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	2016 World Social Situation report: Leaving No One Behind by UNESCO, IDS, International Social Science Council   Sep 2016   The World Social Science Report ‘Challenging Inequalities – Pathways to a Just World’ launched this week, examines the harmful impact of inequalities on citizens, communities and countries.   The report is prepared by the International Social Science Council (ISSC) in Paris in cooperation with the UK-based Institute of Development Studies (IDS), and co-published by UNESCO. It is co-directed by Professor Melissa Leach, IDS Director, Professor John Gaventa, IDS Director of Research and Patricia Justino, IDS Research Fellow, with contributions from many other IDS researchers.   The report warns that unchecked inequalities could jeopardize the sustainability of economies, societies and communities, undermining efforts to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) by 2030.   It highlights significant gaps in social science research into inequalities and calls for more robust research into the links between economic inequality and other inequalities, such as social, political, and environmental inequalities, to create more inclusive societies.   Professor Melissa Leach, IDS Director, says: “The issue of rising inequality and what to do about it looms large in the minds of governments, businesses, civil society leaders and citizens around the world. Reducing inequality is, first and foremost, a question of fairness and social justice. It is also key to eradicating extreme poverty, fostering transformations to sustainability, promoting civil progress, reducing conflict and violence, and developing inclusive governance.”   While there was a fivefold increase in studies of inequalities and social justice in academic publications from 1992 to 2013, the report explains that many of them pay too little attention to inequalities that go beyond income and wealth, such as health, education and gender, according to the report.   It identifies seven intersecting dimensions of inequality: economic, political, social, cultural, environmental, spatial and knowledge-based.   The report also calls for more cooperation across disciplines, geographical borders and fields of research to help governments develop more effective policies for more inclusive societies. It identifies that international networks, open data sources, open access to publishing and software are vital to achieve this.   Why we must act now on inequalities, by Professor Melissa Leach (IDS)   After decades of neglect, rising inequalities, their consequences and what to do about them have risen to the top of public and policy agendas. In the UK, we see this in the summer’s EU referendum result and commentary on it, with recognition that ‘vote leave’ was in part a reaction of those alienated economically by globalisation, and politically by a Whitehall politics dominated by a wealthy and privileged elite.   In some of the poorest countries in Africa, we are also seeing growing poverty and protest, not least amongst young people facing jobless futures while elites profit from commercial mining and land deals.   Inequalities also hampered efforts to deal with the Ebola epidemic that wrought havoc in West Africa during 2014-15 – inequalities in health and access to health services, but also as economic inequalities fuelled mistrust and resistance against outbreak control teams.   The scale and negative impact of inequalities   Wide-spread recognition of the scale and negative impact of inequalities is unquestionable. The 2016 Oxfam report highlights that 62 individuals own the same amount of wealth as the bottom half of the world’s population. The World Economic Forum Outlook on the Global Agenda 2015 identified rising inequality as the most significant trend and challenge. The United Nations Agenda 2030 to which all countries committed in 2015 not only highlights tackling inequalities as one of 17 Global Goals, but recognises it is central to the whole agenda, pledging to ‘leave no-one behind’.   This rising attention marks a defining moment. As the 2016 World Social Science Report ‘Challenging Inequalities: pathways to a just world’ (which IDS has co-edited with the International Social Science Council) argues, rising inequalities are a central challenge of our era. A challenge that is both deeper and more complex than the headlines often suggest and one that requires urgent and transformative action at all levels – in policy, practice, advocacy and the knowledge to inform this.   There is however cause for hope; just as inequalities have multiple dimensions, causes and consequences, so there are multiple routes to tackling them, and building pathways to more equal futures.   Why inequalities matter and how levels are changing?   Bringing together the latest evidence on inequality trends, the report shows that global inequality actually declined during the first decade of this century. This is driven largely by reduced inequality between countries, and large reductions in poverty in China and India. However rising inequalities within countries – both in the old industrialised countries of Europe and North America, emerging and middle income countries, and those with the lowest incomes such as in Sub-Saharan Africa – threaten to reverse this positive trend.   Meanwhile the dramatic rise in the incomes of the top 1 per cent of earners globally in the past three decades, linked to the increasing dominance of financial capital over labour income, has meant the growing concentration of wealth in the hands of a small elite.   Rising inequality matters, in many ways. Most fundamentally, it is ethically and morally objectionable, having no place in societies striving for greater fairness and justice.   