SDG Academy Library

12:03

Virtue Ethics as a Multi-Religious Consensus

In this chapter, William Vendley finds the points of consensus between religious traditions, and shows how religious communities are well-positioned in terms of both spirituality and infrastructure to play a role in sustainable development. This video is licensed under the CC BY-NC-SA license.

06:52

"Do No Harm": The Rise of New Humanitarianism

How we understand humanitarianism has been changing. People have been reconsidering whether we should be more selective in terms of who we give aid to after the Rwandan genocide of 1994. Since the Kosovo War in 1998-1999, there are claims that militaristic interventions are now often "dressed up" as humanitarian interventions, leading some actors to question the principles of humanitarianism. Neutrality has also become an issue. Humanitarians act on short-term scale to alleviate…

07:17

Sustainable Development and Rights

In 2000, the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) set the international policy framework for development across the globe. Critiques of the MDGs are that they were top-down; had a lack of participation; and are a service-based, not rights-based, agenda. These were replaced by the Sustainable Development Goals, which bring together the environmental, economic, and social aspects of the development agenda. Climate change will affect the world’s most vulnerable populations, as will population…

11:52

Getting to Know the SDGs

An introduction to the course Transforming Our World: Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals. Jeffrey Sachs profiles the history of the sustainable development agenda, from the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro, to the creation and implementation of the Millennium Development Goals, to the adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals in 2015. The chapter provides a brief overview of what each of the 17 Sustainable Development Goals are and how to achieve their associated 169 targets. This…

12:33

How a Company Decides to Invest in a Project

This chapter overviews investments in oil, gas and mining projects. It includes a comparison of private and state ventures. Sources of income include: cash from existing projects and retained earnings, bank borrowings against the corporate balance sheet, or project finance specifically loaned against the capacity of that project. The chapter also details the various analyses and assessments done by companies technical, social, governmental, and financial. Sir Mark Moody Stuart stresses that…

07:44

Equality of Opportunity

Non-discrimination is an interesting concept in law; Joshua Castellino argues that in society, some discrimination is perfectly justifiable. Unjustifiable discrimination occurs in the context of marginalized groups as a consequence of a person’s identity, not necessarily ability. Tools for nondiscrimination need to promote equality of opportunity for all. Societies put in place measures like affirmative action to try to remedy this, though these are only temporary solutions. This video…

02:23

What is Climate Change?

Introduces the idea of climate change, highlighting the difference between weather and climate, and the history of natural climate change versus man-made climate change. Climate change is arguably the greatest challenge of our time. Human activity has already warmed the planet by one degree Celsius relative to pre-industrial times, and we are feeling the effects through record heat waves, droughts, wildfires and flooding. If we continue to burn fossil fuels at the current rate, the planet will…

15:37

Aggregate Demand with Flexible Exchange Rate

In this chapter, Professor Sachs discusses international trade and how it is affected by the exchange rate, which is in turn affected by financial flows and the differences of interest rates at home and abroad. There are two ways to manage the exchange rates of a country, namely by supply and demand, or by the central bank setting the price. This is explained using the case of exchange rate of Renminbi to the US dollar, as managed by the People’s Bank of China. Countries have the right…

13:38

Introduction to SDG 15

This chapter provides an overview of the nine targets associated with SDG 15, which relates to terrestrial ecosystems or Life on Land. The targets focus on: preserving freshwater, sustainably managing deforestation, combating desertification, preserving mountain forests, preventing the extinction of threatened species, sharing benefits, reducing the impact of invasive alien species, and integrating ecosystem biodiversity values. Forests are not static; they go through a history of disturbances…