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The Brundtland Commission, formally the World Commission on Environment and Development (WCED), known by the name of its Chair Gro Harlem Brundtland, was convened by the United Nations in 1983. The commission was created to address growing concern "about the accelerating deterioration of the human environment and natural resources and the consequences of that deterioration for economic and social development." In establishing the commission, the UN General Assembly recognized that environmental problems were global in nature and determined that it was in the common interest of all nations to establish policies for sustainable development.

Resolution establishing the Commission

The 1983 General Assembly passed Resolution 38/161[1]; "Process of preparation of the Environmental Perspective to the Year 2000 and Beyond" establishing the Commission. In A/RES/38/161, the General Assembly:

"8. Suggests that the Special Commission, when established, should focus mainly on the following terms of reference for its work:

(a) To propose long-term environmental strategies for achieving sustainable development to the year 2000 and beyond;

(b) To recommend ways in which concern for the environment may be translated into greater co-operation among developing countries and between countries at different stages of economic and social development and lead to the achievement of common and mutually supportive objectives which take account of the interrelationships between people, resources, environment and development;

(c) To consider ways and means by which the international community can deal more effectively with environmental concerns, in the light of the other recommendations in its report;

(d) To help to define shared perceptions of long-term environmental issues and of the appropriate efforts needed to deal successfully with the problems of protecting and enhancing the environment, a long-term agenda for action during the coming decades, and aspirational goals for the world community, taking into account the relevant resolutions of the session of a special character of the Governing Council in 1982;"^[1]

Brundtland Report

The Report of the Brundtland Commission, Our Common Future, was published by Oxford University Press in 1987. The Report is available in HTML format, one version with links to cited documents^[2], and an easy-to-read full version is available at Erol Hofmans' Center for a World in Balance^[3]. The Report was welcomed by the General Assembly in its resolution 42/187^[4]

The report deals with sustainable development and the change of politics needed for achieving that. The definition of this term in the report is quite well known and often cited:

"Sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. It contains within it two key concepts:

• the concept of 'needs', in particular the essential needs of the world's poor, to which overriding priority should be given; and

• the idea of limitations imposed by the state of technology and social organization on the environment's ability to meet present and future needs."

Notes and references

See also

Sustainable development portal

• Sustainable Development
• Our Common Future