Sustainable Development in the Global Context

Aim

On completion of the course, the student should be able to:

• describe and analyse the various fields of sustainable development from the social, ecological and economic perspective.
• create and conduct a project on a sustainable development issue with the help of relevant scientific information.
• demonstrate analyses of environmental and resource preconditions for global relations. Relate these to a social, political, environmental, and economic framework on a global and local scale.
• critically analyse and discuss the impact of human use of resources in a historical and future perspective.

Content

The awareness of environmental issues has, to a high degree, contributed to an increased attention towards global relationships during the last several years. This course focuses on the question of how global flows of resources, trade, materials and goods have developed, particularly during the post-war period, as well as on how the political and ideological debates on these issues have developed. Additionally, different theories concerning these changes are evaluated. This course is interdisciplinary; both social and natural sciences will be considered in the course, and through laboratory experiments, field excursions, lectures and seminars, students gain a scientific understanding of global environmental problems.