Sustainable Development An Appraisal from the Gulf Region [Paperback]

With growing evidence of unsustainable use of the worlds resources, such as hydrocarbon reserves, and related environmental pollution, as in alarming climate change predictions, sustainable development is arguablytheprominent issue of the 21st century.? This volume gives a wide ranging introduction focusing on the arid Gulf region, where the challenges of sustainable development are starkly evident. The Gulf relies on non-renewable oil and gas exports to supply the worlds insatiable CO2 emitting energy demands, and has built unsustainable conurbations with water supplies dependent on energy hungry desalination plants and deep aquifers pumped beyond natural replenishment rates.Sustainable Developmenthas an interdisciplinary focus, bringing together university faculty and government personnel from the Gulf, Europe, and North America -- including social and natural scientists, environmentalists and economists, architects and planners -- to discuss topics such as sustainable natural resource use and urbanization, industrial and technological development, economy and politics, history and geography.?

This is clearly the most comprehensive overview of sustainable development in the Gulf, a strategic region within the global economy&What is particularly innovative is the last section on cultural issues, ranging from collaborative research methods to indigenous knowledge& the inclusion of health issues, together with a discussion of the cultural turn in sustainability, including participatory approaches, make this book an exemplar of the next generation of thought and knowledge development in the area of sustainable development.????Carl Maida, University of California, Los Angeles

[This volume] amounts to a well edited, comprehensive, collection of sustainable development papers, strongly introduced and concluded by the editor, on a region that surely no one could doubt can only gain from the sall“'