Governing through goals sustainable development goals as governance innovation

Governing through Goals


Earth System Governance
Frank Biermann and Oran R. Young, series editors
Oran R. Young, Institutional Dynamics: Emergent Patterns in International Environmental
Governance
Frank Biermann and Philipp Pattberg, eds., Global Environmental Governance
Reconsidered
Olav Schram Stokke, Disaggregating International Regimes: A New Approach to Evaluation and Comparison
Aarti Gupta and Michael Mason, eds., Transparency in Global Environmental
Governance: Critical Perspectives
Sikina Jinnah, Post-Treaty Politics: Secretariat Influence in Global Environmental
Governance
Frank Biermann, Earth System Governance: World Politics in the Anthropocene
Walter F. Baber and Robert B. Bartlett, Consensus in Global Environmental Governance:
Deliberative Democracy in Nature’s Regime
Diarmuid Torney, European Climate Leadership in Question: Policies toward China and
India
David Ciplet, J. Timmons Roberts, and Mizan R. Khan, Power in a Warming World:
The New Global Politics of Climate Change and the Remaking of Environmental Inequality
Simon Nicholson and Sikina Jinnah, eds., New Earth Politics: Essays from the
Anthropocene
Norichika Kanie and Frank Biermann, eds., Governing through Goals: Sustainable
Development Goals as Governance Innovation

Related books from Institutional Dimensions of Global Environmental
Change: A Core Research Project of the International Human Dimensions
Programme on Global Environmental Change

Oran R. Young, Leslie A. King, and Heike Schroeder, eds., Institutions and Environmental Change: Principal Findings, Applications, and Research Frontiers
Frank Biermann and Bernd Siebenhüner, eds., Managers of Global Change: The
Influence of International Environmental Bureaucracies
Sebastian Oberthür and Olav Schram Stokke, eds., Managing Institutional Complexity:
Regime Interplay and Global Environmental Change


Governing through Goals
Sustainable Development Goals as Governance Innovation

edited by Norichika Kanie and Frank Biermann

The MIT Press
Cambridge, Massachusetts
London, England


© 2017 Massachusetts Institute of Technology
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form by any electronic or mechanical means (including photocopying, recording, or information
storage and retrieval) without permission in writing from the publisher.
This book was set in Stone Sans and Stone Serif by Toppan Best-set Premedia Limited.
Printed on recycled paper and bound in the United States of America.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Kanie, Norichika, 1969- editor. | Biermann, Frank, 1967- editor.
Title: Governing through goals : sustainable development goals as governance
innovation / edited by Norichika Kanie and Frank Biermann.
Description: Cambridge, MA : MIT Press, [2017] | Series: Earth system governance |
Includes bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016026443| ISBN 9780262035620 (hardcover : alk. paper) |
ISBN 9780262533195 (pbk. : alk. paper)

Subjects: LCSH: Sustainable development--International cooperation. |
Environmental policy--International cooperation. | Millennium Development
Goals. | Sustainable Development Goals.
Classification: LCC HC79.E5 .G6675 2017 | DDC 338.9/27--dc23 LC record
available at />10  9  8  7  6  5  4  3  2  1


Contents

Series Foreword  vii
Preface  ix
List of Acronyms  xvii
1

Introduction: Global Governance through Goal Setting  1
Norichika Kanie, Steven Bernstein, Frank Biermann, and Peter M. Haas

I

Goal Setting as a Governance Strategy  29

2

Conceptualization: Goal Setting as a Strategy for Earth System
Governance  31
Oran R. Young

3

Goal Setting in the Anthropocene: The Ultimate Challenge of

Planetary Stewardship  53
Oran R. Young, Arild Underdal, Norichika Kanie, and Rakhyun E. Kim

4

Global Goal Setting for Improving National Governance and
Policy  75
Frank Biermann, Casey Stevens, Steven Bernstein, Aarti Gupta,
Norichika Kanie, Måns Nilsson, and Michelle Scobie

