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Localizing the SDGs: Does the SDG Implementation Require a Reform of the Way the United Nations works? (2/4 posts)

Ulrich Graute • Jan 11, 2021

2.      Efforts to localize the SDGs (2015 and 2020)

Note on this series of blog posts


The UN Secretary General and others admitted in 2020 that the implementation of the Agenda 2030 and the Sustainable Development Goals SDGs is off track. To put it back on track there is an urgent need to improve and accelerate implementation of SDG. But does that include local action only or does it need also an improved enabling environment and would that require changes in the way the UN and the member states work? Guided by this question I am launching with the next week on my new blog 'With burning patience' a series of four posts on this burning issue of localizing and implementing the SDG.
 
Post 1:  The UN in 2015 prepared the SDG but no appropriate enabling environment and implementation mechanism
Post 2:  Efforts to localize the SDG (2015-2020)
Post 3:  Local actors call for a seat at the table of international decision-makers to improve SDG implementation (public on 11 Jan 21 or earlier)
Post 4:  Does localizing SDG require a reform of the way the United Nations works? (public on 13 Jan 21 or earlier)


To read all posts of the blog 'With burning patience' please follow this link
https://www.ugraute.de/blog-1


The challenge of implementing SDGs with unclear means of implementation

 

To write about the SDG localization and implementation is not easy. In deed, many national and local SDG policies, programmes and projects have been launched. In addition, there are numerous progress reports. However, the overall picture is mixed and the success at risk. When presenting the Sustainable Development Goals Report in early 2020 the Secretary-General of the United Nations António Guterres summarized the situation as follows:

 

The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2020 brings together the latest data to show us that, before the COVID-19 pandemic, progress remained uneven and we were not on track to meet the Goals by 2030. Some gains were visible: the share of children and youth out of school had fallen; the incidence of many communicable diseases was in decline; access to safely managed drinking water had improved; and women’s representation in leadership roles was increasing. At the same time, the number of people suffering from food insecurity was on the rise, the natural environment continued to deteriorate at an alarming rate, and dramatic levels of inequality persisted in all regions. Change was still not happening at the speed or scale required. [1]

 

In spite of available Thematic and SDG Reviews, Voluntary National Reviews (VNR) and complimentary Voluntary Local Reviews delivered it remains difficult to get a full picture of the state of implementation and to outline the ideal enabling environment and procedures to implement the Agenda 2030 and its SDGs.[2] VNR are no independent reports but voluntary reports by national governments. It is the exception that a country, like Germany in 2016, develops its VNR together with civil society and private sector representatives. In case of Germany the country even shared the speaking slot at the High Level Political Forum (HLPF) with civil society. But even here it is still the view of one country and not an independent external monitoring or evaluation. Unfortunately, at the end of the predecessor agendas, i.e. the Millennium Development Goals (MDG) and the Rio Process which followed the UN Conference in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, no thorough evaluation was carried out. Therefore, at the end of MDG and Rio Process in 2015 the member states took their decision to launch the new Agenda 2030 without being informed by a thorough evaluation of MDG and Rio Process. And now in early 2021 we again only now that there is not enough progress but there are no clear recommendation how to change that. Member states still see no need to develop and adopt a result based implementation mechanism for the Agenda 2030. Instead, the implementation was delegated to the member states and its up to member states when they come up with a VNR.


This all is a pity because part of the resolutions of the Rio Conference in 1992 was the Local Agenda 21. 6400 local initiatives in 183 countries have been launched with reference to the Local Agenda 21 aiming at mainstreaming sustainable thinking and action. Not all of them were successful and only few exist until today but for the localization of SDG a thorough evaluation of the Local Agenda initiatives would have been an enormous treasure. Especially a better understanding on how many of them failed would be helpful to set up the implementation structure to localize SDG. [3] 

 

Without a proper implementation structure, necessary resources and monitoring indicators member states and the UN embarked into the implementation phase. Certainly, the Agenda 2030 was good to protect the sovereignty of member states represented by their national governments but the prize for it is that localization and implementation of SDG became in parts a matter of chance. This is a problem because the Agenda 2030 is crucial for the preservation of life on earth and for our future development. Therefore, it doesn't come at a surprise that the UN Secretary General acknowledged that SDG implementation is off track five years after its launch.

