New village models : examining the sustainability of existing realities and hypothetical visions

Zavoj is a mountain village in the Republic of Macedonia. While the village has become a site of emigration due to the mass exodus of its inhabitants, new house constructions have appeared. Scattered through deteriorating vernacular dwellings are new houses, and new fragments of houses attached to old houses. These new houses and house-fragments are introduced by emigrants returning to the village temporarily, and not by the remaining local village inhabitants. In the new millennium their number has dramatically increased. Migration has produced an incongruous mixture of architectures giving rise to questions about sustainable development in relation to new constructions in traditional environments? New buildings in the village are symptomatic of a much more universal phenomenon that is transforming vast rural landscapes into loosely urbanized regions. In contrast to this existing reality, a program in the Faculty of Architecture, Ss. Kiril & Metodij University, Skopje, Republic of Macedonia, is exploring alternative visions for the revitalization of the village. Can these offer more sustainable design approaches to the village? This paper examines sustainability in the dialectic between new constructions in existing villages and hypothetical visions for the new village.

Corporate sustainability : greenwash or a path to sustainable capitalism?

The problems of unsustainable development and the increased-awareness of corporate power in the global era have contributed to an agenda of corporate citizenship. This thesis explores the meanings and practices that fall under the banner of the triple bottom line of corporate citizenship through forty-two in-depth interviews with representatives from the corporate sector and NGO sector (including trade unions) in Australia. This purposive sample includes a specific range of corporate industries and NGO types, all of which have involvement with various areas of sustainability. Interviewees described their feelings and experiences in relation to the concept of the triple bottom line, the potential and limitations of this type of sustainability and the purpose and impacts of partnerships between NGOs and the corporate sector. On the basis of this research, this thesis argues that corporate citizenship is at best, a set of initiatives for making minor adjustments to the way companies perform their day-to-day operations and at worst, a program for improving corporate image rather than performance and for shifting the agenda of sustainable development toward corporate interests. While radical steps are required to achieve a sustainable society and environment, the terms of corporate citizenship offer very limited opportunities for change. The self-regulatory and market based model of citizenship does not challenge the impact of consumerism or the legitimacy of particular industry types and their products, except where threats are perceived to the longevity of the companies involved. Furthermore, while the exploitation of the environment and society has occurred as a result of corporate self-interest, corporate citizenship is justified on the same basis. The self-interest rationale and the tyranny of the economic bottom line in particular, substantially limit the fields of responsibility that can be included in the citizenship paradigm. While there are undoubtedly some well-intentioned corporate representatives who are working toward attaining a more sustainable corporate culture, the discourse is primarily used to shift the sustainable development agenda toward corporate paradigms and interests.

Sustainability in online communities of practice : the case study of a group of Secondary School Educators in Victoria

This paper reports on Information Technology (IT) secondary school educators in Victoria and their involvement in an online community of practice. It examined the social effects of the online mailing list technology on their participation and factors that influenced their collaboration with other colleagues. In mapping these elements, the motivations of educators and the effects on online communities of practice can be distilled and then used to build and sustain other architectures of participation. It was found that mailing list subscribers seem to trade a currency of support, thoughts, ideas and answers, which helped them in their day-to-day teaching. Online communities of practice provide a convenient way to keep up professional networks while continuing to stay abreast with subject specific knowledge and skills. The findings of this case study may be generalised to other educational mailing lists to guide designers and managers and inspire educators to join and ultimately benefit from these text based online environments.

They talk the talk, but do they walk the walk? sustainability acceptance is low in German and New Zealand firms

Through the International Sustainability Acceptance Measurement (ISAM), we intend to better understand the level of acceptance of sustainability as a practical management tool in business around the world (www.worldreply.com). It was observed by others that sustainability concepts often stay on a rather general level where it is hard to identify specific indicators and the potential for future development.i In an effort to contrast the level of sustainability in the ISAM countries, the participating universities analyze their respective country data and then co-operate to benchmark and compare this information around the globe. This makes the ISAM work one of the few world-spanning efforts to look at the practical implementation of sustainability.

The sustainability of Fiji's budget deficit : an econometric analysis

The sustainability of Fiji's budget deficit is examined here within the framework of inter-temporal budget constraint theory, where government revenue is modelled as a function of government expenditure. An error-correction mechanism test for cointegration finds that government revenue and expenditure are cointegrated, which provides some support for the position that Fiji's budget deficit is sustainable in the long run. It is argued that more government expenditure on capital investment will ensure a broader revenue base and reduce the risk of a budget deficit explosion.

Using building adaptation to deliver sustainability in Australia

Purpose – This paper seeks to establish the rationale for existing office building adaptation within Melbourne, Australia, as the city strives to become carbon neutral by 2020. The problems faced by policy makers to determine which buildings have the optimum adaptation potential are to be identified and discussed.

Design/methodology/approach – This research adopts the approach of creating a database of all the buildings in the Melbourne CBD including details of physical, social, economic and technological attributes. This approach will determine whether relationships exist between attributes and the frequency of building adaptation or whether triggers to adaptation can be determined.

Findings – This research provided evidence that a much faster rate of office building adaptation is necessary to meet the targets already set for carbon neutrality. The findings demonstrate that a retrospective comprehensive examination of previous adaptation in the CBD is a unique and original approach to determining the building characteristics associated with adaptation and whether triggers can be identified based on previous practices. The implication is that a decision-making tool should be developed to allow policy makers to target sectors of the office building stock to deliver carbon neutrality within the 2020 timeframe.