5

Measuring Progress in Achieving the Sustainable Development
Goals  99
László Pintér, Marcel Kok, and Dora Almassy

II

Learning from the Past  135

6

Ideas, Beliefs, and Policy Linkages: Lessons from Food, Water, and
Energy Policies  137
Peter M. Haas and Casey Stevens


vi 

Contents

7

Lessons from the Health-Related Millennium Development
Goals  165
Steinar Andresen and Masahiko Iguchi

8

Corporate Water Stewardship: Lessons for Goal-based Hybrid
Governance  187
Takahiro Yamada

III Operational Challenges  211
9

The United Nations and the Governance of Sustainable Development
Goals  213
Steven Bernstein

10 The Sustainable Development Goals and Multilateral
Agreements  241
Arild Underdal and Rakhyun E. Kim
11 Financing the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development  259
Tancrède Voituriez, Kanako Morita, Thierry Giordano, Noura Bakkour,
and Noriko Shimizu
12 Toward a Multi-level Action Framework for Sustainable Development
Goals  275
Joyeeta Gupta and Måns Nilsson
13 Conclusion: Key Challenges for Global Governance through

Goals  295
Frank Biermann and Norichika Kanie
Annexes  311
Contributors  319
Index  327


Series Foreword

Humans now influence all biological and physical systems of the planet.
Almost no species, land area, or part of the oceans has remained unaffected
by the expansion of the human species. Recent scientific findings suggest
that the entire earth system now operates outside the normal state exhibited over at least the past 500,000 years. At the same time, it is apparent that
the institutions, organizations, and mechanisms by which humans govern
their relationship with the natural environment and global biogeochemical
systems are utterly insufficient—and poorly understood. More fundamental and applied research is needed.
Such research is no easy undertaking. It must span the entire globe,
because only integrated global solutions can ensure a sustainable coevolution of biophysical and socioeconomic systems. But it must also draw on
local experiences and insights. Research on earth system governance must
be about places in all their diversity, yet seek to integrate place-based
research within a global understanding of the myriad human interactions
with the earth system. Eventually, the task is to develop integrated systems
of governance, from the local to the global level, that ensure the sustainable development of the coupled socioecological system the Earth has
become.
This series, Earth System Governance, is designed to address this research
challenge. Books in this series will pursue this challenge from a variety of
disciplinary perspectives, at different levels of governance, and with a range
of methods. Yet all will further one common aim: analyzing current systems of earth system governance with a view to increased understanding
and possible improvements and reform. Books in this series will be of interest to the academic community, but will also inform practitioners and at
times contribute to policy debates.

viii 

Series Foreword

This series is related to the long-term international research program,
the Earth System Governance Project.
Frank Biermann, Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development, Utrecht
University
Oran R. Young, Bren School, University of California, Santa Barbara
Earth System Governance Series Editors


Preface

It was in September 2011, in the midst of the Hakone Mountains in Japan,
when we first learned about the novel idea of “sustainable development
goals.” This idea was advanced by Jimena Leiva Roesch, then representative
of the government of Guatemala to the United Nations, at an intense
brainstorming workshop called the Hakone Vision Factory: Bridging Science Policy Boundaries, hosted by the Earth System Governance Project
and the International Environmental Governance Architecture Research
Group. This “vision factory” originally focused on the institutional framework for sustainable development as one of the two main themes of the
2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development; yet our discussions
quickly expanded to include new, broader visions for sustainable development governance in the twenty-first century. The idea of “sustainable
development goals” was both striking and enlightening, and a consensus
quickly emerged among participants that promoting this idea would benefit governance for sustainability. Yet nobody at that point imagined that
the sustainable development goals would attract greatest attention in the
UN debate soon thereafter.
The evolution of the sustainable development goals over the last four

