Instructions for a Sustainable Anthropocene

Abstract

Is it possible to achieve a sustainable Anthropocene? Yes, if we adopt the correct key for understanding the mechanisms that connect the three dimensions of sustainability, the environmental, the social and the economic. The road to sustainability is made even harder than it was at the beginning of the sustainable development discourse by the fact that nowadays the three dimensions have problems that have time spans that tend to become equally urgent. This paper offers a vision of sustainability that underlines the cause-effect-feedback relationships among the dimensions and shows examples of the functioning of these linkages. This calls for a redefinition of priorities and for a different set of “rules of the house” (economy) to be fit for a world with almost 8 billion people and an endangered natural basis of survival.