"Build the future we want": an interview with Jeffrey Sachs
Eradicate poverty and famine, ensure access to clean water, implement gender equality, provide clean and affordable energy ... the United Nations set 17 goals for sustainable development in September 2015. Achieving these Sustainable Development Goals is at the heart of the SDSN (Sustainable Development Solutions Network) mission, an international think tank that, under the auspices of the United Nations, mobilizes scientific and technological expertise to promote practical solutions.
Jeffrey Sachs, Special Advisor to the UN Secretary-General and Director of SDSN, will give a lecture on June 21 at PSL, on “The Role of France and French Universities in Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals.”
PSL : In June 2017, following Donald Trump's announcement of the withdrawal of the United States from the Paris Agreement, French President Emmanuel Macron launched "Make our planet great again" calling on researchers, teachers, entrepreneurs, and students to come pursue their activities in France. What is the role of research in the fight against global warming? And what is the place of French universities and research organizations in this action?
While the Trump Administration goes to war with America’s climate scientists, France is showing that we need the climate-related science and engineering.
Jeffrey Sachs : President Macron’s call for increased climate-related research in France and Europe is exactly right. While the Trump Administration goes to war with America’s climate scientists, France is showing that we need the climate-related science and engineering. This is good for the planet and good for the economy, where expertise in 21st-century technologies will be key. Trump’s position is reckless, of course, and against the predominant views of the American people. The scientists are fighting back, but the oil and gas lobby, very strong in the US, is pushing Trump’s worst instincts (and those instincts are indeed very bad).
PSL : The 17 Sustainable Development Goals set out a framework for actions aimed at ending poverty, developing economies, promoting peace, and protecting the environment. To achieve this, SDSN mobilizes scientific and technical experts around the world to propose practical solutions. Can new generations, and especially students from major world universities, participate in these actions? And what do you think are the major priority projects?
The universities are the key to sustaining the science and technology for the common good, at a time when ideologies are putting science and technology on the defensive.
The Universities are vital for sustainable development and achieving the SDGs. Science and technology, not nationalism, denialism, or superstition are the only way forward. The universities are the key to sustaining the science and technology for the common good, at a time when ideologies are putting science and technology on the defensive. Also, too much scientific knowledge is being mobilized by powerful corporate interests (think of Big Tech in the US) and for military purposes. We therefore need a new generation of leadership, built on problem solving, the idealism of many young people, and a rigorous analysis of how to achieve our ambitions of ending poverty, promoting social inclusion, and ending environmental catastrophes including climate change, the loss of biodiversity, and massive air and water pollution.
PSL : Many students wish to give meaning to their activities. In addition to their courses, they engage in civic and solidarity associations, or undertake the development of committed start-ups (anti-food waste, local products manufacturing with #MadeInFrance). As an engaged professor, what is your view of this momentum? Do you have any advice for those who are wondering about the possibility of keeping this commitment at the heart of their professional lives?
We fail to help the poor or save the climate because the political, economic, and social systems are oriented towards greed and impunity, not towards the common good.
The SDGs are a moral cause as well as a technical challenge. We fail to help the poor or save the climate not because these challenges are out of reach but because the political, economic, and social systems are oriented towards greed and impunity, not towards the common good. This is the point that Pope Francis is making correctly and relentlessly in every statement. He calls our challenge today “the globalization of indifference.” We need to fight against the narcissism of Donald Trump and the dangerous tendencies towards extreme nationalism that he and his ilk represent. We need to keep our focus on the common good, and on the use of science, technology, and ethics to build “the future we want.”