 

Even the member states already in 2019 were no more satisfied and committed, among other things, to:

 

“Strengthening the high-level political forum; we pledge to carry out an ambitious and effective review of the format and organizational aspects of the high-level political forum and follow-up and review of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development at the global level during the seventy-fourth session of the General Assembly with a view to better addressing gaps in implementation and linking identified challenges with appropriate responses, including on financing, to further strengthen the effective and participatory character of this intergovernmental forum and encourage the peer-learning character of the voluntary national reviews.”[4]

 

The German Institute for International and Security Affairs suggested in February 2020 that when celebrating the UN’s 75th anniversary, member states should strengthen the HLPF, as the UN’s “home of the SDGs”, ensuring the forum is fit for purpose to support them in their efforts to master the decade of action and delivery. Unfortunately, that statement came about the same time when attention shifted to the Corona pandemic and eventually no reform of the HLPF was adopted at the UN's 75th anniversary summit in September 2020.

 

But let's not end the blog here with a negative conclusion. Instead, let's indicate some of the guidance materials and tools which were produced either by UN agencies or other stakeholders. They are important as they provide information on what is needed for a successful localization and implementation of SDG. In addition. local stakeholder can use them as guidance when developing their own activities.

 

 


[1] United Nations (UN) (2020): The Sustainable Development Goals Report 2020, https://unstats.un.org/sdgs/report/2020/

[2] Compare Voluntary National Reviews Database at https://sustainabledevelopment.un.org/vnrs/

Global Environmental Strategies (IGES) (2020): State of Voluntary Local Reviews 2020: Local Action for Global Impact and Achieving the SDGs.

[3] Local Agenda 21 Survey. A Study of Responses by Local Authorities and Their National and International Associations to Agenda 21. ICLEI/UNDPCSD, 1997.

Local Governments’ Response to Agenda 21: Summary Report of Local Agenda 21 Survey with Regional Focus, ICLEI, 2002.

[4] UNGA, Political declaration of the high-level political forum on sustainable development convened under the auspices of the General Assembly (A/RES/74/4) (New York: UN, 15 October 2019), para. 2; Beisheim, Marianne: Reviewing the HLPF’s “format and organizational aspects”– what’s being discussed? Assessing current proposals under debate. German Institute for International and Security Affairs, Working Paper Nr. 1, February 2020.



Guidance Tools to Localize SDGs


The Global Taskforce of Local and Regional Governments (GTF) was set up already in 2013 to bring together and coordinate the joint advocacy work of the major international networks of local governments. GTF includes UCLG, ICLEI, metropolis, CCRE/CEMR, FMDV, C40 Cities, the Global Parliament of mayors and other member networks. The Global Taskforce has participated actively in the SDG and Habitat III processes, and has bought the voices of local leaders to the international debates on financing for development, disaster risk reduction and climate change. Of cause, such a strong network of local authorities has a keen interest in the subject of localizing the SDG.

In 2016 the Global Taskforce in cooperation with UNDP and UN-Habitat launched the Roadmap for Localizing the SDGs aiming to support local and regional governments and other local stakeholders in implementing the 2030 Agenda at local level. The Roadmap reflects the voluntary character of the Agenda 2030 and SDGs. It doesn't provide advise on formal procedures to set up implementing structures, funding provisions and rules for accountability and transparency. Instead, it has a strong supply orientation and appeal character and wants to motivate and provide support to local stakeholders interested in implementing the agenda.

The Roadmap is composed of five parts:
- Awareness-raising
- Advocacy
- Implementation
- Monitoring
- Where do we go from here? as a forward looking final section


As one of the more recently published sources I would like to recommend the 2020 published Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Guidebook and Toolkit of the Community Foundations of Canada and the Charles Stewart Mott Foundation.  It is primarily addressed at the 191 local community foundations in Canada but the toolkit can be inspiring as much for local stakeholders in other countries and contexts.

Important is also the work done with a focus on world regions. To be mentioned is for instance an initiative of PLATFORMA and the Council of European Municipalities and Regions (CEMR). They launched in cooperation with UCLG in July 2020 the study 'THE 2030 AGENDA Through the eyes of local and regional governments’ association'.[1] Already in November 2008 in Marseille, European Ministers responsible for urban development endorsed the creation of a common European Reference Framework for Sustainable Cities (RFSC). Today RFSC provides a web application to guide cities on their own path towards sustainability (visit www.rfsc.eu).


Also very active is the Asia and Pacific region. I recall reviewing the draft of the publication 'THE FUTURE OF ASIAN & PACIFIC CITIES Transformative Pathways Towards Sustainable Urban Development' published by ESCAP and UN-Habitat in 2019.


