Traps in Sustainable Development Governance: Reflection on the Fukushima Crisis for Rio+20

With ample warnings of possible nuclear disasters triggered by earthquakes and tsunamis, why could the accident in the Fukushima nuclear power plant not be prevented? During the 40 years since the Stockholm Conference on the Human Environment, four main traps have been identified: security, economic, social, and environmental. These traps are deeply embedded in the paradigm of sustainable development as well as the institutional responses to the tragedy of the commons. For a genuine green economy in the context of sustainable development and poverty alleviation, both philosophical and institutional frameworks for denuclearization must be reconsidered

Global Justice in the Anthropocene: The Fourth Pillar Debate in Sustainable Development

The three main pillars of sustainable development —economic, social, andenvironmental— have been formed and reconfirmed in the 40 years since the1972 UN Conference on Human Development. Many concerned peopleanticipated a fourth pillar that could have created a momentum fortransformative change at the 2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development(Rio+20). However, a fourth pillar has yet to be clearly articulated. I argue thatthe fourth pillar is governance, or an institutional framework based on globalethics in the Anthropocene, which is a newly proposed chronological term ingeology that refers to the epoch in which human activities are causing globalenvironmental instability. To facilitate the establishment of the fourth pillar, it issuggested that the currently negotiated Sustainable Development Goals shouldreflect global justice in the Anthropocene in a way that balances all threedimensions of sustainable development and their linkages. An institutionalframework for sustainable development and global peace should also bereconstructed to facilitate the transformational integration of these pillars

Competition and Cooperation on Environmental Issues in Asia and the Pacific

This article analyzes the complex interplay between competition and cooperation on critical environmental issues on the atmosphere, the biosphere, and the hydrosphere in Asia and the Pacific. For the atmospheric environment, the power transition between the US and China observed over the last three decades impacted the climate change negotiations. In this process, the contention about the Kyoto Protocol was turned into cooperation on the Paris Agreement between the world’s two largest emitters. In the field of the land biosphere, increased resource use for the developed and emerging economies causes degradation and loss of ecosystem services in the megadiverse countries in the region. For life in the hydrosphere, the gaps in scientific knowledge and evidence-based understanding of the causes of overhunting led to Japan’s withdrawal from the International Whaling Commission. Thus, a varied combination of power, economic interests, and ideas can account for the competition–cooperation dynamism in the environmental issues in the AsiaPacific region. It is argued that effective environmental governance requires not only the renewal of cooperation but also innovative and transformative changes in the region