Thesis – Social Actions of Strategic Sustainable Development

Sustainable Development was conceived as a visionary idea to have society meet the needs of the today while also considering those of future generations. The Framework for Strategic Sustainable Development was developed to provide an operational planning methodology to move society towards ecological and social sustainability. While abundant scientific research and project work have been completed in the ecological issues area – a significant gap remains regarding Social Sustainability. This research project sought to identify leading actions of Social Sustainability that might strategically remove the systemic conditions (barriers) to Social Sustainability. Reducing the complexity of Social Sustainability for sustainability practitioners can be helpful for working within Strategic Sustainable Development. Using an assessment tool based on Social Sustainability Actions Criteria, leading actions of Strategic Sustainable Development emerged from case studies and interviews research with Social Sustainability practitioners and experts. Although this research process was successful, the study of Social Sustainability actions also resulted in two aspects of proposed discovery: a means to identify systems barriers within a Social Sustainability Actions Criteria Tool and a model of Core Characteristics of Social Sustainability Actions. Additionally proposed, 3 potential Universal Categories of Social Sustainability Actions.