The "report is an attempt to reimagine the urban future. It projects a picture of a future that is prosperous, resilient and inclusive. It analyses possibilities for sustainable development by asking what kind of policy options could help cities in the region localize and meet the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development." [2]


The roadmaps, guidebooks, studies and other sources not mentioned here are important even if the enabling environment for SDG implementation is not sufficient. They allow stakeholders at the local level to go ahead and do the local groundwork for a more sustainable development considering the specific context of their municipality and territory. They are all forward looking and aim at fostering efforts to localize SDG.  


[1] https://platforma-dev.eu/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/CEMR-PLATFORMA-SDGs-2020-EN-Final.pdf (accessed on 8 January 2021)

[2] https://www.unescap.org/sites/default/d8files/knowledge-products/Future%20of%20AP%20Cities%20Report%

202019.pdf (accessed on 8 January 2021) 


 

International Guidelines on Urban and Territorial Planning (IG-UTP)

 

Last but not least, I have to mention that there are other guidance documents and toolkits by other organizations. They may have existed already at the time when the Agenda 2030 was launched and sometimes their importance is underrated. One outstanding example is the International Guidelines on Urban and Territorial Planning (IG-UTP). They were adopted by the Governing Council of the United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat) in spring 2015, i.e. even prior to the adoption of the Agenda 2030 and prior to the adoption of the New Urban Agenda (NUA) at the Habitat III conference in 2016.[1]

 

In my own advisory work I had to take note more than once that for mayors, urban planners and other local stakeholders it is not always easy to understand why the UN adopted the NUA on top of the Agenda 2030 without clearly linking the two and without a coordinated implementation mechanism for the two. Instead, while it is not easy to implement the NUA, it is a lot easier to communicate the value added of other guidance tools like the IG-UTP which was also produced by experts in the framework of UN-Habitat.


Just have a look at the 12 Key Principles as described in the Guidelines (see table). They provide a snapshot of both, the complexity of challenges and the how to do of integrated planning for sustainable development. With ambitious agendas like Agenda 2030, SDG and NUA there is the challenge of the 'last mile', i.e. the translation of the global agenda and goals into the specific context of a municipality or territory. This is again an issue of the implementation mechanism. It needs to be assured that the implementation of the goals is operational at all levels of governance. SDG (and NUA) are not self-explanatory. The more complex and interrelated global goals the more it is important to translate them into the specific context and day-to-day work situation of local authorities and other stakeholders. In this respect the IG-UTP can help a lot. The Guidelines are no local master plan by themselves but at least its 12 Key Principles and 114 action-oriented recommendations have been developed from a practitioners point of view.



[1] Link to the IG-UTP and IG-UTP Handbook:

https://unhabitat.org/project/international-guidelines-on-urban-and-territorial-planning-guidelines-or-igutp



It will be important to not loose the momentum of the above and other on-going activities because they are indispensable for goals achievement. However, available roadmaps, toolkits and guidelines cannot and don't claim to be a substitute for a proper implementation mechanism and enabling environment. Such mechanisms and enabling environment need to be well thought-out linking the global, national and local parts of the development pillar. And, of course, to support transparency and accountability they need to describe tasks, roles and responsibilities for all actor groups involved.

 

The next two blog posts will discuss changes proposed to better localize SDG and what that could mean for the way the UN works.