years is truly phenomenal, and we feel privileged to have been able to witness this development. The more we learned about the sustainable development goals, the more we realized their potential and innovative implications.
Governing through goals is fundamentally different in character from
other forms of global governance. It is a new governance strategy that has
emerged at an opportune time under the novel conditions of the twentyfirst century. And as such, it requires careful academic investigation.
This first book on global governance through goal setting is a product of
many different but interconnected projects about governance and sustainability. The first of our workshops to discuss the governance implications of
sustainable development goals took place during the 2013 Earth System


x 

Preface

Governance Tokyo Conference. The conference was supported by the Japan
Foundation Center for Global Partnership, the Institute for Global Environmental Strategies in Japan, the Paris-based Institut du Développement
Durable et des Relations Internationales, the Japan Science and Technology
Agency, and Japan’s Ministry of the Environment through its Global Environmental Research Fund (RFe-1201). After intense discussions on possible
new and innovative dimensions of governance of, as well as for, the sustainable development goals, participants became interested in the idea to
launch a new project specifically to look at the governance dimensions of
the sustainable development goals. Participants in the first workshop
included, among others, Steinar Andresen, Joyeeta Gupta, Peter M. Haas,
Marc Levy, Måns Nilsson, László Pintér, Laurence Tubiana, and Takahiro
Yamada.
In April 2013, one of us—Norichika Kanie—was commissioned to lead a
strategic research project (“S-11”) of the Environment Research and Technology Development Fund of Japan’s Ministry of the Environment. This
project, entitled “Project on Sustainability Transformation beyond 2015,”
or POST2015, was designed to investigate both human and planetary wellbeing and how both could be consolidated in the making and implementation of sustainable development policies, with the primary aim of providing
inputs and evidence for international discussions on a post-2015 development agenda and the sustainable development goals. This book project has
been part of the wider framework of this strategic research project, through
the leadership team and one of the subthemes commissioned at the United

Nations University Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability (until
2013, the United Nations University Institute of Advanced Studies). Thus,
our sincere thanks are due to the Ministry of Environment of Japan; and as
project leader, Norichika Kanie wishes to mention in particular the following persons who have helped realize the policy-oriented project: Ryutaro
Yatsu, Soichiro Seki, Yutaka Matsuzawa, Hiroshi Tsujihara, Akio Takemoto,
Naoya Tsukamoto, Keiko Segawa, Atsushi Takenaka, Yasukuni Shibata, Shuichi Mizushima, Yuta Higuchi, Takuya Fusamura, Maya Suzuki, and Hirofumi Karibe.
This governance project was conducted through the UN University
Institute for the Advanced Study of Sustainability, in close collaboration
with the Earth System Governance Project, the leading international transdisciplinary network in the field of sustainability governance studies. All
authors in this book have been involved in the Earth System Governance
Project in one way or another, as members of its Lead Faculty, research
fellows, participants in global conferences, or as members of the project’s


Preface 

xi

Scientific Steering Committee, chaired by Frank Biermann. Two colleagues
deserve special acknowledgment. First, Oran R. Young has been closely
involved in, and very supportive of, this collaborative effort from its start.
Without his support, this project would not have attracted the participation of the many outstanding scholars who contributed chapters in this
book. Another person who has provided unconditional and unlimited
support is Ruben Zondervan, the executive director of the Earth System
Governance Project, without whom this project would not have materialized. Ruben has participated in all the workshops and meetings and
provided numerous and highly useful comments. We also thank Lund
University, Sweden, for hosting the Earth System Governance International Project Office, and for generously providing the infrastructure and
support for a number of interns who supported this endeavor. We thank
here especially the many highly talented and enthusiastic interns who
have worked on the sustainable development goals at the Earth System

