Twelfth Global Studies Conference

Abstract

In 2015 United Nations announced 17 new sustainable development goals. Countries around the world can approach them together to improve people’s wellbeing. Responsible production and consumption was chosen to be one of the goals, because of growing consumer demand resulting in damage to environment. The choice of this topic shows its growing relevance in the 21st century. In 2013 the ASEAN Ministers Responsible for Environment issued a Joint Statement on the Implementation of Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP). Sustainable consumption and production was named as fundamental to sustaining its development and achieving our prosperity. The nations committed to strengthening cooperation, encouraging stakeholders and acknowledged Indonesia’s proposal to establish an ASEAN Forum on Sustainable Consumption and Production. Since then, meetings and cooperation among the parties continued. The aim of this paper is to analyse the governance of sustainable consumption and production in East Asia, with a special focus on cooperation and integration process in this area. Through application of a selected theory of change, the policy development and impact is assessed. First, the history of sustainable consumption and production in the region is analysed. Then the governance structure is examined. Further, the inputs, outputs and impact are studied to formulate policy recommendations. The analysis will be supplemented with a case study. Preliminary results show that the cooperation among actors in this field has intensified in recent years. Despite the development of multiple regional cooperation platforms, actions are limited and there is a lack of coordination.