But it also has far-reaching consequences for almost every aspect of our lives, and abilities to achieve other political and social goals. Inequality can hamper economic growth, and certainly reduces the impact of that growth on poverty reduction.   Health and social problems are worse in countries with higher income inequality, and this has consequences for everyone, rich and poor alike.   Inequalities are associated with conflict, and countries with high levels of inequality between groups are more likely to experience civil war.   Inequality can hinder responses to crises – whether epidemics like Ebola, or the migrant crisis in Europe. Inequality can be associated with political alienation and marginalisation, undermining democracies.   And it can worsen environmental problems like climate change, and make the co-operation needed to tackle them far more difficult.   The inequalities that matter are not just of income and wealth. We also need to address six further forms: political, social, cultural, environmental, and spatial and inequalities related to knowledge.   The report’s contributors show the numerous ways these multiple inequalities interact.   People often experience intersecting discriminations and injustices, as these different forms of inequality interact and compound each other.   Some of the most enduring forms of inequality are those associated with identities, such as race, caste and ethnicity, which are themselves facets of what we term cultural inequality.   Gender pervades all these, and in many settings we see women and girls facing persistent – and sometimes growing – material disadvantages, discriminatory social norms, violence, and restrictions on voice and participation.   Downward spirals of intersecting inequalities can in turn affect people’s self-perceptions, limiting their capacities to aspire to a different way of life. Unequal futures are bleak futures, whether for individuals, communities, nations or the globe.   Towards a more equal future   So how can unequal futures become equal futures? The Report helps to widen the current focus on inequality and its consequences, to consider greater equality and how it can be achieved - and how action by governments, civil society, businesses and citizens can make a difference.   As the report highlights, there is much to learn from the countries which have managed to achieve reduction, or at least stabilisation, in levels of inequality during particular periods – whether those in East Asia during the 1990s or in Latin America during the first decade of the 2000s.   There are also many examples from around the world of rule-changing measures in trade and finance, taxation and asset distribution, work and employment, education, health care, social protection and housing which can contribute to reducing economic inequalities.   Policies and legal changes to widen access to services and reduce discrimination have key roles to play in addressing social, gender and political inequalities, while reforms to land and resource access and control are critical in reducing environmental inequalities. The list goes on.   But what is clear is that rule-changes have sometimes worked on only some aspects of inequality, or only for a period, or have had unintended negative effects. Overall, sustained success is more likely when there is a package of measures that form a coherent whole, in a context of relative economic and political stability, and shared concern and commitment amongst governments and citizens.   And there is clearly no one size fits all; policy mixes will need to be different for and adapted to particular countries and regions, reflecting their histories and contexts.   In a globally connected world, they will need to align with reforms to international governance and social policy to address drivers of inequality within and between countries, for example through tax cooperation, favourable trade agreements, strengthened social rights, carefully targeted aid packages and effective regulation of the international financial system.   How citizen action can drive change   Policy and regulation are not the only responses to inequality. While the vicious circle of multiple inequalities can create a sense of powerlessness leading to inaction, it can also create its own response, stimulating demands and action from citizens.   Thus in India, Indonesia, Ethiopia and Brazil, we see local initiatives empowering poor and vulnerable adults, especially women, to diversify their income sources and access microcredit, in the process building solidarity and self-help networks.   In South Africa, grass-roots mobilization and political action has helped to break down deeply connected economic, social and political inequalities.   In Brazil, public participation in the country’s ‘Zero Hunger’ effort was crucial in pushing for its turnaround to reduce inequality in the early 2000s.   New alliances of stakeholders can also be important in building broad support for change. In Egypt, the mobilisation of doctors, patient groups and political forces was crucial in bringing about legal changes towards universal health coverage.   Such efforts from below may start small, but they may also multiply, spread and scale up to have large-scale impacts, especially when combined with rule changes and actions involving states and market actors. Small pathways can thus coalesce to become the highways and motorways and offer visions of a more equal future.   * Access the report: http://en.unesco.org/wssr2016 http://bit.ly/2do5jIR http://www.ids.ac.uk/news/unchecked-inequalities-could-threaten-the-global-goals   * Executive Summary here: http://bit.ly/2chTIGO   http://bit.ly/2f6cDKM http://bit.ly/2ePmUGc http://bit.ly/2dHeLrc http://sd.iisd.org/category/sdgs/goal-10-reduced-inequalities/ http://sd.iisd.org/sdg-news/ http://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/sustainable-development-goals/ http://bit.ly/29Awr0C http://bit.ly/29y960L http://bit.ly/2czZQ29 http://bit.ly/RvL8cr   * External link: The Spotlight report is an independent CSO report on the 2030 Agenda with a focus on Inequality: http://www.2030spotlight.org/ Visit the related web page
