魅力宜居之城——我们共同的向往

一个好的城市是什么？我非常欣赏城市设计师杨·盖尔对宜居城市的定义：人们热爱待在户外而不是困在家里或者大商场里,人们热爱在人行道上行走、公园漫步或者在公园长凳或者室外咖啡座闲坐。好的城市是一个有趣的城市,是一个让我们喜欢行走、闲坐、玩耍、骑自行车、四处闲逛的城市。     

SUSTAINABLE URBANIZATION: NEEDED POLICY CHANGES FOR INDIA

This paper is concerned with two questions: what is it that is unsustainable about the process of urbanization and growth of cities in developing countries?; and why do countries persist with strategies that are evidently unsustainable? Making use of data from India, which today has the second largest urban population in the world, and taking note of increasing global concern for sustainable urbanization, this paper points out that the developing countries have to move beyond a general acceptance of the concept to see it being put into practice.     

技术创新的可持续发展战略与企业核心技术能力培育

加强技术创新、培育企业核心技术对国企的振兴与发展、企业市场竞争力的提高、产业结构调整下企业经营方式转变、企业可持续性发展能力提高乃至实施国家可持续发展战略都起着至关重要的作用。要实现国企效益的普遍提高 ,必须克服现有企业技术创新系统中存在的科技、经济脱节和技术创新激励机制弱化等问题 ,使企业成为真正的创新主体。     

BOTTOM-UP APPROACH FOR SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITY DEVELOPMENT IN SRI LANKA

Low-income communities, whether in urban or rural areas, need certain basic facilities that are difficult or impossible to acquire either due to poverty or other constraints. Welfare-oriented governments have, therefore, attempted to provide these basic facilities, but not with great success. Recently new approaches have been adopted to improve the situation by encouraging people to become involved in community-level decision making with respect to their needs and to implement the construction of acceptable facilities. The communities would then shoulder a greater responsibility, leading to development with a higher degree of sustainability.     

SUSTAINABLE TECHNOLOGY DEVELOPMENT: THE MOBILE HYDROGEN FUEL CELL

Sustainable technology development implies large changes in technological systems. The illustrative process ‘hydrogen fuel cell in a boat’ is used here as an example of a learning process concerning a transition towards a hydrogen economy. Theoretically the concepts of constructive technology assessment, back-casting and social niche management are combined in this approach.     

2012’未来城市可持续发展论坛暨第十届地产经济主流高峰论坛

未来城市可持续发展论坛暨中国地产经济主流峰会论坛是由中国房地产业协会、中国市长协会指导主办,由中国房地产最具影响力媒体《房地产导刊》联合《广州日报》、《北京青年报》、《天津日报》等权威媒体发起并主办的中国目前规格最高、影响最大的房地产专业论坛和城市发展论坛。     

SUSTAINABLE PENSION REFORM IN INDIA: TOWARDS A MARKET-BASED SYSTEM

Market-based pensions are developing slowly in India because of distorting tax rules and draconian investment regulations. Recent reform proposals point in the right direction but fail to address the fundamental issues. Instead of creating large-scale pension policy blueprints, India needs to develop better tax rules, reduce regulation and let markets develop products to meet the needs of the people.     

DECENTRALIZED PLANNING FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: The Case of Indonesia*

The government of Indonesia frequently has stressed the need for decentralization to achieve effective regional development, but yet has hesitated to proceed because of fears that such action would undermine national unity and disrupt centrally defined national priorities. Furthermore, the entrenched bureaucratic hierarchy, reinforced by the persistence of patrimonialism, would have to surrender its planning and decision making authority to popularly constituted bodies. This paper examines this dilemma and argues that deconcentration of planning and implementation functions to lower administrative levels does not constitute decentralization. The analysis concludes by suggesting that collaboration between government and non-governmental organizations might be the appropriate means for encouraging popular participation for sustainable development.     

PLANNING BY NEGOTIATION FOR SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: A TALE OF TWO HABITATS

In the December 2005 issue of Economic Affairs , a collection of authors considered alternative institutions for planning and managing urban affairs. Following up the idea of 'planning by contract', this paper reflects on the role of negotiation in securing gains from trade over contested local environmental resources. The idea of an obstructive classical planning game is contrasted with the concept of creative negotiation by reference to two case studies.     

FOSTERING SUSTAINABLE COMPLEXITY IN THE MICROFINANCE INDUSTRY: WHICH WAY FORWARD?

The microfinance movement has gained tremendous popularity over the past 30 years, but it is still far from meeting its full potential. The industry stands at a crossroads between increased commercialisation and increased philanthropic aid. Standard economic discourse does little to resolve the debate. F. A. Hayek's concept of the'extended order' sheds new light on how we might understand the future development of microfinance.     

