Can I read Local Agenda 21 and the shift to ‘soft governance’ on EtoBox?

Local Agenda 21 and the shift to ‘soft governance’ by B. Evans; K. Theobald is a book available to read on EtoBox.

What is Local Agenda 21 and the shift to ‘soft governance’ about?

Despite its enigmatic title, Local Agenda 21 has become an important and arguably the most influential output of the 1992 Rio de Janeiro 'Earth Summit'. Emerging from the Summit Prepcoms as the policy embodiment of the green mantra to 'think globally, act locally', the agreement to LA21 at Rio was the result of a much more pragmatic realisation that if the proposed global plan for sustainable development, Agenda 21, was to have any chance of implementation, it would be necessary to mobilise action at the level of local communities and local government. The task in hand was simply too vast and complex to be left to national governments alone. Although LA21 has its roots in environmental sustainability, and the clear need to combat pollution, resource and energy waste, environmental degradation and destruction of the global commons, from the very start, LA21 was more than this. Chapter 28 of the Rio Agenda 21 agreement shows very clearly how the authors saw the need to link the local sustainability agenda to questions of political participation, mobilisation and democracy. As the level of governance closest to the people, local authorities play a vital role in educating, mobilising a

Author

B. Evans; K. Theobald

Publisher

Elsevier

Published

2003

Language

EN