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Plenary session III: Mobilizing networks to strengthen global environmental and social governance: Research communities, civil society and business communities

Climate change and the pressure on the global environmental space call for collective action. Governments play an important role in setting the goals and enforcing compliance. But improvements in energy efficiency and in the use of natural resources can only be realized if the citizens themselves understand the challenges and accept responsibility for adjusting to the imperatives of sustainability. Citizens aware of the environmental challenges put pressure on their political representatives and their governments to elaborate and implement policies and cooperate with others. To be effective global governance has to be socially concerned and includes a wide range of stakeholders. The challenges of sustainable development are multidimensional and call for new partnerships. The research community assesses changes affecting societies and contributes to the search for technically and socially acceptable solutions. Among non-state actors, multinational corporations have increasingly acquired the ability to influence the processes of global governance. But stakeholders are many and other voices have grown. The credit for putting the issues of sustainable development on the global agenda goes to far-sighted research and to international civil society. In this respect, NGOs play an important role through agenda setting, public awareness raising and lobbying for policy reforms. Companies exposed to the scrutiny of an environmentally and socially concerned public have to take these challenges seriously. They can play a strategic role in reducing the pressure of economic growth on natural resources and global public goods through creativity and technological innovations. At the closing plenary of the EADI General Conference, representatives of civil society, business communities, and the research community will reflect and discuss how the challenges of sustainable development are perceived among their members and networks.