Some Remarks for a New Sociological Theory of Sustainability

This paper explores theoretical and methodological strategies for rethinking some principles of sociological theory in the light of the fact that the basic sociological concepts—for instance, time, space, and relations among individuals and groups— could facilitate better observation and understanding of contemporary societies. Thanks to a selected literary review and an analysis of some representative social phenomena—such as the Internet of Things (IoT), Big Data and smart cities—we can hypothesize that sustainability could be an effective strategic paradigm for the exploration of new social structures and processes, and the revision of sociological tools for their analysis, as well as the development of a draft sociology of sustainability. The concept of network is an appropriate starting point. The paper uses an inductive structure that is based, firstly, on the hypothesis that contemporary social analyses of society are inadequate. The frequent use of prefixes and suffixes—added to classical sociological concepts, to describe social actors, processes, and relations—reveals how inconsistent current production of epistemological categories is, as well as how dependent current researchers and scholars are on the legacy of their “fathers.

The POETICs of industrial carbon dioxide emissions in Japan: an urban and institutional extension of the IPAT identity

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>This study applies the POETICs framework (population, organization, environment, technology, institutions and culture) to an analysis of industrial carbon dioxide emissions in Japanese cities. The inclusion of institutional variables in the form of International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives membership, ISO 14001 implementation, and non-profit sector activity addresses the ecological limitations of the often used IPAT (impact = population × affluence × technology) approach.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Results suggest the weak existence of an environmental Kuznets curve, in which the wealthiest cities are reducing their emissions through increased efficiency. Significant institutional impacts are also found to hold in the predicted directions. Specifically, panel and cross-sectional regressions indicate that membership in the International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives and non-profit organizational presence have negative effects on industrial carbon dioxide emissions.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>The presence of institutional drivers at the city level provides empirical support for the POETICs rubric, which recasts the ecological framing of the IPAT identity in a more sociological mold. The results also indicate that Japanese civil society has a role to play in carbon mitigation. More refined studies need to take into consideration an expanded set of methods, drivers, and carbon budgets, as applied to a broader range of cases outside of Japan, to more accurately assess how civil society can bridge the issue of scale that separates local level policy concerns from global level climate dynamics.</p