Introduction

The most well-known definition of sustainability is probably the one found in the Brundtland Commission’s report Our Common Future from 1987. Since Rio there has been an ongoing discussion as to what extent the Brundtland Commission’s definition of sustainability represent a so-called ‘weak’ or ‘strong’ version of sustainability. Some might argue that this newer way of understanding sustainability is just a more precise specification of the Brundtland definition, while others might argue that it is definitively more radical, as Raworth directly encourages us to be ‘agnostic about growth’. Clark A. Miller that the current focus on sustainability pushes the highly technical field of energy management, which is traditionally driven in a top-down manner, towards a more bottom-up approach of socio-technological self-governance. Diversity is a striking feature of community-based solutions. The chapter also presents an overview of the key concepts discussed in this book.