The Sustainable Development Oxymoron: Quantifying and Modelling the Incompatibility of Sustainable Development Goals

Abstract

In 2015, the UN adopted a new set of Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to eradicate poverty, establish socioeconomic inclusion and protect the environment. Critical voices such as the International Council for Science (ICSU), however, have expressed concerns about the potential incompatibility of the SDGs, specifically the incompatibility of socio-economic development and environmental sustainability. In this paper, we test, quantify and model the alleged inconsistency of SDGs. Our analyses show which SDGs are consistent and which are conflicting. We measure the extent of inconsistency and conclude that the SDG agenda will fail as a whole if we continue with business as usual. We further explore the nature of the inconsistencies using dynamical systems models, which reveal that the focus on economic growth and consumption as a means for development underlies the inconsistency. Our models also show that there are factors which can contribute to development (health programmes, government investment) on the one hand and ecological sustainability (renewable energy) on the other, without triggering the conflict between incompatible SDGs. ARTICLE HISTORY

Are the Sustainable Development Goals self‐consistent and mutually achievable?

“…Finally, we briefly contrast the analysis here with work by Spaiser et al (); see also Ranganathan, Nicolis, Bali Swain, and Sumpter () and Ranganathan and Bali Swain (). The key difference is that these authors build a dynamical systems model directly from available historic data.…”

“…More generally, we argue that the philosophy of attempting to describe and justify statements of the kind that “progress on Goal X is (positively or negatively) influenced by progress on Goal Y ” might be particularly useful when used in conjunction with data collected systematically country by country to monitor progress towards the SDGs over the coming decades. In this sense, this paper attempts to complement data‐driven approaches (Spaiser, Ranganathan, Bali Swain, & Sumpter, ; Pradhan et al, ) and the essential work of defining and collecting development statistics and progress indicators.…”

Better energy indicators for sustainable development

“…13 There is currently much research into the relationship between energy and issues such as food and water. However, the links from energy extend much further than this, including to the SDGs on health, education, gender, economic growth, industry, cities and climate.…”

The Sustainable Development Goals for Eastern Partnership Countries: Impact of Institutions

“…It is also very important to provide innovations and public security. The negative correlation between component 1 and indicator Goal 7 (Renewable energy consumption) can be explained by internal contradiction within SDGs [16].…”