Consumer Cooperation in Sustainability

The planet is under threat. Unless all stakeholders, that is governments, businesses, and consumers, become more environmentally friendly, some predict dire consequences for the earth and all those who inhabit it. While governments and businesses have a role to play, green consumer behavior is vital to the sustainability of the environment. Consumers have been shown to express increasing concern for the environment, but in many studies this concern has been found not to be matched by actions, a phenomenon labelled the green gap. This chapter describes a study that investigated the existence and extent of the green gap amongst a sample of South African adult consumers and sought to determine possible reasons for a lack of green behavior. Recommendations are made to marketers and policy makers to encourage consumer cooperation in environmental sustainability.

Water Security in Pakistan

Pakistan largely faces water scarcity, and the arid agricultural land of Pakistan is mainly due to the violation of the Indus Water Treaty by its neighbor India. By blocking the river flow towards Pakistan from the head-works, India has been building excessive dams, barrages, and power projects which are illegal according to the above-mentioned international treaty, and Pakistan has many times appealed in the UN to take action against this unfair act. However, so far, nothing could be done in this regard. The study will be helpful to understand the various challenges facing Pakistan to cater the insufficient supply of water and will give insight on the most important dimensions and facts about the international challenges to meet the shortage. The trans-boundary water issue between China and India have also been studied to try to explore new options and find the solution of a much pressing problem. The study might thus contribute to understand the issue, study the role of international community, and give useful and practical suggestions to solve the most pressing problem.

Global Implications of Sustainability and E-Society Infrastructure in Developing Economies

The main purpose of this chapter is to investigate the global implications of sustainability and e-society infrastructure in developing economies. A generally accepted definition of e-society is very difficult to compress into words considering the complexity of the phenomenon itself. However, an exhaustive approach includes a great variety of original views and individual multifaceted opinions which converge to obtain a solid theoretical structure. Globalization is the modern term used to describe changes in the structure of societies and the world economy, but having a major impact in the context of an accelerated informatization. The process of globalization is not a new and innovative process, but it is the result of changes in the world economy that have increased in recent years, considering the fact that it brings a number of advantages. Moreover, globalization means labor mobility without constraint of geographical boundaries. Generally, the progress of communications is another consequence of globalization and the impact of change is even stronger in developing economies.

“Airpocalypse” or Tsar Economic China

This chapter focuses on the case study of China, which is facing grave issues regarding environment and global warming. Hence, the “Airpocalypse” in China led to need and debate about the sustainability of the environment. In this chapter, an effort has been made to analyze the environmental sustainability risk which the country of China can have for the increasing rate of global warming, and how this part of region can have a transnational impact on other neighboring countries when it comes to the cause of making environment pure from pollutants, carbon dioxide, and coal emissions. The methodology of this research is qualitative, descriptive, and analytical in nature. This chapter includes the variable of environmental sustainability which is dependent on the energy consumption of industries of China involved in emission of greenhouse gases.

International Businesses and Environmental Issues

This chapter on international businesses and environmental issues addresses the relationship between activities of international businesses and environmental goals. Because of the increasing awareness about environmental issues, the related groups, international policies, and relation force the businesses to be more environmentally friendly and consider the future of resources in their operations. The international regulations, declarations, and other pressures can change the usages of the businesses. The combination of the planet, profit, and people are conceived to protect nature with the aim of growth. From this viewpoint, this chapter provides an overview of the environmental issues, international politics, relations, standards, and successful examples of businesses about being environmentally conscious.

From Kyoto to Paris

The Earth Summit of 1992 held in Rio de Janeiro awakened the consciousness of the world to the danger of climate change. The establishment of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change provided the platform for parties to negotiate on ways of moving forward. The global acknowledgement of the weightiness of the climate change and the future of the planet galvanized international agreements to this regard. Consequently, a landmark agreement was brokered in 1992 at Kyoto, Japan and 2015 in Paris, France. However, the strong issues of national interest tend to bedevil the implementation that would take the world forward on climate change. The chapter therefore examined multilateralism from the platform of climate change conferences and analyzed the political undertone behind disappointing outcomes even when most of the negotiators realized that the only way to salvage the impending doom is a multilateral binding agreement when nation-state can subsume their narrow interest.

Globalization and Rethinking of Environmental Consumption From a Sustainability Perspective

Sustainable environmental consumption has been a marginalized concept in international development studies and cooperation. In recent decades, there has been growing interest in identifying robust indicators that demonstrate the evidence of globalization and unsustainable environmental consumption. Globalization is premised on integrating the world into a global village. Various dimensions of globalization have different effects on the ecosystem. Plausible evidence linking globalization trajectories into practical interactions suggesting sustainable environmental consumption has been less lucid as the effects of globalization on the ecological environment does not provide clear patterns. This hugely significant problem has reopened critical debates on novel thinking on dynamics of environmental consumption patterns of the affluent societies in the era of globalization and its implications on environmental sustainability. This chapter deployed content analysis methodology and political ecology framework to review and analyze seminal studies on sustainable consumption and globalization, including relevant globalization indexes. The aim is to provide evidence of the impact of globalization on environmental consumption. The chapter suggests that globalization results in asymmetrical and deleterious natural resource extraction between the affluent North and poor South. It offered alternative thinking in which sustained policy framings and international development collaboration could be institutionalized to strengthen sustainable environmental consumption one which is premised on ecological justice and natural resource equality.