Practical implications – Drastic reductions in greenhouse gas emissions are required to mitigate global warming and climate change and all stakeholders should be looking at ways of reducing emissions from existing stock.

Originality/value – This paper adds to the existing body of knowledge by raising awareness of the way in which the adaptation of large amounts of existing stock can be fast tracked to mitigate the impact of climate change and warming associated with the built environment, and in addition it establishes a framework for a decision-making tool for policy makers.

Acceptability, impact and sustainability of the national pilot quality assurance system for self management programs

Chronic condition self-management education and training interventions such as the Stanford Self Management Programs (SMP) have the capacity to improve health and quality of life of people with chronic conditions whilst reducing the use of health services. This is in line with the outcomes from the recent Council of Australian Governments’ meeting where it was indicated that self-management will be a centrepiece in forthcoming chronic disease initiatives.
Aim: report on a large national pilot quality assurance program involving the implementation and of an evaluation and quality monitoring system for SMPs including the provision of structured feedback to courses course leaders and service providers. During 2005/06 the quality assurance program was implemented at 11 diverse organisations across Australia. The program involved assisting organisations apply the 42-item Health Education Impact Questionnaire (HEIQ), a chronic disease health education outcome measure, and then observe and evaluate the value and impact of the quality program. Interviews with course leaders (n=60) and course participants (n=35) have elicited views about course quality and feedback processes.
Results: The evaluation revealed enablers and barriers to effective implementation and sustainability. Important enablers were:
- Course Leaders and organisations valued an Australia-wide system that provided feedback on course
quality and the impact on participants.
- Course Leaders were strongly personally motivated to respond appropriately to HEI-Q course
report feedback.
- Completing the questionnaire provided participants with the opportunity to reflect on issues that
emerge in the course content and reflect on their progression at the end of the SSMP.
Sustainability issues included:
- Organisations and course leaders require support, training and flexibility on how to administer and
manage the use of the HEI-Q.
- Availability of administrative resources in organisations to support the quality assurance activities.
- The requirement that course leaders are trained in interpreting HEI-Q course report data.
A quality improvement framework was developed which identified the actions required of key stakeholders to
support effective implementation.
Discussion: With the increasing endorsement of SMP across sectors it is important that course quality is known, is acceptable, and is communicated to stakeholders to inform and engender confidence in the SSMP. To effectively implement and sustain a quality improvement program for SMP, the processes and tools for measuring outcomes need to be responsive, flexible and easily integrated into the organisation and delivery of programs.

Delivering sustainability through the adaptive reuse of commercial buildings : the Melbourne CBD challenge

The City of Melbourne is aiming to be carbon neutral by 2020 (Arup 2008) and have set a target of adapting twelve hundred commercial buildings to incorporate sustainability initiatives to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from the sector (AECOM 2008). In order to meet this target the City of Melbourne is taking a proactive approach to establish strategies to deliver sustainability in the built environment within the 2020 timeframe. With regards to upgrading and building maintenance 71% of investment is used for such works (Department of the Environment 2008) and the total Australian property stock was worth over $6 trillion in June 2008. Given that building services in commercial buildings typically lasts between 20-30 years and the average age of the stock is 31 years – it appears that many properties are due for adaptation and there is major opportunity for adaptation that alleviates the impact of global warming and climate change.

Uncertainty surfaces such as; how much adaptation of existing stock is typically undertaken? And is the target of 1200 adaptations before 2020 achievable? Furthermore how could the City identify which buildings are most probable to be adapted prior to 2020? This paper details the configuration of a database of Melbourne buildings populated with data about physical, social, economic legislative and environmental attributes. There is a discussion about how the database will be used to determine; how much adaptive reuse has been undertaken historically; if any triggers to adaptation can be identified; and whether any relationships between adaptation physical, social, economic, legislative and environmental attributes and adaptation exist. The relevance of this research is obvious to all policy makers where adaptation of existing commercial buildings is perceived a as key component of delivering sustainability.

Universiti Sains Malaysia and the engagement with sustainability and civil society within globalization

According to some commentators, the dynamics and forces of globalization have lead to a radical rethink in respect to the role of the university in contemporary society. This rethink has taken several guises. For some it involves the radical privatization of universities. For others it involves the democratization of  universities. Universities exist therefore in a globalized world that is increasingly interconnected and where space and time are increasingly narrowed and  accelerated. Within these broad phenomenons’s neo-liberal globalization entails the increasing need to produce profit and the expansion of the logic of neo-liberal hegemony in education in the guise of reframing education as a service industry. The contradictions that characterize Malaysia s engagement with globalization at a national level manifest in debates over globalization and Higher Education. The most pertinent issue in regards to this relates to the problem of sustainability. In the context of neo-liberal globalization sustainability contradicts the fundamental essence of consumption. The idea of human beings as first and foremost  consumers of things is a normative ideal at odds with the concept of a  sustainable future. At a very basic philosophical level the concept and normative project of neo-liberal capitalism and globalization is tied to a concept of individual possessiveness and consumption that radically challenges cultures that do not share such possessively individualistic precepts. Marketization in Malaysian universities must be tempered by also connecting universities to civil society in such a way that tempers both extremes of the state and market and allows a more sustainable relationship between the social frameworks within which it operates.