National sustainable development strategies: features, challenges and reflexivity

More than a decade has passed since the first countries issued national sustainable development strategies. This essay will consider recent developments in this area, and explore the extent to which such strategies can be considered an emergent mode of reflexive governance of the type required to promote sustainable development. The argument involves three steps: first, a review of the current state of play with respect to sustainable development strategies; second, an assessment of existing strategy processes, and third, a more theoretically focused discussion of their potential significance. Copyright © 2007 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd and ERP Environment.

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