New Paragraph

Policies and Governance for Resilient and Sustainable Cities and Regions

The Future of the United Nations and the Second Law of Thermodynamics

by Ulrich Graute • 08 May, 2024
The United Nations is preparing for its Summit of the Future and hopes for a Pact for the Future bring the SDG implementation and multilateralism back on Track as main outcome of the Summit scheduled for September of this year in New York. Can that become a success and bring multilateral cooperation and SDG goal achievement back on track? The UN describes 'Halfway through the 2030 Agenda, the world is not on track to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals. It is not too late to change course, if we all rethink, refocus, and recharge. “UN 2.0” encapsulates the Secretary-General's vision of a modern UN family, rejuvenated by a forward-thinking culture and empowered by cutting-edge skills for the twenty-first century – to turbocharge our support to people and planet.'[1] The UN certainly will try but at the end progress will depend on the political will of member states and there is not much visible until now. On May 7, 2024 Parag Khanna, Founder & CEO of AlphaGeo, Strategic Advisor and Bestselling Author, published in Noema his paper The Coming Entropy Of Our World Order. He writes in his analysis: ‘Indeed, the most accurate description of today’s world is high entropy, in which energy is dissipating rapidly and even chaotically through the global system. In physics, entropy is embodied in the Second Law of Thermodynamics (pithily summed up in a Woody Allen film as: “Sooner or later, everything turns to shit”). Entropy denotes disorder and a lack of coherence.’ But for Khanna entropy is not anarchy. Instead, entropy ‘is a systemic property that manifests itself as a growing number of states and other actors seize the tools of power, whether military, financial or technological, and exercise agency within the system. There is still no consensus as to what to name the post-Cold War era, but its defining characteristic is clear: radical entropy at every level and in every domain of global life. How do we reconcile an increasingly fractured order with an increasingly planetary reality?’ It's worth reading the full paper where he welcomes the reader to the Global Middle Ages as a very complex geopolitical marketplace. He expects that what will matter much more than sovereignty, then, is capacity as measured by coherence, agency and resilience. States will no longer hold monopoly over the tools of physical violence. The future he envisages far more resembles the pre-Westphalian patterns of Hanseatic Leagues than ‘today’s Potemkin sovereign assemblies such as the United Nations’. According to him it is hard to find anybody who really cares for multilateralism. More visible is that every state fights for herself. Khanna also asks: 'If institutionalized orders such as the late 20th-century multilateral system tended to be established only after major wars, would an entropic drift into regional spheres of influence be preferable to a World War III among dueling hegemons? In this scenario, conflicts may flare from Ukraine to Taiwan, but they would be ring-fenced within their respective regions rather than becoming tripwires for global conflict. Regions that strive for greater self-sufficiency, such as North America and Europe today, could reduce the carbon intensity of their economies and trade, but potentially at the cost of undermining their interdependence with and leverage over other regions. Such is the double-edged nature of an entropic world. With no major power able to impose itself on the global system or able to reign in those transnational actors domiciled abroad or in the cloud, the future looks less like a collective of sovereign nations than a scattered tableau of regional fortresses, city-states and an archipelago of islands of stability connected through networks of mobile capital, technology and talent. To argue that there is some bedrock Western-led order underpinning the global system rather than crumbling inertia is tantamount to infinite regress'. Who considers Khanna a negativist should read also the end of his paper: 'Global entropy doesn’t solely imply fragmentation. To the contrary, the system exhibits characteristics of self-organization, even aggregation, into new patterns and formations. Highways, railways, electricity grids and airlines link cities in ways that form neo-Hanseatic networks and alliances, and the internet transcends borders to link self-governing social communities. The universal reach and penetration of connectivity enables authorities of all kinds to forge bonds effectively more real than the many states that exist more on maps than in their peoples’ reality. The world comes together — even as it falls apart.' I would like to read more on how the self-organization into new patterns and formations will work successfully and prevent the world from falling apart. For that we may have to wait for his next book. In the meantime, we should ask ourselves what we can do to get ready for the future. The Summit of the Future and UN 2.0 are unlikely to proof more than that the UN is not dead. Entangled in its old procedures and the current multi challenge environment it would be unrealistic to expect more. What could help as a starter is to develop and test new forms of Model UN, i.e. the simulation of how international cooperation can work in a world described by Parag Khanna. I would be interested. Back to the post on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/posts/graute_the-future-of-the-united-nations-and-the-activity-7194007832390750208-Brqe?utm_source=share&utm_medium=member_desktop Footnotes [1] https://www.un.org/two-zero/en [2] Link to Parag Khanna's full paper https://www.noemamag.com/the-coming-entropy-of-our-world-order/

Artificial Intelligence II - AI as co-pilot in urban and regional planning and international cooperation

