The Centre for Development and the Environment ( no, Senter for utvikling og miljø, SUM) is a research institute which is part of the

University of Oslo The University of Oslo ( no, Universitetet i Oslo; la, Universitas Osloensis) is a public research university located in Oslo, Norway. It is the highest ranked and oldest university in Norway. It is consistently ranked among the top universit ...

. Its focus areas are

international development International development or global development is a broad concept denoting the idea that societies and countries have differing levels of economic or human development on an international scale. It is the basis for international classifications ...

and

environmental studies Environmental studies is a multidisciplinary academic field which systematically studies human interaction with the environment. Environmental studies connects principles from the physical sciences, commerce/economics, the humanities, and social ...

History

The Centre for Development and the Environment was established in 1990, following the work with the report ''

Our Common Future __NOTOC__ ''Our Common Future'', also known as the Brundtland Report, was published on October 1987 by the United Nations through the Oxford University Press. This publication was in recognition of Gro Harlem Brundtland's, former Norwegian Prime M ...

'' (the Brundtland Report), presented by the

Brundtland Commission The Brundtland Commission, formerly the World Commission on Environment and Development, was a sub-organization of the United Nations (UN) that aimed to unite countries in pursuit of sustainable development. It was founded in 1983 when Javier Pér ...

chaired by Prime Minister

Gro Harlem Brundtland Gro Brundtland (; born Gro Harlem, 20 April 1939) is a Norwegian politician ( Arbeiderpartiet), who served three terms as the 29th prime minister of Norway (1981, 1986–89, and 1990–96) and as the director-general of the World Health Organizat ...

, and the increased focus on the environment and sustainable development. In 2000, the Program for Research and Documentation for a Sustainable Society (ProSus), formerly called the Project for an Alternative Future (established 1984), was merged into the Centre for Development and the Environment. ProSus was established on the initiative of 17 organisations and was funded by parliament over the Norwegian state budget; it was part of the Norwegian Research Council for Science and the Humanities from the early 1990s and became part of the University of Oslo in 1996. ProSus was discontinued as a separate programme in 2006. SUM is currently one of the few institutions in Scandinavia advancing synergic, interdisciplinary research on development and the environment, combining insights from the social sciences, natural sciences and humanities. SUM was also the academic home of the founder of Deep Ecology, professor Arne Næss, and is the organizer of the annual even
Arne Næss Symposium

Structure

The centre is placed directly under the University Board of the University of Oslo. Its Board comprises representatives from the relevant faculties of the university, that is the faculties of Social Sciences, Arts, Natural Sciences, and Law. In addition, the Board has two members not connected to the university. The current director is Sidsel Roalkvam. It is funded by the University as well as organizations such as the

Research Council of Norway The Research Council (also the Research Council of Norway; no, Norges forskningsråd) is a Norwegian government agency that funds research and innovation projects. On behalf of the Government, the Research Council invests NOK 11,9 billion (2021) ...

, th
European Research Council
the

Ministry of Foreign Affairs In many countries, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs is the government department responsible for the state's diplomacy, bilateral, and multilateral relations affairs as well as for providing support for a country's citizens who are abroad. The entit ...

and

NORAD North American Aerospace Defense Command (NORAD ), known until March 1981 as the North American Air Defense Command, is a combined organization of the United States and Canada that provides aerospace warning, air sovereignty, and protection ...

. More than 50 people are affiliated with the Centre for Development and the Environment. The centre hosts the

Arne Næss Arne Dekke Eide Næss (; 27 January 1912 – 12 January 2009) was a Norwegian philosopher who coined the term " deep ecology", an important intellectual and inspirational figure within the environmental movement of the late twentieth centur ...

Programme on Global Justice and the Environment, which includes the Arne Næss Chair, which is awarded each year to "one or several scholars of international standing who have made a significant contribution to the study of global justice and the environment." SUM is the host institution o
Oslo SDG Initiative
th
Oslo Academy of Global Governance
and th
Independent Panel on Global Governance for Health
and the geographical research networks th
Norwegian Latin American Research Network (NorLARNet)
and th
Network for Asia Studies

Education

Although SUM is primarily a research institution, it offers courses at MA and PhD levels, as well as a
international master programme

Notable researchers

Notable researchers currently or formerly affiliated with the centre include: * Kristin Asdal *

Margunn Bjørnholt Margunn Bjørnholt (born 9 October 1958 in Bø, Telemark) is a Norwegian sociologist and economist. She is a research professor at the Norwegian Centre for Violence and Traumatic Stress Studies (NKVTS) and a professor of sociology at the Univers ...

Ottar Brox Ottar Brox (30 August 1932 – 16 February 2024) was a Norwegian authority in social science and a politician for the Socialist Left Party (Norway), Socialist Left Party. He was professor of sociology at the University of Tromsø from 1972 to 198 ...

* Harald Bøckman * J. Peter Burgess *

Kjetil Fretheim Kjetil is a Norwegian masculine given name. It may refer to: * Kjetil Aleksander Lie (born 1980), Norwegian chess player, Norway's eighth International Grandmaster *Kjetil André Aamodt (born 1971), Norwegian former alpine ski racer *Kjetil Bang-H ...

* Jan Fuglestvedt * Nina Margrethe Gornitzka * Beatrice Halsaa * Ketil Fred Hansen * Dag Hareide * Bente Herstad * Fritz Christian Holte * William M. Lafferty * Oluf Langhelle *

James Lovelock James Ephraim Lovelock (26 July 1919 – 26 July 2022) was an English independent scientist, environmentalist and futurist. He is best known for proposing the Gaia hypothesis, which postulates that the Earth functions as a self-regulating sys ...

* Desmond McNeill *

* Kit-Fai Næss *

Erik S. Reinert Erik Steenfeldt Reinert (born 15 February 1949) is a Norwegian economist, with development economics, economic history and history of economic policy as his specialties. Biography Reinert was born in Oslo, attended the University of St. Gallen ...

* Else Skjønsberg * Nils Christian Stenseth * Kristi Anne Stølen *

Nina Witoszek Nina Witoszek Nina Witoszek (Fitzpatrick) is a Polish-Irish-Norwegian writer and research professor at the Center for Development and the Environment in Oslo. She is also director of the Arne Næss Programme on Global Justice and the Environment ( ...

*Sidsel Roalkvam

References

External links

Official Centre for Development and the Environment website
�� {{Coord, 59, 56, 51.6, N, 10, 43, 53.5, E, type:landmark_region:NO_dim:530, display=title Environmental research institutes Research institutes in Norway Social science institutes University of Oslo Environmental organizations established in 1990 1990 establishments in Norway