Seventeenth International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic & Social Sustainability

Abstract

(Un)sustainable developments remain a significant challenge for state and non-state actors from global to local level. Within the framework of the UN Transformation Agenda 2030 and the global Sustainable Development Goals, state institutions have a particular responsibility in guiding the process. In order to secure social acceptance, sustainability governance is challenged to bring about well-being oriented transformations. In this regard, besides cognitive insight into the need for change, the multisensorial dimensions of human existence in general as well as in everyday social practices in particular need to be more systematically taken into account into political- administrative decision-making. Based on foundational insights from sensory sustainability science conceptual and methodological considerations of artful scientific policy, advice for sensory-informed policy-making are discussed. Finally, empirical results of an exploratory experiment applying the approach in a municipal region in Germany are presented. In sum, the study provides conceptual, methodological, and empirical arguments for enabling artful sustainability governance.