Sustainable Development: Implementation in Urban Water Systems
type: CreativeWork
description: As Sustainable development, a widely used but poorly understood term, challenges traditional scientific values such as prediction and control, scientists have tried to manipulate the concept to promote their own particular agendas. Thus, it has suffered from misrepresentation which has prevented the concept from being fully implemented at a practical level. It is asserted that traditional fragmented and mechanistic science is unable to cope with sustainability issues, and that there is no equilibrium or optimal point for an evolving system since the optimum is also moving. Therefore, approaches advocating engineering, linear, and mechanistic paradigms to define sustainability do not make much sense. Instead, we need to resort to non-linear thinking, more commonly referred to as systems thinking. Thus, System Dynamics, one branch of systems thinking which operates in a whole-system fashion, is put forward as a powerful methodology to deal with the issue. Using a system dynamics approach, the thesis introduces the idea of Viability Loops, the balancing loops in a dynamic system that serve to check the reinforcing mechanisms. It is also argued that sustainability is neither a system state nor a static goal to be achieved. It is an ideal of development efforts in a system. Ideals come from ethics and values, and they are indeed non-quantifiable. Sustainable development is perceived as a dynamic process evolving through a learning process, and not as any kind of optimum or end-state of a system. Neither is it adoptable to strategies based on command and control, fixed goals, and predictability. It, therefore, refers to the goal of fostering adaptive capabilities to respond to changes while simultaneously creating opportunities for the next generation to find a variety of options to meet their needs. The thesis argues that sustainable development is a process in which the Viability Loops are kept healthy. This process deals with evolutionary changes where the end point is…
abstract: As Sustainable development, a widely used but poorly understood term, challenges traditional scientific values such as prediction and control, scientists have tried to manipulate the concept to promote their own particular agendas. Thus, it has suffered from misrepresentation which has prevented the concept from being fully implemented at a practical level. It is asserted that traditional fragmented and mechanistic science is unable to cope with sustainability issues, and that there is no equilibrium or optimal point for an evolving system since the optimum is also moving. Therefore, approaches advocating engineering, linear, and mechanistic paradigms to define sustainability do not make much sense. Instead, we need to resort to non-linear thinking, more commonly referred to as systems thinking. Thus, System Dynamics, one branch of systems thinking which operates in a whole-system fashion, is put forward as a powerful methodology to deal with the issue. Using a system dynamics approach, the thesis introduces the idea of Viability Loops, the balancing loops in a dynamic system that serve to check the reinforcing mechanisms. It is also argued that sustainability is neither a system state nor a static goal to be achieved. It is an ideal of development efforts in a system. Ideals come from ethics and values, and they are indeed non-quantifiable. Sustainable development is perceived as a dynamic process evolving through a learning process, and not as any kind of optimum or end-state of a system. Neither is it adoptable to strategies based on command and control, fixed goals, and predictability. It, therefore, refers to the goal of fostering adaptive capabilities to respond to changes while simultaneously creating opportunities for the next generation to find a variety of options to meet their needs. The thesis argues that sustainable development is a process in which the Viability Loops are kept healthy. This process deals with evolutionary changes where the end point is…
author: Bagheri, Ali
language: eng
keywords: Water Engineering, Miljöteknik, pollution control, Environmental technology, Naturvetenskap, Natural science, Water resources systems, Viability loops, Urban water system, System dynamics, Sustainable development, Strategy, Social learning, Process, Principles, Indicators, Planning, Monitoring, kontroll av utsläpp
date published: 2006
date modified: 2026-07-24T03:00:02Z
provider: University of Lund
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: Department of Water Resources Engineering, Lund Institute of Technology, Lund University