by Ulrich Graute • 25 Apr, 2024
The KPMG Future Summit event on AI which I attended on 23 April 2023 [1] did not address directly urban and territorial planning or international cooperation in the field. I was listening to the online event while ironing my shirts (unfortunately, that’s not done by AI yet). What caught my attention was among others the statement by Miriam Kugel, Director of People Science Advisory for Europe, the Middle East and Africa at Microsoft. She said that AI will be in future like our co-pilot. While many admin tasks will be taken over by AI more managerial oversight by managers will be needed. Just imagine all the rules and regulations that have to be consider in planning a city can be considered and factored in by AI. It still will need the planners to identify the best proposals and recommend them to politicians for decision-making. Chris Chiancone, Chief Information Officer at the City of Carralton suggests regarding the use of AI in planning to ‘Picture a tool that can absorb data about a city's current layout, population density, infrastructure, and other factors, and then generate a model of how the city could be restructured to optimize certain objectives.’ Chris Chiancone writes in his paper of 20 June 2023 ‘Revolutionizing Urban Planning with Generative AI: A new Era of Smart Cities’ [2] : “At its heart, Generative AI is a type of machine learning that crafts new data instances reflecting its training set. Picture a master artist who, rather than simply duplicating a scene, employs their creativity to produce unique, lifelike outputs from a given input. That's the magic of Generative AI, but in the realm of data. It's the digital world's virtuoso, wielding algorithms and computational power instead of brushes and pigments”. For Chiancone Generative AI brings a unique fusion of creativity and efficiency to urban planning. It's akin to having a supercharged assistant that can process numbers, analyze data, generate models, and make predictions at a pace and scale that humans simply can't compete with. All of this is done with the aim of creating more efficient, habitable, and sustainable cities. According to Chiancone Generative AI is a tool that's not just revolutionizing urban planning, but also holds the potential to significantly enhance the quality of life in our urban habitats. And that ‘supercharged assistant’ corresponds to Miriam Kugels ‘co-pilot’. In spite of all creativity, Chiancone and Kugel understand AI as supportive tools (assistant or co-pilot) and that it needs data strategies, AI governance and capacity building to keep the pilot on track to intended goals. Scenario planning could be one of the big beneficiaries of AI. The planner as pilot of the planning process can modify the scenario setting and ask AI to develop the best scenario accordingly. This way, planners and decision-makers can better test out different options before taking a decision. Now let’s think ahead a bit further. If AI can support scenario planning AI can also support the inter-sectoral and multi-level coordination of planning process which are often loaded with conflicting interests. AI could extend the scenario planning and apply a Large Language Model to include also all policies, laws and regulations of other relevant policy fields, policy levels plus the rights of citizens and property owners affected by a plan. By combining and comparing all these data AI could either identify win-win situations or generate proposals to bridge conflicting positions. It still will need the planning process and the decision-making but AI could support this process significantly by assuring that all relevant policies, rules and regulations are taken into account. And if new challenges and opportunities emerge, they can be included to proposed scenarios without much delay. And planners assisted by their ‘co-pilot’ might become even more reliable and appreciated authorities in the planning process. [1] https://kpmg.com/de/de/home/events/uebersicht/kpmg-zukunftsgipfel.html [2] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/revolutionizing-urban-planning-generative-ai-new-era-smart-chiancone/ AI and the interrelated web of sustainable development goals Since 2012 I am working on the post 2015 development agenda of the United Nations which is since 2015 called 2030 Agenda and it includes 17 Sustainable Development Goals with 169 targets. The Agenda is currently off-track but what puzzles me since its launch is how to we can keep track of the fact that goals and targets are an interrelated web. Progress on one goal or target may imply regression on others. How can a zero-sum game or an overall regression be prevented? Here too, AI offers opportunities. The Human Settlements Programme of the United Nations (UN-Habitat) launched in 2022 its report “AI and Cities” [3] . This first more comprehensive review of the relation between AI, cities and urban planning includes among others the recommendation to align AI strategies with SDGs and National and Local Goals (UN-Habitat 2022 AI and Cities, page 100). [3] https://unhabitat.org/sites/default/files/2022/10/artificial_intelligence_and_cities_risks_applications_and_governance.pdf

Artificial Intelligence I - Travelling with a rocket still under construction - AI as a promising but also scary change-maker

by Ulrich Graute • 25 Apr, 2024
AI is to be understood as a combination of hardware, software and (this is new!) learning. If you have a virus software on your computer a virus scanner may identify and remove the virus. Now imagine, your virus would be AI enhanced and able to learn and modify itself. Virus scanners may not be able to identify self-modifying viruses and the virus could keep learning, remain undetected and increase damage without limits. That’s scary and that’s why data strategies and AI governance by governments, providers and users is necessary. Would a world without AI be a better place? As an expert in international cooperation, urban and regional development I am sceptic. We’re living in times of multiple and often interrelated and interdependent crises. There is an international system of multi-level and multilateral rule-based cooperation and this system generates complex programmes like the UN 2030 Agenda with its 17 Sustainable Development Goals and 168 targets. In spite of such programmes and centuries of experience in diplomacy the human system is not able (yet) to prevent war, mitigate climate change, remove high inequality and assure a sustainable development which leave no one behind. Our governments, societies and we as individuals are experienced in solving single issue problems but the current complexity is growing, already now overwhelming and our capacities are slow in growing up to the many challenges. In this situation (a well governed and strategised) artificial intelligence which helps us to understand complexity and to identify solutions for our challenges could be the change-maker we need.

