Terri Willard, Project Manager:

"The past 10 years have been an intensive period of partnership-building at all levels, from the local to the global. In 1992, no one really understood the challenges and opportunities that such multi-stakeholder collaborations would bring to sustainable development. One of the most important things we have learned is that neither need nor communications technology alone can catalyze effective partnerships--human trust is the critical element. The next 10 years will show us to what degree that trust can be drawn upon to enable people from around the world to chart a course together through the difficult changes and transitions ahead."

Jason Switzer, Project Officer:

"Today, it is uncontested that conflicts in faraway places can have global impacts, reaching even the main streets of the developed world's financial centres. Globalization of economies, ideas and peoples has found its complement in the globalization of violence. There is no 'over there' anymore. At IISD, we are witness to an emerging body of evidence demonstrating that, on the one hand, rising scarcity of basic natural resources can lead to conflict, and that international trade in valuable natural resources--timber, minerals and rare animals--can be both motive and bankroll for violence. It is time to recognize that unregulated resource extraction and the accelerating flow of goods across borders have serious consequences for security, both for the nation and the individual. Acknowledging the links between social unrest and the management of natural systems will be the 'philosopher's stone' that transforms sustainable development from a luxury good to a global imperative."

Christian Friis Bach, PhD, Board Member:

"The future of sustainable development depends critically on our ability to strengthen the global and binding rules on environmental protection and social redistribution. To do this we must move towards free trade. Not because free trade solves the problems, but because free trade forces us to cooperate. We must strengthen the global organizations. Not to lose sovereignty, but to regain sovereignty. We must link the global negotiations closer together. Not to drown in details, but to confront the complexities."

Ashok Khosla, PhD, Board Member:

"To create a world that is more socially just and environmentally resilient, all its citizens must have access to sustainable livelihoods. In such a world, jobs will have to be created at one hundredth the cost needed today and the productivity of resource use must be raised by at least a factor of 10. This will require very different technologies and a new science of economics. Sustainable industrialization will unquestionably have to be more decentralized, efficient and responsive than it is today--and will need fundamentally different mixes of labour and capital, scales of production, resource pricing and financing systems."

László Pintér, PhD, Senior Project Manager:

"Sustainable development is often described as a three-, sometimes four-legged stool, but I could also describe it as a train trying to run on two tracks. One is a track of rhetoric, theory and declarations, and the other is a track of actions and facts on the ground. One has the feeling that these tracks started diverging soon after Rio. I have little doubt that without convergence --actions catching up with words--we are approaching a major derailment."

Konrad von Moltke, PhD, Senior Fellow:

"Sustainable development is an ideal construct. The current challenge is to identify measures that make it practical. It is easy to overlook the progress of the last decade: tentative steps in many countries, new approaches in industry and commerce, further development of international environmental governance, and a vigorous debate on the role of trade policy and investment. Sustainable development is the only alternative to the 'Washington Consensus,' the macroeconomic perspective on development. It is vital for the future of international relations to make it work."

Pumulo Muyatwa, PhD, Project Officer:

"What we have come to learn is that sustainable development is a complex web of interdependent factors culminating from various disciplines--ecology, economics, anthropology, sociology and psychology, and computer science. Measuring progress towards sustainability in the future will require the application of system science and non-linear dynamics and complex adaptive/simulation models. We will need to first better understand the underlying theory, operationalize the concepts by continuing to develop appropriate metaphors and models, and, finally, measure the progress using appropriate indicators and assessment processes."

Jennifer Castleden, Project Officer:

"Sustainability as a principle is not new; rather, the ideology and practice of over-consumption encouraged by the dominant economic system has displaced our knowledge of sustainable living. In a world fragmented by borders, beliefs and power imbalances, hope, paradoxically, exists in globalization. For one, globalization has brought renewed understanding that the Earth and its inhabitants are inextricably interdependent. Further, through the creation of binding international agreements on one hand, and the increasing exchange of ideas, values and solutions among people on the other, alternatives to over-consumption are re-emerging. We have begun crafting the prologue to a just and equitable era--one which will bridge the chasm between 'sustainable' and 'development.' Indeed, we must."