainable Development Goals

The final chapter presents the Sustainable Development Goals adopted in 2015 as a universal agenda that applies to rich and poor countries alike. It begins by noting that the world is far off course, considers doubts about humanity's capacity to respond, citing Jane Jacobs, Martin Rees and James Lovelock, and ends on the argument that ideas matter and a breakthrough is possible.

Key Concepts

Chapters 1–2: Defining the field

• Sustainable development: both a way of understanding the interactions of economic, social and environmental systems and a set of shared goals for a decent life.
• Four objectives: economic prosperity, social inclusion, environmental sustainability and good governance.
• Income versus human development: ranking countries by income per head and by the Human Development Index gives different pictures of well-being.

Chapters 3–6: Growth, poverty and limits

• Convergence and divergence: whether poorer economies catch up with richer ones or fall further behind.
• Clinical economics: diagnosing a country's development problems according to its particular conditions before prescribing policy.
• Planetary boundaries: environmental limits within which humanity can operate safely.
• Decoupling: separating economic growth from resource use and environmental impact.

Chapters 7–14: Sectors and goals

• Millennium Development Goals and Sustainable Development Goals: the UN goal frameworks for 2000–2015 and from 2015 onwards.
• Resilient cities: urban areas able to withstand shocks through infrastructure and planning.
• Mitigation, adaptation and decarbonization: the main responses to climate change.
• Ecosystem services: benefits people draw from biodiversity and ecosystems.

Critical Analysis

Strengths

• Breadth in a single volume. The book ranges over economic history, poverty, health, education, gender, food, cities, climate and biodiversity. Endorsements on the publisher's page stress this: Jared Diamond calls it "ten terrific books under one cover", and Choice praised its "incredible breadth".
• Data and illustration. Simonis describes all chapters as well documented and illustrated by global graphs and statistics, and Publishers Weekly, quoted by the publisher, noted its clear prose and wealth of statistics. The volume is designed as a teaching book, with companion online material and a related course.
• An integrated framework. The four objectives of Chapter 1 and the planetary-boundaries argument of Chapter 6 give a consistent frame for the sector chapters that follow, so students can see how poverty, environment and governance connect.
• Written for students and general readers. Matthew E. Kahn, in the Journal of Economic Literature as quoted by the publisher, describes it as written for a popular audience and usable as a complementary text in environmental or development economics, public health or environmental studies.

Limitations

• Length. Simonis, who considered the book valuable, judged that at over 500 pages it is too voluminous to reach the widest readership and called for a condensed edition. Few courses will assign all of it.
• Contestable definitions. Simonis questions the use of "sustainable" inside the definition of sustainable development and observes that what counts as good governance is open to debate.
• An advocate's perspective. Sachs writes as a policy adviser and director of programmes he discusses, including the Millennium Villages Project; his approach to ending poverty is one position among several, and critical perspectives on development and aid should be read alongside it.
• Fixed at 2015. The book appeared as the Sustainable Development Goals were adopted, so it describes the goals at their launch rather than progress since; its statistics need updating.

Where It Fits in the Course

In the development geography list this is the broad, data-rich survey of global development aimed at a general and student readership. It pairs closely with Sen's Development as Freedom: Sen provides the evaluative argument about what development is for, while Sachs supplies the empirical panorama and the policy agenda of the development goals. Potter and colleagues' Geographies of Development and Willis's Theories and Practices of Development are textbooks that set Sachs's approach among competing theories; Willis in particular traces the succession of development theories from modernization to neoliberalism and grassroots approaches, which helps place Sachs's emphasis on aid, investment and international goals.

Sheppard and colleagues' A World of Difference is a substantial critical geography of development that treats development as contested and shaped by colonialism, markets and policy; it is the natural counterweight to Sachs's more technocratic optimism. The Companion to Development Studies offers short chapters on individual debates for following up any of Sachs's sector chapters.

How to Use This Book

No economics or statistics background is assumed. The book suits first-year students in geography, development studies, environmental studies and public health, and readers who want a single overview of sustainable development.

A practical plan:

• Core: Chapters 1, 2, 4 and 6 give the definition, the picture of global inequality, the explanation of uneven development and the planetary-boundaries argument on which the rest depends.
• Poverty block: Chapters 3 and 5 for courses with a focus on growth and poverty reduction.
• Sector chapters by course topic: Chapters 7–13 each take one sector and can be assigned individually, to match course weeks on inclusion, education, health, food, cities, climate and biodiversity.
• Close with Chapter 14 on the Sustainable Development Goals.

Pair the reading with current data: check each sector chapter's figures against the UN's annual Sustainable Development Goals reports and World Bank indicators, and compare the book's 2015 expectations with progress since. To read critically, set Chapters 3–5 against a critical text such as A World of Difference or against Willis's account of competing theories. The publisher's companion material and the associated online course can support independent study.