Developing Strategies
Featured Challenges and Suggestions in Smart Mobility in Sustainable Cities Collaborating to Address Air Quality and Traffic Congestion: Encouraging Innovation, Facilitating a Collaborative Ecosystem, and Meeting Sustainability Goals View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Claudia Ribeiro Pereira Nunes, Pedro Diaz Peralta
The paper provides a perspective on urban mobility challenges and examples of innovative urban mobility as possible solutions. Urban mobility is described as the lifeblood of modern cities, a critical economic factor, and a facilitator of intelligent, sustainable development. The methodology approach is to systematically review the literature to explore the strategies to meet city mobility challenges involve. The results demonstrate that smart mobility challenges are part of the rapidly changing landscape of urban mobility, as seen through the lens of an intelligent city planner. For instance, crafting policies and strategies to promote adherence to air quality standards and other quality-of-life measures; designing effective, equitable, safe, and secure public transport systems integrated and other platforms; and adapting to vehicle innovation as autonomous, connected, electric, and shared, dockless, etc. build sustainable infrastructure to support innovative mobility solutions from public and private sectors. The outcomes and findings point to equitable urban mobility solutions as one of the cities' most pressing problems worldwide.
Climate Change and the Future of Humanity: Reasons for Optimism View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Spencer S Stober
A problem is "wicked" when we cannot fully comprehend the problem's scope and possible solutions (Rittel & Webber, 1973). The climate crisis is a "super" wicked problem because of four characteristics: (1) time is running out, (2) those who cause the problem are seeking to provide a solution, (3) the central authority needed to address the problem is weak or non-existent, and (4) irrational discounting pushes responses into the future (Levin et al., 2012, p. 123). These characteristics and the UN Agenda 2030 serve as the framework for this analysis of humanity's efforts to mitigate climate change and promote climate justice. For example, one characteristic of climate change as a super wicked problem is the need for "central authority" in global affairs. The UN is maturing as a "central authority"—a global leader—in humanity's efforts to mitigate climate change and justice. The UN Climate Change Conference (COP27, 2022) announced an agreement on a "Loss and Damage Fund" for vulnerable countries. The International Court of Justice (ICJ) also plays a supporting role. On March 29, 2023, the Republic of Vanuatu and 132 co-sponsoring countries received UN General Assembly support calling for an advisory opinion by the ICJ to determine if countries can be sued under international law for their role in climate change (https://www.vanuatuicj.com/). This example illustrates the UN's important role in humanity's efforts to mitigate harm and restore relationships among nations. These actions and others are discussed as reasons for optimism.
Social and Solidarity Economy and Sustainable Local Economic Development: Institutional and Policy Resilience in the Face of Electoral Changes – the Case of Barcelona View Digital Media
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session Eric Griego Montoya
Building upon existing literature, this paper explores the interplay between local electoral politics and institutions created to advance the Social and Solidarity Economy (SSE) and sustainability. The connection between local SSE policy initiatives and sustainable economic development policy has been explored and established by recent research. However, despite the wealth of knowledge surrounding local economic democracy efforts, our understanding of the relationship between local SSE and local electoral politics remains limited and requires further investigation. The Barcelona 2030SSE Strategy is a case study of developing local institutions and capacity to successfully promote more democratic and sustainable economic initiatives. Several studies have analyzed the growth of the SSE policies at the local and national levels, yet the intricacies of how electoral politics affect economic sustainability warrant further study. Will recent electoral swings in support for pro-SSE and sustainability policies at the local and national levels undermine the institutions that have been launched in recent years to promote more democratic, inclusive, and sustainable economic development models? Using preliminary data from semi-structured interviews of policy elites and participant observations from public and governmental hearings, this research will provide a case study of whether the rightward ideological shift in global, European, and local politics will undermine these new SSE and sustainability-related institutions. This paper contributes to the growing body of literature on SSE and sustainability by exploring the often-overlooked role of local politics and elections in shaping SSE and sustainability policy outcomes.
