Skip to Main Content

GLB5310 Foundation of Sustainable Development: Home

Course Description

This course introduces the global trends and changing conditions of our lives, habitats and the plant, including population explosion, urbanization, the situation with energy, water, climate, food and agriculture and globalization more generally. It also helps students gain the knowledge of and capability to discover the principles, alternative conceptions and theoretical interpretations of the notion of sustainable development. The roles of individual, society, market, government and nongovernmental actors towards sustainability will be highlighted. 

Recommended Books

International Law, Human Rights and Public Opinion: The Role of the State in Educating on Human Rights Standards

This book concerns how international human rights law perceives public opinion and whether it demands that public opinion be mobilized in order to protect and promote core human rights. Issues explored include whether States have a duty to inform and educate public opinion regarding the support and violation of fundamental human rights such as ethnic equality and death penalty, and States’ actions to mold public opinion in favor of fundamental human rights through education. It concludes that States have an educational duty to inform public opinion regarding core human rights standards. Shift of international law in terms of what role States should play in educating public opinion is also presented.

Energy Systems and Sustainability: Power for a Sustainable Future

This book addresses the issue of energy supply, mainly focusing on the UK but also providing comparisons and examples from other countries: the USA, France, Denmark, India and China. The book begins with an introduction to energy systems, sustainability, and primary energy, as well as the purpose of energy use and forms of energy. Then the book elaborates on specific energy sources such as coals, hear, oil and gas, electricity, nuclear power. The book ends with reflections on the cost of energy use, the environmental and health impacts of energy use, and the remedies to the negative impacts brought by energy abuse.

Recommended Databases