DILEMMAS AND RETURNS OF SUSTAINABILITY PROJECTS IN THE LIGHT OF THE SCIENCE OF SUSTAINABILITY

In the debate on sustainable development there is still a concern about the contribution of science to the construction of environmentally and socially sustainable communities. Its impact depends on scientific discipline, the... [ view full abstract ]

In the debate on sustainable development there is still a concern about the contribution of science to the construction of environmentally and socially sustainable communities. Its impact depends on scientific discipline, the way it is shaped and how it interacts with society and politics. The social sciences and humanities(SSH) are decisive for both knowledge and development. In particular when it comes to challenges associated with socially relevant problems in which scientific knowledge must overcome the traditional boundaries of the discipline and engage in inter and transdisciplinary efforts. In this sense, it is assumed that the potential of sustainability-science lies in focusing on solutions, creating transdisciplinary collaborative research contexts, and reducing institutional barriers beyond understanding the changes that have occurred in the nature-society relationship, creating conditions for the involvement of people in the decisions that affect their lives and their environment. But the development of sustainability-science projects can be an arduous path, producing dilemmas, antagonisms and societal conflicts, requiring time, and having a limited influence on the political decision, reducing the potentiality of its results. This article first elaborates on the valuation of the SSH for the sustainability-science, proceeding in the adaptation of the model of Arnim Wiek et.al.(2012) on evaluation of sustainability-science projects. This model allows the analysis and appraisal of sustainability projects in order to understand how concretely a project contributed to the transformation towards the sustainability of the systems in question. The work intends to illustrate the difficulties and benefits that arise of these projects where various scientific disciplines are applied and the communities are involved. Two projects developed in Portugal will be analyzed, one on the valorization of a  brownfield, and another on the valuation of intangible archaeological knowledge of a region. The projects arose from the need for socioeconomic and environmental long-term sustainable returns to the stakeholders from the effects of the use of local resources. In both projects the approach listening to stakeholders. In the project of brownfield valorization several disciplines and methods were used: from stakeholder's analysis, auscultation and participation to life cycle assessment, contingent valuation and multicriteria analysis. During the project a collaborative plan for brownfield sustainable (re)development was issued. The project on the valuation of intangible knowledge involved the auscultation of the stakeholders and a contingent valuation analysis. A conceptual creative tourism cluster model was found adequate. It was verified in both projects that the organized involvement in the search for sustainable solutions and the integration of interdisciplinary results, benefited the follow-up activities accordingly with sustainability principles. The approach potentiated focal points of action and continuously dialog with growing transformations towards the sustainability of the sites. However in both cases the transformations are of different value, of small scale, of reduced visibility and slow progress. In these two cases, the financial and political barriers commonly associated with the development of sustainability projects are confirmed. May also limitations such as “lack of advanced stakeholder involvement” (Arnim Wiek et al., 2012) were found. The project evaluation process is still under way.