Governance International Project Office in Lund, notably Javier MunozBlanco, Maria Dahlman Ström, Henry Kröger, Johannes Nilsson, and
Jonathan Volt.
The kick-off workshop of the book project was held in July 2013 as part
of the S-11 project inaugural meeting in Yokohama, Japan, chaired by
Norichika Kanie. A first outline of the book project was elaborated, and
potential themes and contributors were identified. At the workshop the
ideas behind launching the book project were elaborated, and initial ideas
of the issues to be addressed in each chapter were discussed. An important
element of the process was that wherever possible, senior and junior
researchers were brought together in writing chapters, with the aim of making this research community sustainable and combining the cutting-edge
knowledge and inspiration of both the younger and the more advanced
generations. About half a year later we organized a subsequent International
Workshop on Governance of, and for, Sustainable Development Goals in
New York. At that time, the sustainable development goals received much
more political attention because the formal negotiation phase had begun.
Our workshop was thus explicitly organized as a transdisciplinary effort
that brought together both researchers and practitioners in a “world café”
discussion format to generate novel ideas on the governance dimensions of
the sustainable development goals.
The workshop was held just before the eighth meeting of the UN General Assembly’s Open Working Group on sustainable development goals,
which concluded the “stock-taking” phase of this group. One major topic
then was the architecture of the sustainable development goals—that is,


xii 

Preface

how to formulate the sustainable development goals at the global level
while securing diversity of implementation in different national circumstances. Although our workshop did not directly discuss the contents of

this book, some outcomes of the workshop—especially the policy briefs
resulting from the meeting—formed the basis of some chapters of this
book. Hence, all participants in the workshop who are not formally contributors of chapters to this volume deserve full acknowledgment for their
input, starting with Csaba Kőrösi, a co-chair of the Open Working Group,
and including Mathilde Bouyé, Guy Brendan, Olivia Caeymaex, Ngeta
Kabiri, Yuto Kitamura, Maja Messmer Mokhtar, Ian Noble, Simon Høiberg
Olsen, Barbara J. Ryan, Mayumi Sakoh, Masahisa Sato, Anne-Sophie Stevance, Jan-Gustav Strandenaes, Zoltán Szentgyörgy, Farooq Ullah, Peter
Veit, Dongyong Zhang, Janos Zlinszky, and Irena Zubcevic.
The first draft of this book was then discussed at two authors’ workshops, in Toronto in March 2014 and in Paris in September 2014. It was at
the time of the Paris workshop that the Open Working Group outcome of
17 goals and 169 targets was decided at the sixty-ninth session of the UN
General Assembly as the main input to the post-2015 development agenda,
and the now-crucial importance of this new governance strategy became
even more evident.
Earlier versions of this book and several chapters were presented at
various occasions, including the conference “Our Common Future under
Climate Change” in Paris in July 2015; the annual convention of the International Studies Association in New Orleans in February 2015; the convention of the Society for Environmental Economics and Policy Studies in
Kobe in September 2013; and the fourteenth conference of the Japan Society for International Development in June 2013. We would like to extend
our appreciation for all comments and suggestions provided at these occasions, which have improved many core ideas included in our conceptual
development.
Apart from the aforementioned persons, we have received useful advice
from practitioners, academics, and those who take on the difficult task of
going in between both. Norichika Kanie, in particular, as overall project
leader, wishes to thank very much Keizo Takemi, a member of the House of
Councilors, along with Sakiko Fukuda-Parr, David Griggs, Shinishi Iida,
Keita Iwase, Takehiro Kagawa, Kaori Kuroda, Hiroshi Minami, Shuzo Nishioka, Atsuyuki Oike, Tomoko Onishi, Atsushi Suginaka, Motoyuki Suzuki,
Naohito Asano, Katsunobu Takada, Kazuhiro Takemoto, Kazuhiko Takeuchi, Masami Tamura, Ikufumi Tomimoto, and Kazuhiro Ueta.