	Respecting planetary boundaries to achieve sustainability and resilience for all by UNEP, WWF, IIED, Poverty Environment Partnership   07 August 2016   Eight months into 2016, humans have already spent Earth’s ecological budget for the year.   Earth Overshoot Day – the approximate date when humanity’s annual demand on nature exceeds what Earth can regenerate in that year – is on the 8th of August this year, according to the Global Footprint Network.   As global consumption rises, we are emitting more carbon dioxide into the atmosphere than our oceans and forests can absorb, and we are depleting fisheries and harvesting forests more quickly than they can reproduce and regrow.   Put simply, at its current rate, the estimated level of resources and ecosystem services we require to support human activities exceeds what the Earth can provide – to continue living like this, we would require over 1.6 planets.   “Nature''s services are crucial to our well-being, prosperity and happiness, and to our very survival. So we must shift from being irresponsible exploiters to careful stewards and good managers of the planet’s essential, finite resources,” said Marco Lambertini, Director General, WWF International in a statement published on overshootday.org.   An ecological overshoot is possible only for a limited time before ecosystems begin to degrade and possibly collapse. Sixteen years ago, in 2000, Earth Overshoot Day fell in late September.   Earth Overshoot Day must serve as a stark reminder of the actions we need to urgently take on an individual, country and global level to respect planetary boundaries and achieve sustainability and resilience for all.   http://bit.ly/2aFe1CR http://www.overshootday.org/ http://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/planetary-boundaries/planetary-boundaries-data.html   20 July 2016   Worldwide Extraction of Materials Triples in Four Decades, Intensifying Climate Change and Air Pollution. (UNEP)   Rising consumption fuelled by a growing middle class has seen the amount of primary materials extracted from the Earth triple in the last four decades, according to a new report by the United Nations Environment Programme-hosted International Resource Panel (IRP).   The dramatic increase in the use of fossil fuels, metals and other materials will intensify climate change, increase air pollution, reduce biodiversity and ultimately lead to the depletion of natural resources, causing worrying shortages of critical materials and heightening the risk of local conflicts, warns the report.   "The alarming rate at which materials are now being extracted is already having a severe impact on human health and people''s quality of life," said IRP Co-Chair Alicia Bárcena Ibarra. "It shows that the prevailing patterns of production and consumption are unsustainable.   "We urgently need to address this problem before we have irreversibly depleted the resources that power our economies and lift people out of poverty. This deeply complex problem, one of humanity''s biggest tests yet, calls for a rethink of the governance of natural resource extraction to maximize its contribution to sustainable development at all levels."   The information on material flows contained in the new report complements economic statistics, identifies the scale and urgency of global environmental issues and supports the monitoring of the progress countries are making towards achieving the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).   The amount of primary materials extracted from the Earth rose from 22 billion tonnes in 1970 to a staggering 70 billion tonnes in 2010, with the richest countries consuming on average 10 times as many materials as the poorest countries and twice as much as the world average.   If the world continues to provide housing, mobility, food, energy and water in the same way as today, by 2050 the planet''s nine billion people would require 180 billion tonnes of material every year to meet demand. This is almost three times today''s amount and will likely raise the acidification and eutrophication of the world''s soils and water bodies, increase soil erosion and lead to greater amounts of waste and pollution.   The report also ranks countries by the size of their per-capita material footprints - the amount of material required for final demand in a country, an indicator that sheds light on the true impact of a country on the global natural resource base. It is also a good proxy for the material standard of living in a country.   Europe and North America, which had annual per capita material footprints of 20 and 25 tonnes in 2010, are at the top of the table. By comparison, China had a material footprint of 14 tonnes per capita and Brazil 13 tonnes.   The annual per-capita material footprint for Asia-Pacific, Latin America and the Caribbean, and West Asia is between 9 and 10 tonnes. Africa''s footprint is below 3 tonnes per capita.   Global material use has rapidly accelerated since 2000 as emerging economies like China undergo industrial and urban transformations that require unprecedented amounts of iron, steel, cement, energy and construction materials.   Since 1990, there has been little improvement in global material efficiency. In fact, efficiency started to decline around 2000. The global economy now needs more material per unit of GDP than it did at the turn of the century because production has shifted from material-efficient economies such as Japan, South Korea and Europe to far less material-efficient economies like China, India and South East Asia. This has led to an increase in environmental pressure for every unit of economic activity.   