UN Classics: IGUTP - International Guidelines on Urban and Territorial Planning by UN-Habitat

by Ulrich Graute • 28 Mar, 2024
The need for planning cannot be over-emphasized. Urbanization is progressing rapidly and by 2050, seven out of ten people will be living in cities. Inappropriate policies, plans, and designs have led to the inadequate spatial distribution of people and activities, resulting in the proliferation of slums, congestion, poor access to basic services, environmental degradation, and social inequity and segregation. The International Guidelines on Urban and Territorial Planning (launched by the Governing Council of UN-Habitat in 2015) serve both as a source of inspiration and a compass for decision makers and urban professionals when reviewing urban and territorial planning systems. The Guidelines provide national governments, local authorities, civil society organizations and planning professionals with a global reference framework that promotes more compact, socially inclusive, better integrated and connected cities and territories that foster sustainable urban development and are resilient to climate change. They have been downloaded from the website of UN-Habitat more than 100.000 times during the first years after its publication. You can find it following this link in eleven different languages: https://unhabitat.org/international-guidelines-on-urban-and-territorial-planning The following picture shows the 12 key Principles which should drive Planning and refers to 114 recommendations made in the Guidelines.

2024 Conference Centrality in the Age of Dispersion

by Ulrich Graute • 21 Feb, 2024
Having a highly positive experience with the first edition of the International Conference Centrality in the Age of Dispersion in 2023, we are pleased to announce the second edition of this event! The conference will be held in Wroclaw on 25-27 September 2024. Human settlement have always developed around centres. Whether it is the ancient Greek polis or the 20th century neighbourhood, each has concentrated different human activities and formed a specific node in geographical space. Today, the natural mechanisms of concentration are being undermined by various dispersal processes of a multiscalar and temporal nature. The networked society, demographic transitions, the global economy, instant communication, teleworking, online services - among others - are challenging urban planning paradigms around the world. What is special about centrality and dispersion today? What is the current balance between centrality and dispersion in urban development? How does public governance respond to these complex phenomena? These are the main questions of the International Conference Centrality in the Age of Dispersion, organised by the Chair of Urban Planning and Spatial Management, Faculty of Architecture, Wroclaw University of Science and Technology, Wroclaw, Poland, 25-27 September 2024. The conference will address the demand for a new approach to territorial governance and will bring together experts from different scientific disciplines to present their research on urban centres and discuss dispersion phenomena. The attached flyer provides some basic information about the conference. You are invited to submit a paper for the conference, which may be considered for publication in 'Planning Practice and Research', 'Bulletin of Geography. Socio-Economic Series' and 'Architectus' journals. The deadline for submitting abstracts is 15.04.2024 23:59 CET. More information is available on the conference website: https://lnkd.in/eE67ibEB Please share this invitation with your colleagues and partners in both academia and policy-making. If you have any issues or questions, please do not hesitate to contact us at centrality-dispersion@pwr.edu.pl. We look forward to your contribution to our conference and hope to meet you in person in Wroclaw. Lukasz Damurski, associate professor Head of the Scientific Committee of the International Conference ‘Centrality in the Age of Dispersion’ Faculty of Architecture Wrocław University of Science and Technology Dr Ulrich Graute, Member of the Scientific Committee of the Conference and Chair of the Scientific Committee of ISOCARP - International Society of City and Regional Planners

Ulrich's CV in Pictures since the late 1970s

by Ulrich Graute • 26 Jan, 2024
Ulrich on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/feed/ and Ulrich's CV in pictures: https://www.ugraute.de/ulrich-s-cv-in-pictures-since-the-late-1970s

Engaged since a European Forum in 1979, turned Professional in 1989 and since 2014 Independent Consultant in support of International Cooperation and Peace