Preface 

xiii

Project partners from the International Institute for Sustainable Development have given us additional valuable information on the internal
details of the UN workings and beyond, and we thank in particular Langston James “Kimo” Goree VI, Pamela Chasek, Lynn Wagner, Faye Leone, and
Kate Offerdahl. Special thanks is due to Csaba Kőrösi, Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Hungary to the United Nations and a co-chair of
the Open Working Group; Janos Zlinszky, Special Advisor to the Open
Working Group Co-chair; and David O’Connor and Richard A. Roehrl from
the UN Division for Sustainable Development, Department of Economic
and Social Affairs.
Furthermore, all chapter authors would like to thank their individual
supporters and funding agencies, which have made this project possible.
In particular, László Pintér, Marcel Kok, and Dora Almassy would like to
acknowledge three additional reviews for their chapter by Peter Bartelmus,
professor at the Bergische Universität Wuppertal; Marianne Beisheim,
senior associate with the German Institute for International and Security
Affairs; and Steven Bernstein, who is also a contributor to this book. Steinar
Andresen and Masahiko Iguchi acknowledge support from the International Collaboration for Capitalizing on Cost-effective and Life-saving
Commodities under the Global Health and Vaccine Program of the Norwegian Research Council. Takahiro Yamada would like to thank Gavin Power,
deputy executive director at the UN Global Compact, for generously spending two hours in an interview. He would also like to extend his appreciation to members of the Orchestration Project Team, funded by the Japan
Society for the Promotion of Science, for comments on the draft chapter
when he gave the paper at its meeting on May 7, 2015: Prof. Makiko
Nishitani of Kobe University; Prof. Satoshi Miura of Nagoya University;
and Prof. Yoshiko Naiki of Osaka University. Steven Bernstein would like to
thank David O’Connor and Irena Zubcevic at the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs for invitations to contribute to the UN’s work on
institutional reform following the 2012 UN Conference on Sustainable
Development, from which many of the ideas for chapter 9 first evolved, as
well as their valuable feedback on that research. He would also like to
thank Kenneth Abbott for their joint work on orchestration that informs
parts of chapter 9. Portions of his work in this volume were presented to

expert group meetings sponsored by the United Nations and groups of
governments and civil society organizations, including “Friends of Governance for Sustainable Development,” and to academic workshops including “Rio+20 to 2015: A New Architecture for a Sustainable New World” at
Yale’s School of Forestry and Environmental Studies (November 2013) and


xiv 

Preface

the “Arizona Workshop on Implementing the Sustainable Development
Goals,” at University of Arizona in April 2015, all of which provided valuable discussions, context, and feedback. Måns Nilsson would like to thank
for financial support the Swedish International Development Cooperation
Agency. Joyeeta Gupta would like to thank the support of the Amsterdam
Institute of Social Science Research at the University of Amsterdam, and
the UNESCO-IHE Institute for Water Education. She also benefited from
comments received when she presented “Governing the Risks with Respect
to the Millennium Development Goal on Water, Water and Sustainable
Development” at the 2015 UN Water Annual International Zaragosa Conference in Zaragosa in January 2015. Casey Stevens would like to acknowledge financial support from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science
and his colleagues at the United Nations University Institute for the
Advanced Study of Sustainability.
Furthermore, Norichika Kanie wishes to extend special thanks to all
members of his research team, notably Yuri Akita, Kaori Eto, Rieko Horie,
Mie Iijima, Akemi Porter, Hitomi Shimatani, Kyoko Suganoya, Chiharu
Takei, Noriko Takemura, Chikako Tokuda, as well as his research assistants,
Yuka Hayakawa, Ikuho Miyazawa, and Yui Nakagawa. Mari Kosaka and
Maki Koga should be particularly mentioned for their devotion to finalization of the project. Without their enthusiasm and dedication, the project
would have been much more difficult!
And of course, thanks are due to all the contributors to this book. It has
been enjoyable, inspirational, and, indeed, lots of fun to have been able to
work with them!