The report, Global Material Flows and Resource Productivity, presents various ways the world can maintain economic growth and increase human development while reducing the amount of primary materials it uses to achieve this.   Decoupling escalating material use from economic growth is the "imperative of modern environmental policy and essential for the prosperity of human society and a healthy natural environment", states the IRP, which is a consortium of 34 internationally renowned scientists, over 30 national governments and other groups.   Decoupling, which will be necessary for countries to achieve the SDGs, requires well-designed policies. Investments in research and development, combined with better public policy and financing, will be essential. This will create significant economic opportunities for inclusive and sustained economic growth and job creation.   But increasing material efficiency alone is not enough. By lowering costs, greater efficiency will allow for higher economic growth and perhaps hamper efforts to reduce overall material demand. The IRP recommends putting a price on primary materials at extraction in order to reflect the social and environmental costs of resource extraction and use while reducing the consumption of materials. The extra funds generated could then be invested in R&D in resource intensive sectors of the economy.   Looking to the future, the IRP warns that low-income countries will require increasing quantities of materials to achieve the same level of development experienced by high-income countries. This expanding demand for materials will possibly contribute to local conflicts like those seen in areas where mining competes with agriculture and urban development. http://bit.ly/2a2FOes   July 2016   Poverty Environment Partnership issues call to action on 2030 Agenda   The Poverty Environment Partnership (PEP) has launched a new report calling for the mainstreaming of poverty, environment and climate issues at the heart of efforts to implement the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the 2030 Agenda.   The report, entitled Getting to Zero, proposes a "triple vision" of zero extreme poverty, zero net climate emissions, and zero net loss of natural assets.   The Partnership launched the paper in July, at an event at the High-level Political Forum on Sustainable Development (HLPF). The forum is the key United Nations platform for reviewing the 2030 Agenda and the SDGs.   The Poverty Environment Partnership (PEP) is an alliance of nearly 30 international organisations committed to ending extreme poverty while sustaining the environment. The meeting featured speakers from Bangladesh, Bhutan, UNDP and Finland. Panelists discussed how the links between poverty, environment and climate need to be addressed to ensure that ''no one is left behind''.   The report says poverty, environment and climate linkages must no longer be marginalised if the 2030 Agenda is to be achieved. It emphasises that urgent action is required now in order to achieve the necessary structural reform to enable poor countries to take the 17 SDGs to scale.   The report recommends:   Increased empowerment and rights for women and men suffering extreme poverty, giving them the chance to control their future   Integrated institutions: developing integrated, inclusive and transformative institutions – including for collective action on multiple systemic risks and opportunities   Inclusive finance and business: reforming private and public investment – to better engage with the people and environments marginalised by current policy   New messages and metrics: improving and aligning poverty, environment and climate messages, narratives and metrics – to inspire widespread understanding of poverty, environment and climate issues, and to galvanise and measure progress.   Paul Steele, chief economist at IIED and PEP coordinator said: "Getting to Zero provides a clear and simple message for reaching integrated development that ends poverty, climate change and loss of natural assets. It puts the needs of people in poverty at the front and in the centre of country implementation plans while highlighting the urgent structural reforms needing to be tackled."   The report calls for action from 2015 to 2030 to ensure poverty, environment and climate issues are fully integrated during the ''SDGs era''.   http://bit.ly/2bd0pKy http://www.iied.org/poverty-environment-partnership-issues-call-action-2030-agenda   Why social inclusion matters for green growth, by Yvo de Boer and Andrew Norton   Ordinary people in many parts of the developing world are feeling more and more left out. While hundreds of millions have been lifted out of extreme poverty since the 1990s, particularly in places like China and Latin America, many have stayed behind.   The gap between the rich and poor has grown, and is widening. About 20 per cent of developing country populations as a whole still live on less than US$1.25 per day – at least one billion people.   Lack of income translates directly to lack of access to basic services and resources. According to the United Nations, the poorest children in developing countries are still up to three times more likely to die before their fifth birthday than children of well-off families.   Confidence has been falling in the ability of governments to manage their economies in ways that provide for a prosperous, sustainable, and healthy society. In short, these economies – whether robust or not – are not doing much for ordinary people, and policy is failing to deliver sustainable, so-called "inclusive" prosperity.   