Interactive dialogue on the relationship between social and sustainable development!

What is the relationship between social development and sustainable development? How can we ensure that people are at the centre of the sustainable development process? What are some of the major social development challenges that we are facing today, or that we are likely to face in the future?

With the international community poised to adopt the post-2015 development agenda and the Sustainable Development Goals in September, stakeholders are exploring effective means of ensuring that no one gets left behind in the implementation and realization of these goals. Understanding the role of social policy and social development is critical to this process. WorldWeWant2015.org and the Division for Social Policy and Development in the United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs, have collaborated to host an online discussion to get YOUR views on how to achieve truly people-centred development.

Accessed through the WorldWeWant2015.org online platform, the discussion aims to collect ideas from civil society and development practitioners on moving social development forward post-2015. The online dialogue, the “Future of Social Development in the Post-2015 Era” forms part of the commemoration of the 20th Anniversary of the 1995 World Summit for Social Development and the adoption of the Copenhagen Declaration and Programme of Action. The online dialogue will be open until 31 July 2015 and your recommendations will feed into the work of the 54rd Session of the Commission for Social Development (CSocD54) under the theme “Rethinking and strengthening social development in the contemporary world”.

While the idea of shared global development goals and collaborative attention to human well-being is not new (You have, of course, heard of the MDGs!), past efforts found it hard to overcome existing inequalities and exclusionary practices in implementation. While average global improvement in poverty reduction, health, education, economic growth and other development factors proved remarkable, large disparities remained within and across countries with some social and geographical groups facing disproportionate levels of disadvantage and exclusion.

So far the discussion has highlighted the importance of promoting greater harmonization of human development with environmental conservation, as well as the interdependent nature of social, economic and environmental concerns. The importance of communication has also been highlighted as well as the role of technology in promoting communication. Discussants have highlighted the importance of communication across generations and socio-economic classes, and noted the power of digital and off-line platforms for engagement.   The importance of collaborative decision-making at the international level has also come up as a proposed way forward for more inclusive development.

Click here to weigh in, and present your views, on how we define and understand the social dimensions of sustainable development.