Many thanks also to the excellent team at MIT Press. First of all, we are
grateful to the anonymous reviewers, who helped to improve the manuscript with numerous highly constructive comments. Second, we wish to
thank Beth Clevenger for her support, encouragement, and useful advice
during the smooth and efficient review and production process of this
book. Thirdly, we wish to thank the copyeditor, Kristie Reilly.
Last but not least, we wish to thank our families. Norichika Kanie, as the
overall leader, had to take on extraordinary travel duties in managing and
presenting this broader project. He wishes to thank in particular his wife,
Reiko, for her support and understanding of his work. At the first project
workshop in Hakone, in 2011, Reiko brought with her the youngest participant to the workshop, Hugo, who was then a 10-month old baby, and
hence possibly the youngest person ever to have heard about the sustainable development goals. Hugo is now five years old at the time of conclusion of this book, and he will be 20 years old in 2030, when the sustainable


Preface 

xv

development goals will hopefully have been achieved. The future is in his,
and his generation’s, hands. This book is, therefore, for all our children,
who will grow up in the age of “governing through goals.”
Norichika Kanie and Frank Biermann
Fujisawa, Japan, and Utrecht, The Netherlands
March 2016



List of Acronyms

ECOSOC United Nations Economic and Social Council
FAO

UN Food and Agriculture Organization

GAVI

Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization

GDP

Gross domestic product

GNP

Gross national product

OECD

Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development

SDSN

Sustainable Development Solutions Network

UN

United Nations

UNCED

United Nations Conference on Environment and Development

UNDP

United Nations Development Programme

UNECE

United Nations Economic Commission for Europe

UNEP

United Nations Environment Programme

UNESCO United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural
Organization
UNGA

United Nations General Assembly

WHO

World Health Organization

WTO

World Trade Organization



1  Introduction: Global Governance through Goal Setting

Norichika Kanie, Steven Bernstein, Frank Biermann, and Peter M. Haas

In September 2015, the UN General Assembly adopted the Sustainable
Development Goals as an integral part of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable
Development (UNGA 2015). The Sustainable Development Goals were to
build upon and broaden the scope of the earlier Millennium Development
Goals, which had expired in the same year. The Sustainable Development
Goals mark a historic shift for the United Nations toward one “sustainable”
development agenda after a long history of trying to integrate economic
and social development with environmental sustainability. They also mark
the most ambitious effort yet to place goal setting at the center of global
governance and policy. Governments’ enthusiasm for goal setting, however, is not yet matched by knowledge about its prospects or limits as a
governance strategy. This book aims to address this knowledge gap through
a detailed examination of the Sustainable Development Goals and the governance challenges they face.
Neither goal setting nor sustainability are new approaches to world politics, development, or earth system governance. The United Nations, among
other grand historical projects, is firmly rooted in broader goals such as
justice, equality, and peace (or the elimination of war). Goal-setting has also
been a feature of many multilateral agreements and programs of international institutions (Ruggie 1996; Williams 1998). Meanwhile, “sustainable
development” and “sustainability” served as the conceptual cornerstones
for the 1992 UN Conference on Environment and Development (“Rio Earth
Summit”), the 2002 World Summit on Sustainable Development, and the
2012 UN Conference on Sustainable Development (“Rio plus 20”). But the
Sustainable Development Goals go a step further than these earlier efforts.
They add detailed content to the concept of sustainable development, identify specific targets for each goal, and use the concept to help frame a
broader, more coherent, and transformative 2030 agenda.