by Ulrich Graute • 25 Jan, 2024
WORK EXPERIENCE SINCE THE 1980s AND THEREOFF NOW 10 YEARS AS INTERNATIONAL CONSULTANT - AND EACH YEAR BRINGS NEW CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES On 3 January 2024 I found an automated message from LinkedIn congratulating me for being now ten years member of the network. On 31 December 2013 my employment contract as senior advisor at the UN Secretariat in New York run out after more than five years. Joining LinkedIn on 3 January 2024 was indeed my very first step into the world and life of an independent consultant. 10 Years as consultant means ten years of ups and downs on the market of consultancy contracts, moving from UNDESA in New York to work from Berlin e.g. for the mayor of Berlin, GIZ and Cities Alliance before moving to Nairobi to work for UN-Habitat and back to Berlin. The list of employers was already remarkable in 2014 but private clients with smaller or bigger assignments keep joining the list of clients and partners (see pictures): https://www.ugraute.de/https-www-ugraute-de-ulrich-cv-in-pictures-since-the-late-1970s 10 years as consultant means 10 years of constant learning, testing new approaches, tools and searching for new opportunities. I survived the difficult first five years (when most start-ups go out of business) because in January 2014 I had already 25 years of experience as professional. Please see my picture gallery for a visual impression: Clients usually don’t pay for my learning but, of course, before getting a new contract I always have to convince new clients that I am the best for the job and have all necessary qualifications. And imagine doing that in times of multiple crises and high dynamics like these days. I managed it so far and keep finding new clients because I learned right at the beginning of my career to be value drven while flexible and curious enough to face new challenges and embrace dynamics. My career was derailed right at the beginning with the fall of the Berlin Wall in 1989. I had finished university in Hamburg just months earlier and soon was sent from the West to Eastern Germany to help building up public administration and a learning center in the new Free State of Saxony after the peaceful revolution. There were no plans, manuals and tool boxes for the transformation of a political system and society with a collapsing economy. So, I was thrown into the water and supported the development of a new form of governance in a changing society at local and regional level. All this happened more or less in parallel to the preparation of the United Nations 'Earth Summit' in 1992. I didn’t attend it but it became clear to me that the development of governance and society need to be aligned with a sustainable development. Again, at the time there were no manuals and tool boxes but I already knew how to swim in unchartered waters. Working at the Leibniz Institute of Sustainable Urban and Regional Development in Dresden (Saxony, Germany, 1993-2002) I added a PhD to my path which otherwise remained driven by curiosity for cross disciplinary, cross-border and multilevel cooperation in a changing world. Working at the UN the UN core values of professionalism, integrity and respect of diversity became my own core values and remeined ever since. In addition, I always keep thinking that there have to be better solutions. My employers, partners, and friends since 1989 and my clients since 2014 appreciate this attitude and the related flexibility very much. There were difficult times like the Corona pandemic but to my own surprise demand for my work is growing ever since. But so are the challenges in times of crises. Inspite of challenges, ups and downs I like to be consultant carrying now professional experience along with me which I gained since the late 1970s. As consultant I may be team leader or member but I'm usually not the boss. That makes it easier to cooperate with others as colleagues, to share my knowledge and experience with changing teams in different countries. Each new contract and team provides me a treasure of new insights and experience. And my LinkedIn network? It reached 102 followers within the first year 2014. Now it gains 100+ new followers within a month and is inching towards 5000 followers. That’s nice but I still value even higher face-to-face meetings. At the beginning of my 11th year as independent consultant and about to embark on new tasks and even more diversified assignments I would like to say thank you to all colleagues, friends and clients who supported me in the course of the least ten years and who’ll continue to do so in future. Consultants may often work alone or as part of global online teams from their home office but we are nothing without the people who support us and who use our advice, knowledge and recommendations. Therefore, let me thank all of you very much for your trust and let’s keep (co-)working to make this world a better place.In spite of my many years there is still a lot left to be done. Ulrich on LinkedIn https://www.linkedin.com/feed/ and Ulrich's CV in pictures (1985-2024):https://www.ugraute.de/ulrich-s-cv-in-pictures-since-the-later-1970s

Jordan: Municipal services to assist refugees and to strengthen climate and social resilience in the Kingdom

by Ulrich Graute • 14 Nov, 2023
Despite being challenged by millions of refugees Jordan is turning to strengthen climate resilience Jordan is a politically and economically stable country but with its direct neighbours Iraq, Syria, Israel and Palestine (the latter having since 2012 a non-member observer state in the United Nations) the Kingdom is challenged by many conflicts in its vicinity. Jordan has hosted more than 1.3 million Syrians since the beginning of the Syrian crisis in 2011, including 660,000 registered Syrian refugees with the UNHCR. In addition, 66,801 Iraqi refugees and more than 2 million registered Palestine refugees live in Jordan. This refugee population makes up for more than 18 percent of the overall population of Jordan of 11,32 million. A burden which would be too much to handle in other countries doesn't keeop Jordan from turning to the other huge challenge: Climate Challenge. Since 2014 the World Bank already supports Jordanian municipalities affected by the influxes of Syrian refugees in delivering services and employment opportunities for Jordanians and Syrians in context of the Municipal Services and Social Resilience Project (MSSRP). Now a tiny part of that support is used to explore opportunities to support municipalities in their efforts to fight climate change. Already in 2022 the World Bank published a Jordan Country Climate and Development Report identifying two pathways towards adaptation, resilience, and low-carbon growth: The water, energy, and food security nexus The urban-transport-energy nexus

