Introduction. "Competences for Sustainable Development"

Complex Dynamics Group, Institute for Theoretical Physics

• What are “Competences for Sustainable Development”?
• What do we try to teach in the present course?

In 2015 the UN agreed upon 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) that aim to transform our world to substantially improve the living conditions of live on Earth by 2030. The Introduction to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development states

However, not everybody agrees that we are successful in this endeavor.

• In his 2015 Ted Talk the economist Michael Green argued that the goals can be met. However, not with business as usual.
• In 2019 Greta Thunberg complained at the UN Climate Action Summit that “You have stolen my dreams and my childhood with your empty words.[…] And all you can talk about is money and fairytales of eternal economic growth. How dare you!”
• Also in 2019 the award-winning writer and journalist Naomi Klein argues in her book On Fire that the transition to a better world will require a Green New Deal, and she popularizes this idea with am Emmy nominated video “Message from the Future”.
• In 2020 the Euopean Union implements an European Green Deal, and the European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen announces that this will be “Europe’s man on the moon moment.”
• Previous students of the module argued that “Sustainable Development” is an oxymoron.

In this introductory lecture I will discuss the aims and the setup of the course:

• What are “Competences for Sustainable Development”?
• What do we try to teach in the present course?

I also hope to learn about the attendents own point of view and potential engagements.

• Rachel Carson (1962): Silent Spring. Houghton Mifflin.
• Hannah Arendt (1963). Eichmann in Jerusalem: A Report on the Banality of Evil. New York: Viking Press.
• Ernst Friedrich Schumacher (1973): Small Is Beautiful: A Study of Economics As If People Mattered. Blond & Briggs
• James E. Lovelock (1979). Gaia: A New Look at Life on Earth. New York: Oxford University Press.
• Gerald O. Barney, ed. (1980): The Global 2000 Report to the President (US Government Printing Office); bzw. die dt. Übersetzung Global 2000 (Zweitausendeins, 1980)
• Rebecca Solnit (2004): Hope in the Dark. Untold Histories. Wild Possibilities. New York: Nation Books.
• Tim Flanney (2005): The Weather Makers: Our Changing Climate and What it Means for Life on Earth. London: Penguin Press
• Bjørn Lomborg (2007): Cool It! The Skeptical Environmentalist's Guide to Global Warming. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.
• Naomi Klein (2019): On Fire The (Burning) Case for a Green New Deal. New York: Simon & Schuster.
• Clair Cane Miller (1 Dec 2018): How to Be More Empathetic (New York Times)

• Theodor W. Adorno (Talk on 6 Apr 1967): Aspekte des neuen Rechtsradikalismus. in (2019): Collected Works. Berlin: Suhrkamp.
• Philipp Blom (2017): Was auf dem Spiel steht. München: Carl Hanser.
• Klaus Dörre (14 Jan 2022): Alle reden vom Klima Perspektiven sozial-ökologischer Transformation. in Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte 3-4/2021. Themenheft zu Green New Deals
• Ulrike Herrmann (2022): Das Ende des Kapitalismus. Köln: Kiepenhauer & Witsch.

• Social Development pages of the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, and their pages spelling out the goals
• World Economic Forum (13 Jan 2021): 14 innovative projects helping to save the planet and make the world a better place
• Social Progress Imperative (2023): 2023 Just Transition Score
• Global Social Progress Index (2024): 2024 Social Progress Index
• ISO standard on sustainable procurement
• University of Leipzig (2024): Nachhaltigkeitsstrategie und Nachhaltigkeitsbericht

• Robert Ehrlich (2001): Nine Crazy Ideas in Science: A Few Might Even Be True. Princeton: Princeton UP.
• Randall Munroe (2014): What if?. London: John Murray.
• Alvin E. Roth (2015): Who Gets What — and Why: The New Economics of Matchmaking and Market Design. New York: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.

Talk on 17 October 2024 — Ringvorlesung in Winter Term 2024/25