Planning for Sustainability: In the Time of Populism, Inequality, and Climate Crisis

Planning for Sustainability: In the Time of Populism, Inequality, and Climate Crisis

How can humanity sustain itself and thrive on a small planet? This challenge grows ever more urgent as the climate crisis deepens and as right-wing populism and high levels of inequality prevent action. Planning for Sustainability presents a wide-ranging, intellectually well-grounded, and accessible introduction to the concept of sustainability planning. The text explores topics such as how more livable cities and towns might be created, how greenhouse gas emissions might be curtailed, how social inequities might be reduced, how local ecosystems can be restored, and how more sustainable forms of economic development can be brought about. More than simply a third edition, this book has been extensively rewritten to provide a timely rethinking of the nature of sustainability planning, issues central to it, and scales of application. There is a new focus on system change in order for other forms of progress to come about. This edition also includes expanded material on climate action, housing, social equity, capitalism, democracy, the Sustainable Development Goals, and the developing world. This book considers in turn each scale of planning - international, national, regional, municipal, neighborhood, and site and building - and illustrates how sustainability action at different scales interrelates. This comprehensive volume lays out a hopeful and constructive view of the future in a time of growing challenge. It will be essential reading for students of urban planning, urban development, and similar fields and practitioners. “The 3rd edition of Stephen Wheeler’s Planning for Sustainability provides students, planners, policy makers, and activists essential readings on one of the most important topics facing planet Earth. It provides theoretical insight and positive practical suggestions on how to make communities more resilient, slow and mitigate the impacts of global warming, promote environmental justice, and achieve other Sustainable Development Goals from the neighborhood to the international scale.” Richard T LeGates, Professor Emeritus of Urban Studies and Planning at San Francisco State University "Wheeler’s 3rd Edition of Planning for Sustainability is a guide for professionals, students and everyone else. Grounded in history, overarching contexts and key issues, it identifies the many necessary actions across scales that can move the world toward sustainability. It offers holistic knowledge, practical ideas, and a deeply hopeful perspective." Elizabeth Macdonald , Professor Emeritus of City & Regional Planning, Landscape Architecture & Environmental Planning, and Urban Design at UC Berkeley Stephen M. Wheeler , PhD, is Emeritus Professor in the Department of Human Ecology at the University of California, Davis, with interests in sustainable development, climate action planning, urban design, and theory of social change. Former chair of the UC Davis Community Development Graduate Group and Faculty Sustainability Champion, his books include Reimagining Sustainable Cities , Climate Change and Social Ecology , and The Sustainable Urban Development Reader .