Whose sustainability? Understanding and redefining just sustainability transformations through disability and queer perspectives

Introduction

A major adagio of the Sustainable Development Goals is “Leave no one behind,” implying that actions addressing the sustainability challenges of our time should not only be ecologically beneficial but also emancipatory for the most vulnerable and marginalized. Yet, many vulnerable and marginalized groups are often left behind in sustainability research and actions.

Background

Despite the increasing engagement of disabled and queer scholars and societal actors for environmental and climate justice, their voices are rarely considered in research and action on sustainability transformations. Using an inter and transdisciplinary approach, this project aims to understand and redefine the often-neglected contributions of disability and queer scholarship and societal initiatives around sustainability towards new theories, methodologies, and ethics of just and emancipatory sustainability transformations.

Objectives

WEIRD will:

1. Overcome the fragmentation of disability and queer scholarship around sustainability.
2. Explain how disability and queer societal initiatives contribute to just sustainability transformations by subverting ableistic and cis/heteronormative social norms.
3. Develop new theories of emancipatory sustainability transformations that rely on subversive social norms.
4. Generate new transformative methodologies in sustainability science.
5. Redefine transformative justice for sustainability and the ethics of sustainability science.

Significance

This project is groundbreaking because it will generate new theories, methodologies, and ethics to systematically integrate issues of justice and emancipation in the study of sustainability transformations that are anchored in, but not limited to, disability and queer perspectives.

Conclusion

Overall, through the synergistic achievement of all its objectives, WEIRD will enhance the potential of sustainability science to generate new knowledge about and for just sustainability transformations.