Mainstreaming green growth   One of the positive things to result from the global economic crisis of 2008 was to make the concept of "green growth" a bit more mainstream. This was mostly evident in the numerous short-term "green stimulus" packages that governments adopted to shore up weakened industries, invest in green projects and sectors, such as renewable energy, and promote both long- and short-term boosts to jobs.   The inclusive, social side of economic stimulus played a key role in ensuring successful economic turnaround, and in many respects it worked.   Giving it a historical perspective, green growth takes the economic growth model that has endured since the start of the industrial age, and seeks to turn it inside out. This has meant taking a hard look at laissez faire economics and being much more deliberate in ensuring "external" costs are fully internalised in national economies by planning more strategically.   Success is measured not only by profits and economic gain, but also by overall advances in social and environmental value, including job creation, poverty reduction, and sustainable use of natural resources.   The global community has been making progress in promoting green growth as a smarter, better, more successful model of economic growth. But implementing it has been easier said than done. In practice, many socially inclusive initiatives have been left on the sidelines, and overarching social crisis persists.   In OECD countries, income stagnation for most of the population runs in stark contrast to soaring incomes and wealth of the elite, creating challenging conditions for democratic governance. This has in turn led to an upsurge in populist political movements – on both the left and the right.   In middle and low-income countries, while growth rates held up better after 2008, extreme poverty has changed little and still remains unacceptably high worldwide. In Sub-Saharan Africa in particular, growth has not brought proportionate reductions in poverty, where 388 million people still lived in poverty as of 2012.   The Global Green Growth Institute (GGGI), the Green Economy Coalition (GEC), and IIED have been working together to bring poverty, social development, and inclusive green growth to the forefront of economic debate.   Our joint report on pro-poor, inclusive green growth makes a simple argument. For green growth to really fulfil its promise, to improve on the economic growth model of the past, it needs to focus on people.   It needs to tackle the poverty, inequality, and exclusion that constrain both growth and environmental sustainability, to realise women''s and men''s aspirations, and to gain broad societal support. Without this integrated approach, stand-alone green growth projects and investments will not lead to real transformation.   Putting inclusive green growth into practice requires four basic things: inclusive governance that fosters communication between citizens and government; policies that strengthen the livelihoods of poor people, secure their rights, and ensures they benefit from green transformations; reforms to financial systems to drive investment; and tools to measure and track this progress.   Despite the odds, some real successes are taking hold around the world. In South Africa, environmental job schemes provide social protection for poor people while helping to preserve wetlands and biodiversity. Indonesia has effectively slashed fossil fuel subsidies while moving the saving towards more publicly appealing health insurance and conditional cash payments for the poor.   Rwanda has piloted a model for ecotourism that shares revenues locally and improves conservation. And strong public consultation in Mexico meant that the poorest communities benefited from new renewable energy investments.   Taking these successes much further, in 2015 the global community achieved two landmarks for sustainable development. The sustainable development goals (SDGs) provide a comprehensive framework for guiding development progress and recognise the simultaneous need for growth, prosperity, peace, environmental protection, and reducing inequality.   The Paris Agreement on climate change is the first legal instrument with global reach designed to halt planetary warming and protect the poorest people and countries from its negative impacts.   Practical strategies for promoting pro-poor socially inclusive green growth will be the subject of several major events taking place during the forthcoming Global Green Growth Week in Jeju, South Korea from September 5-9. This will bring together more than a thousand government ministers, United Nations officials, researchers, private sector leaders, and experts to move the inclusive green growth agenda forward, through new partnerships, initiatives, and commitments to action.   The progressive global agreements on the SDGs and climate change provide a strong global framework for sustainable development.   But ultimately they will not work unless national politics backs them up, and we need leaders to seize the opportunities now available at the international level to mobilise financing and make smarter, greener investments in their long-term development.   There is more need than ever to develop policies and commitments that can deliver inclusive green growth. Everyone will gain, and millions will finally escape extreme poverty – and finally feel included.   * Yvo de Boer is director-general of the Global Green Growth Institute and served as executive secretary of the United National Framework Convention on Climate Change from 2006-10; Andrew Norton is director of IIED.   http://www.iied.org/why-social-inclusion-matters-for-green-growth http://www.iied.org/tag/sustainable-development-goals-sdgs http://www.iied.org/tag/leave-no-one-behind Visit the related web page
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