Keeping climate policy and sustainability policy separate – was it a mistake? Yes, it was!

by Ulrich Graute • 08 Oct, 2023
At ISOCARP’s 59th World Planning Congress and the 5th Uraben Economic Forum this week in Toronto, Canada planners, urban economists and climate experts will meet and talk about Climate Action and Urban Finance. You may want to intervene and say that climate change and sustainable development are often discussed in context and not separately. Yes, however, at the institutional level climate change and sustainability are delt with in separate arenas and that since thirty years. I assume, but it should be further analyzed, that this separation generated a path dependency which prevented integrated solutions. Background: In May 1992 the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) established an international environmental treaty to combat dangerous human interference with the climate system. It was signed by 154 states at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), informally known as the Earth Summit, held in Rio de Janeiro from 3 to 14 June 1992. At the very same conference, the Agenda 21 as the Rio Declaration on Environment and Development, and the Statement of principles for the Sustainable Management of Forests were adopted by more than 178 Governments. While these twince were born at the same conference they took separate paths right after the conference. The UNFCCC got its separate secretariat not at a UN Headquarters e.g. in New York, Nairobi or Geneva but at Bonn, Germany and the implementation and further follow-up is within the responsibility of the Conference of Parties (or COP) where all signatories meet on an annual basis. In contrast, for the effective follow-up of the Agenda 21 the UN General Assembly established in December 1992 the Committee on Sustainable Development. In 2015, climate and sustainability policy needed an uplifting. For the Agenda 21 this came in September 2023 in form of the 2030 Agenda with 17 Sustainable Development Goals while UNFCCC agreed just three months later at its COP21 on the Paris Agreement. Both were organized under the auspices of the UN but remained on their separate tracks. UNFCCC still has its secretariat in Bonn and the 2030 Agenda is monitored by the High Level Political Forum of the UN General Assembly. Now, in 2023 UNFCC and Agenda 2030 are both off track but they are also interdependent. There won’t be a mitigation of climate change without change of human behavior as it is aimed at by the 2030 Agenda. And, of course, the 2030 Agenda needs climate action (SDG 13). Why aren’t they merged? When I asked the question in the 1990s I was told that Climate Change requires a lot of scientific understanding and it is driven by political commitments by signatory states of UNFCC and Paris Agreement. That sounded a bit more like a distinction according to status rather than substantial necessity. After all, without scientific and social science understanding the 2030 Agenda cannot exist either. Also important, this distinction left a deep impression on the work of both strands. For instance, an online session at the Pre-conference of the Toronto Congress on 15 September 2023 organized by ISOCARP in collaboration with the Global Planning Education Association Network (GPEAN) and chaired by Zeynep Enlil (Istanbul, GPEAN and ISOCARP Scientific Committee) revealed that climate change is hardly a subject in curricula of the education of planners. This might be a consequence out of the artificial separation between climate and sustainability policy over three decades. Knowing that climate change has this science and policy making focus and (self-)image planning schools may have turned automatically more towards the broader sustainability planning and, as a side effect, largely ignored climate change. A change is slowly taking shape. ISOCARP with support of its Scientific Committee is now setting up a Climate Action Group to more closely follow UNFCC and to be present at COP28 in Dubai. And of course, the Congress in Toronto has a change to bring urban planning, climate action and urban finance closer together. I am looking forward to the discussions until 13 October 2023 in Toronto. Conference website: https://toronto2023.dryfta.com/

Quality of Life and Enhancing Territorial Governance

by Ulrich Graute • 26 Sept, 2023
The International Conference "Centrality in The Age of Dispersion" will be organized by Wrocław University of Science and Technology in collaboration with ISOCARP on Thursday and Friday of this week (28-29/09/2023). The subject of the conference is closely related to concerns of quality of life and on how territorial development is governed. I am very proud that the organizers appointed me to chair two sessions on these important aspects. In the session on Quality of Living Concerns on 29 September 2023 Constanze Zöllter will discuss attractive places to live in shrinking cities. Moti Kaplan of the Technion Israel Institute will analyse the contribution of linear parks to the regeneration of dense, high quality urban centers. As citizen of a garden city in Berlin I am looking forward to Justyna Kleszcz's presentation on a contemporary vision of a garden city. Other speakers from Olsztyn and Opole will feature the situation of elderly people and health-promoting urban forms.
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