20 MSEK to research program on Agenda 2030

The project Transformative partnership for sustainable development, led by Karin Bäckstrand, has been granted 20 million SEK from the Research Council Formas. 

The title of the project is "Transformative partnerships for sustainable development. Assessing synergies, effectiveness and legitimacy of UN multi-stakeholder partnerships across SDGs to achieve 2030 Agenda". It is led by Karin Bäckstrand, researcher at the Institute for Futures Studies and professor in Environmental Social Science at Stockholm University. 

The role of multi-stakeholder partnerships in global governance

The role of multi-stakeholder partnerships (MSPs) in global governance has gained increasing attention among the international community. As part of the 2030 Agenda, all UN member states agreed that sustainable development should be achieved through MSPs (SDG 17). But do MSPs under the 2030 Agenda contribute to sustainable development? Or do they merely reflect a rhetorical commitment of the international community?

The overarching aim of this project is to examine if, how and when MSPs can contribute to the implementation of the 2030 Agenda and act as a vehicle to accelerate transformative shifts toward sustainability.  By creating synergies between SDGs, utilizing effective strategies to address challenges and prescribing themselves to practices that generate legitimacy, MSPs can enhance implementation and accelerate societal transformation. The findings of this project will have substantive implications for how MSPs should be designed, governed, and integrated across SDGs to achieve the 2030 Agenda.

The project is a collaboration between the Institute for Futures Studies (Karin Bäckstrand and Dr. Faradj Koliev), the Departments of Political Science at Stockholm University and Lund University (Associate Professors Magdalena Bexell and Kristina Jönsson ), and the Institute for Environmental studies på Vriije Universitet Amsterdam (Dr. Oscar Wiederberg and Professor Philipp Pattberg). 

Find more information at Formas