2 

Norichika Kanie, Steven Bernstein, Frank Biermann, and Peter M. Haas

This single, goal-oriented agenda is not simply a continuation of unfinished elements of the Millennium Development Goals; it aspires to build
from their central mission of poverty eradication and social inclusion a
universal, integrated framework for action that also responds to growing
economic, social, and planetary complexity in the twenty-first century.
Some may wonder whether goal seeking is a deliberate effort to evade the
sort of commitments that were developed after the fact for the Millennium
Development Goals. Others have questioned whether the particular formulation of sustainable development in the Sustainable Development Goals
provides a sufficient foundation for a comprehensive agenda that includes
human rights, social and political inclusion, and good governance (Browne
2014). The combination of extraordinary ambition, uncertain political
commitments, and questions about the ability of goals to mobilize political
and economic actors, and the resources required to pursue them, motivates
three sets of questions that animate this volume.
First, the book studies in detail the core characteristics of goal setting
in global governance, asking when it is an appropriate strategy in global
governance and what makes global governance through goals different
from other approaches such as rule making or norm promotion. Second,
the chapters analyze under what conditions a goal-oriented approach can
ensure progress toward desired ends; what can be learned from other, earlier experiences of global goal setting, especially the Millennium Development Goals; and what governance arrangements are likely to facilitate
progress in implementing the new Sustainable Development Goals. Third,
the book studies the practical and operational challenges involved in global
governance through goals in promoting sustainability and the prospects for
achieving such a demanding new agenda.
While these questions inform all chapters in this volume to varying
degrees, chapters 2 to 5 focus especially on the first question. Chapters 6–8
most directly address the second question. Chapters 9–12, on operational
challenges of goal attainment and implementing the Sustainable Development Goals globally and nationally, primarily focus on the third question.
Apart from advancing sustainable development worldwide, the Sustainable Development Goals are also an important focus of study in their own
right as a new type of global governance. The perceived success of the Millennium Development Goals (an evaluation that a number of chapters in

this book critically assess) has set the stage for this elevation of goal setting
as a governance strategy. The Sustainable Development Goals now raise the
stakes for this strategy, in part owing to the very public and high-level political process that has produced them.


Introduction 

3

Although the Millennium Development Goals reflected outcomes from
many earlier UN and other international processes, as well as consultations with governments and UN agencies before and after the 2000 Millennium Summit, their specific formulation came from the UN Secretariat
(McArthur 2014). The eight concise, yet broad, Millennium Development
Goals and attendant targets were not negotiated outcomes (see this volume, Annex 1). In contrast, the Sustainable Development Goals required
over two years of intense intergovernmental stocktaking and negotiation
sessions, and perhaps the largest public and multi-stakeholder consultations in UN history. They are not simply standalone goals, but form the
centerpiece of the broader new UN agenda approved by the UN General
Assembly in September 2015: “Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda
for Sustainable Development” (UNGA 2015; see table 1.1 for a list of the
goals).
This encompassing declaration also reflects its own extensive negotiating and consultation process and incorporates the outcomes of numerous
related international processes, including the third International Conference on Financing for Development (UN 2015; Voituriez et al., this
volume, chapter 11) and the third World Conference on Disaster Risk
Reduction, both held earlier in 2015. It even includes a space for the then
forthcoming outcome from the twenty-first session of the Conference of
the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate
Change, which is now called the Paris Agreement. The UN Secretary-General’s synthesis report on a variety of inputs provided for the post-2015
development agenda was published just before the start of the final intergovernmental deliberation in 2015, which aimed to create a vision around
which these various streams could cohere (UN 2014b).
The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development also pays attention to the
means of delivering on its ambition, recognizing that achieving the Sustainable Development Goals will require not only a broader effort through

the UN system, but also the mobilization of political support and resources
well beyond it, including at regional and national levels and among
multiple civil society, financial, and business actors. In sum, as the agreed
title of the wider 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development reflects, the
Sustainable Development Goals aim at “transforming our world.”
In the remainder of this chapter, we lay out a research agenda to assess
conditions, challenges, and prospects for the Sustainable Development
Goals to pursue this aim. First, we discuss goal setting as a global governance strategy. Second, to contextualize the Sustainable Development
Goals, we discuss the unique nature of the contemporary challenges that


