In The Spotlight

Dubrovnik 27 September - 1 October 2010: Sustainability for the 21st Century - Rethinking Paradigm Shifts in Governance, Culture and Business

Ceres21 Workshop at the Inter University Centre, Dubrovnik


Core partners

The Centre for Development and the Environment (SUM), University of Oslo 

SUM is an international research institution at the University of Oslo* which promotes scholarly work on the challenges and dilemmas posed by sustainable future. The Center was established in 1990 in response to the report of the Brundtland Commission: Our Common Future.  It is currently one of the few institutions in Norway advancing synergic, interdisciplinary research on development and the environment and combining insights from the social, humanist and natural sciences.  SUM is also an academic home of the founder of Deep Ecology, professor Arne Næss, and the coordinating unit for the network for the Norwegian Latin American Research (NorLARNet).In addition, SUM highlights research in selected thematic areas, such as Natural Resource Management and Business and Governance.   

SUM's current research is organized into 5 broad areas;

1) Consumption, Energy and Social Change;
2) Culture, Ethics and Sustainability;
3) Global and Regional Governance for Sustainable Development;
4) Poverty and Development;
5) ProSus – Programme for Research and Documentation for a Sustainable Society

Although SUM is primarily a research institution, it offers courses at the Bachelor, MA and PhD levels, as well as an International Master in Culture, Environment and Sustainability.  The Center has the status of Research School which specializes in educating scholars interested in interdisciplinary perspectives on development and the environment. 

SUM is presently a coordinating center of several prestigious international projects - financed by the Norwegian and the European Research Councils, The Norwegian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, and NORAD. These include, among others, Creative Responses to Sustainability in the context of climate shift (CERES 21), Poverty and Legal Empowerment , Land Use Policies and Sustainable Development in Developing Countries (LUPIS),  and  Explaining Different Immunization Coverage in Developing Countries.    

 

*The University of Oslo is Norway’s largest and oldest institution of higher education. It was founded in 1811 when Norway was still under Danish rule. Today the University of Oslo has approximately 30,000 students and 4,600 employees, and - in spite of its short history - it boasts four Nobel Prize winners: Ragnar Frisch (economics, 1969),  Odd Hassel (chemistry, 1969), Ivar Giæver (physics ,1973) , and Trygve Haavelmo (economics, 1989).

 


The institute of innovation and economic organisation, Norwegian School of Management

The Institute of Innovation and Economic Organisation conducts research and education in fundamental topics related to innovation, business development, management of global companies, business history and economic organisation. The Institute hosts 7 professors, 20 researchers and 6 phd candidates, and comprises 4 research centres, two of which are engaged in the Ceres project:

1) The Centre for Corporate Responsibility, headed by professor Atle Midttun which studies and promotes sustainable and responsible business. The Centre supplies and builds competence among students and business leaders, for dealing with corporate challenges in relation to economics, ethical, social and ecological sustainability. 

2) The Centre for Energy and Environment - headed by professors Atle Midttun, Øystein Noreng and Bjarne Ytterhus -  which upholds research and educational programmes within the fields of energy and the environment.

The Institute of Innovation and Economic Organisation is one of nine research institutes at BI Norwegian School of Management is a self owned foundation with 18 253 students, whose purpose is to conduct education and research at a high international level within management, administration, economics, marketing, innovation and entrepreneurship.

Founded in 1943 as a private cooperation offering evening business classes, BI Norwegian School of Management has grown to be one of the leading and most influential education and research institutions in Norway. The school has agreements with 148 universities and business schools in 40 countries all over the world. This includes an MBA program in China in cooperation with Fudan University School of Management, and a strategic collaboration with Nanyang University of Technology in Singapore, ESCP/EAP European School of Management in Paris and University of California- Berkley.

 


Sun Yat-Sen University, Guangzhou, China 

Sun Yat-Sen University was one of the two schools founded by Dr. Sun Yat-Sen, the leader of the republic revolution in 1911 and one of the founding fathers of modern China. It is one of the earliest modern institution for high learning in China and one of the best national elite universities in China today. It stands out from its peers as one of the most open-minded, free-spirited, and highly innovative universities nation-wide both due to its broad and active international collaborations, and its location at one of the most vibrant economic region—the Pearl River Delta in southern China where has been the power house of China’s phenomenal development over the past 30 years.