MODELING THE NEXUS BETWEEN SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT AND RENEWABLE ENERGY: THE AFRICAN PERSPECTIVES

Motivated by the gained momentum of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) under the umbrella of the United Nations organization, in the light of the SDG‐7, which stipulates the access to affordable, sustainable, and modern energy, this paper explores the dynamic relationship between renewable energy and the pillars of sustainable development. Its insights are driven using a simultaneous equation model based on a panel of 25 African economies covering the period 1990–2014. The results show that renewable energy is important for sustainable development and that higher levels of renewable energy can increase sustainability. The findings also confirm the positive influence of renewable energy on the economic, environmental, social, and institutional dimensions. These positive effects stem from investment in clean energy in the whole of Africa, combined with structural changes promoting the use of clean energy and the achievement of the millennium development goals. The findings should be useful for policymakers in Africa. Aggressive renewable energy policies will be crucial for achieving energy‐policy goals and the “multiple benefits” of renewable energy, such as reducing climate change and air pollution, improving energy security, and increasing access to energy.     

REINVENTING FOREIGN AID FOR INCLUSIVE AND SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT: KUZNETS,PIKETTY AND THE GREAT POLICY REVERSAL

This survey essay reviews close to 200 papers in arguing that in order to achieve sustainable and inclusive development, foreign aid should not orient developing countries toward industrialization in the perspective of Kuznets but in the view of Piketty. Abandoning the former's view that inequality will fall with progress in industrialization and placing more emphasis on inequality in foreign aid policy will lead to more sustainable development outcomes. Inter alia: mitigate short‐term poverty, address concerns of burgeoning population growth, train recipient governments on inclusive development, fight corruption and mismanagement and avoid the shortfalls of celebrated Kuznets’ conjectures. We discuss how the essay addresses post‐2015 development challenges and provide foreign aid policy instruments with which discussed objectives can be achieved. In summary, the essay provides useful policy measures to avoid past pitfalls. ‘Output may be growing, and yet the mass of the people may be becoming poorer’ (Lewis). ‘Lewis led all developing countries to water, proverbially speaking, some African countries have so far chosen not to drink’ (Amavilah). Piketty has led all developing countries to the stream again and a challenging policy syndrome of our time is how foreign aid can help them to drink.     

BRAND AGRICULTURE AND ECONOMIC GEOGRAPHY: WHEN ARE HIGHLY DIFFERENTIATED PRODUCTS SUSTAINABLE IN THE REMOTE PERIPHERY?

This paper presents a general equilibrium model of new economic geography, incorporating brand agriculture that produces differentiated agricultural products. Focusing on the core‐periphery space, we show that highly differentiated brand agriculture can be sustained in the periphery even when access to the core market is not particularly good. This result supports the promotion of innovative products in rural areas in order to avoid direct price competition in generic commodities markets under unfavorable conditions.     

ARE THE CURRENT ACCOUNT IMBALANCES BETWEEN EMU COUNTRIES SUSTAINABLE? EVIDENCE FROM PARAMETRIC AND NON‐PARAMETRIC TESTS

Using parametric and non‐parametric estimation techniques, we analyze the sustainability of the recently growing current account imbalances in the euro area and test whether the European Monetary Union has aggravated these imbalances. Two alternative criteria for the assessment of external debt sustainability are considered: one based on the transversality condition of intertemporal optimization, and the other based on the stationarity properties of the stochastic process of the debt–GDP ratio. Econometric sustainability tests are performed using the pooled mean‐group estimator and panel unit root tests, respectively. Variants of both test procedures with varying coefficients using penalized splines estimation are applied. We find empirical evidence suggesting that the introduction of the euro is associated with a regime shift from sustainability to unsustainability of external debt accumulation for the euro area. Copyright © 2012 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

CLUSTERING OF THE URBAN FIELD AS A PRECONDITION FOR SUSTAINABLE POPULATION GROWTH IN PERIPHERAL AREAS: THE CASE OF ISRAEL

Analysis of the development of urban communities suggests that sustainable population growth is based on a settlement's ability to attract and retain residents, rather than on natural causes (birth-death rates). In the special case of small, peripheral urban communities, sustained growth was found to be related to the location of the settlement, and in particular to the spatial characteristics of a cluster of urban settlements of which it may be a part. An index of clustering was defined, which allows an analysis of the combined effect on population growth of spatial isolation and distance from major metropolitan centers of the country. Although the present analysis was restricted to urban settlements in Israel, the mode of analysis and its applications for planning policy may be applicable to regional and urban physical planning elsewhere.