4 

Norichika Kanie, Steven Bernstein, Frank Biermann, and Peter M. Haas

Table 1.1
Final List of Sustainable Development Goals
Goal 1

End poverty in all its forms everywhere

Goal 2

End hunger, achieve food security and improved nutrition, and
promote sustainable agriculture

Goal 3

Ensure healthy lives and promote well-being for all at all ages

Goal 4

Ensure inclusive and equitable quality education and promote
lifelong learning opportunities for all

Goal 5

Achieve gender equality and empower all women and girls

Goal 6

Ensure availability and sustainable management of water and
sanitation for all

Goal 7

Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy
for all

Goal 8

Promote sustained, inclusive, and sustainable economic growth, full
and productive employment, and decent work for all

Goal 9

Build resilient infrastructure, promote inclusive and sustainable
industrialization, and foster innovation

Goal 10

Reduce inequality within and among countries

Goal 11

Make cities and human settlements inclusive, safe, resilient, and
sustainable

Goal 12

Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns

Goal 13

Take urgent action to combat climate change and its impacts*

Goal 14

Conserve and sustainably use the oceans, seas and marine resources
for sustainable development

Goal 15

Protect, restore, and promote sustainable use of terrestrial
ecosystems, sustainably manage forests, combat desertification, and
halt and reverse land degradation and halt biodiversity loss

Goal 16

Promote peaceful and inclusive societies for sustainable

development, provide access to justice for all, and build effective,
accountable, and inclusive institutions at all levels

Goal 17

Strengthen the means of implementation and revitalize the Global
Partnership for Sustainable Development

* Acknowledging that the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change is the
primary international, intergovernmental forum for negotiating the global response
to climate change.
Source: UN General Assembly. 2015. Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for
Sustainable Development. Draft resolution referred to the UN summit for the adoption of the post-2015 development agenda by the General Assembly at its sixtyninth session. UN Doc. A/70/L.1 of September 18.


Introduction 

5

the Sustainable Development Goals must confront and review the historical and political trajectory of sustainable development governance, including the evolution from a primarily rule-based to a more goal-based system
and the experience of the earlier Millennium Development Goals. Third,
we review the negotiating history of the Sustainable Development Goals.
Fourth, we elaborate on how the chapters are organized to address the three
questions that guide the volume.
Goal Setting as a Global Governance Strategy
Governments and other political actors adopt goals at a global level to identify and publicize collective ambitions or aspirations in order to achieve
some set of objectives, or at least to commit themselves publically to pursuing those objectives. By embracing international goals—through adopting
such measures as declarations by conferences, summits, or the UN General
Assembly—governments signal their interest in achieving such goals and
possibly being held accountable for doing so. In return, goals are often

expected to include measurable targets and time frames that are used in
tracking progress. As a strategy of global governance, chapter 2 in this
volume elaborates on these features, highlighting that goal setting aims to
establish priorities that help combat the tendency for short-termism that
would draw attention away from longer-term objectives.
Yet goal setting remains a contested governance strategy. Analysts are
divided on its utility and effectiveness. Many international lawyers support
the use of aspirational norms against which states can be held morally
accountable. Others look at their value in terms of providing the foundations for formal institutional mechanisms to promote their diffusion and to
sanction violators. Yet political “realists” tend to dismiss the setting of goals
as a veneer for failures to achieve meaningful binding multilateral agreements. As Underdal and Kim (this volume, chapter 10) note, the adoption
of seventeen Sustainable Development Goals as a package, along with
the even wider 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, provides “scant
guidance for prioritizing scarce resources,” and there are no hierarchical
governance arrangements internationally to ensure compliance. Still, they,
as well as a number of other authors in this volume (for example, Bernstein,
chapter 9; Voituriez, chapter 11; Gupta and Nilsson, chapter 12), though
with varying degrees of caution, highlight the specific institutional
and resource-mobilization efforts—some already emerging—to concretize
implementation at multiple levels.