The book gathers 25 essays written by PhD students and alumni of the Agenda 2030 Graduate School. Over the past few months, they have worked together on this project, exploring sustainability from multiple perspectives. While grounded in their doctoral research, the essays are presented in a personal and accessible style.
Four broad themes
The anthology is organised around four broad themes: how the past shapes the present and future; the balance between solving urgent problems and asking critical questions; the interplay of local and global perspectives; and how sustainability can appear both as harmony and as conflict.
The anthology has been edited by Markus Gunneflo, coordinator of the Agenda 2030 Graduate School.
From HIV to veganism
Examples from the book’s contents include:
- The fight against HIV is one of the greatest medical achievements of modern times – over 30 million people are alive today thanks to effective treatment. Yet this success remains fragile. When the United States recently froze its aid, thousands of patients were suddenly left without vital medicines, notes PhD student Ilili Jemal Abdulahi in her chapter “Sustainability in Hindsight: The Balance Between Local and Global Dimensions in the HIV/AIDS Response”. In her research, she highlights the crucial link between global commitment and locally adapted approaches as the basis for more stable and sustainable solutions.
- PhD candidate Naja Yndal Olsen examines sustainability as a matter of relations between humans and other species in her chapter “Sustainability as a Species Relational Issue – Vegan Animal Rights Activism in Denmark”. Through her study of vegans and animal rights advocates in Denmark, she shows how they seek to make visible the animals that are otherwise rendered invisible in sustainability debates – animals often reduced to carbon emissions or market commodities – thereby challenging deeply rooted boundaries between humans and animals.
- How can we light up urban forests so that people feel safe, without disturbing wildlife or wasting energy? PhD candidate Georgios Tsiakiris investigates how different forms of lighting, from fixed installations to head torches, affect both people’s sense of security and the lives of other species. Using digital models of forests, he develops knowledge that can provide practical solutions for sustainable and accessible green areas – locally in today’s cities, but also as a basis for global principles of sustainable urban development.
'Enriching our understanding of sustainability'
Markus Gunneflo, editor of the anthology and coordinator of the Agenda 2030 Graduate School, summarises the book.
'The Agenda 2030 Graduate School was created to bring different disciplines together to work on complex societal challenges. This book is a reflection of that ambition – showing how scholarship on sustainable development is made in an increasing amount of issue areas but also in a multitude of ways,' says Markus Gunneflo.
Alongside the printed edition, the book is available online through Open Books at Lund University as a full download or by individual sections.
Through the Kaleidoscope of Sustainability – 25 essays – books.lub.lu.se
