7th International Conference on Sustainability Science (ICSS)

In 2017, the 7th International Conference on Sustainability Science (ICSS) will be held in Stockholm, organized by The University of Tokyo Institutes for Advanced Study (UTIAS) Integrated Research System for Sustainability Science (IR3S), Future Earth, and Stockholm Resilience Centre. The conference has been designed to dovetail with the Resilience Conference taking place in Stockholm 24-26 August, and intends to create productive and innovative interactive sessions by bringing together the resilience scholar community and the sustainability science community.

The 7th ICSS will focus on new knowledge generation and integration to support the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and how this knowledge is implemented by society.

The conference will have two types of sessions:
1. SDG Labs (open call)
2. Future Earth Knowledge Action Networks (invitation)

At the 2015 United Nations General Assembly, 193 UN member states unanimously adopted the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, a global development agenda that lays out 17 Global Goals for Sustainable Development (SDGs) to be achieved by 2030. The SDGs, which came into effect in January 2016, are a universal set of goals, targets and indicators that set out quantitative objectives across the social, economic, and environmental dimensions of sustainable development. Addressing critical sustainability issues such as poverty, climate change, inequality, economic development and ecosystem protection, the SDGs will be implemented in all countries, across different territorial scales. (Addressing critical sustainability issues such as poverty, climate change, inequality, economic development and ecosystem protection, sustainable natural capital management for the future is the first measure for implementing SDGs in all countries, across different territorial scales.)

The conference ICSS 2017 – “Global Goals – new approaches to knowledge generation -challenges and solutions from local to global scales” will be the first larger international conference that will bring together the academic research community with other stakeholders to address the challenges of implementing the Global Goals. The conference will be designed to 1) analyse mechanisms for new knowledge generation and mechanisms for integrating knowledge (anchored in natural capital management) to support the implementation of the (broad set of) Global Goals and 2) to further develop interactive interfaces among the global Future Earth research community and networks in the context of analysing and implementing the Sustainable Development Goals with special focus on managing natural capital.

The three-day conference will include a day on policy and co-design of questions involving policy makers and business representatives and be followed by sessions on how we develop answers and solutions to these questions. This work will be a critical contribution towards collaborative research between OECD countries. The conference will lead to publication through Sustainability Science and a Springer e-book designed for use by stakeholders.