ABSTRACT
The emergence of the People's Sustainability Treaties (PSTs) initiative in the run-up to the United Nations (UNs) 2012 Conference on Sustainable Development was a significant development for sustainability praxis. It offers a strikingly concrete manifestation of civil societies increasing discontent with the glacial progress of the international governance community in addressing the pressing interconnected environmental, social and economic sustainability challenges that have come to characterize the early twenty-first century. The paucity of progress in flailing climate change negotiations and the dispiriting level of state interest in the pre-Rio+20 negotiations themselves. Civil society actively engaged with the Rio+20 processes its own right and an opportunity to facilitate the development of a coherent approach towards its global activities. In marked contrast to most state actors, civil society attacked the Rio+20 process vigorously on a number of fronts. In response to the near moribund state of international environmental law, civil society was moved to offer direction and leadership that it felt signally lacking.
