Below is a list of some common sustainability definitions. These definitions are used by different groups in different contexts and are intended to provide some examples for academic departments to consider.
There are many different and contested sustainability definitions, models, and frameworks, which are used in many different ways. Many modern and typically Western understandings of sustainability have roots in the 1987 Brundtland Report, which introduced the concept of sustainable development through a framework of intergenerational equity. This Brundtland Report concept of sustainable development as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs” has value in its simplicity. There are many fields of natural and social science contributing theory and evidence that help form more detailed, accurate, and/or practically useful sustainability definitions and frameworks. However, Indigenous worldviews, while varying considerably themselves, have often embedded intergenerational equity and sustainability concepts for far longer than the comparatively recent focus in Western scholarship.
This summary is not intended to adjudicate different definitions, or provide an academic list of definitions, but rather to give you some ways of thinking about sustainability to reflect upon. This brief descriptions are intended to provide some information about the framework, which you can further research and consider. Definitions sustainability are constantly expanding and are often contested across and within disciplines. If there are other ways of framing you would recommend we include, or if you have suggested edits, please email us.
University of Waterloo 2017 Environmental Sustainability Strategy
Sustainability: Maintaining the integrated health of the environment, society, and economy for today and into the future (University of Waterloo, 2017)
Environmental Sustainability: Strategies and activities that minimize adverse environmental impacts, enhance and protect the natural environment, and meet the needs of students, employees, alumni, the communities in which Waterloo operates, and other relevant stakeholders (University of Waterloo, 2017)
United Nations Brundtland Commission
Sustainable Development: Meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs (Brundtland, 2987)
Oxford English Dictionary
Sustainability: The quality of being sustainable at a certain rate or level (Oxford English Dictionary, 2023)
Environmental Sustainability: The property of being environmentally sustainable; the degree to which a process or enterprise is able to be maintained or continued while avoiding the long-term depletion of natural resources (Oxford English Dictionary, 2023)
Cambridge Business English Dictionary
Environmental Sustainability: the idea that goods and services should be produced in ways that do not use resources that cannot be replaced and that do not damage the environment (Cambridge business English dictionary, 2011)
Sources
Brundtland, G.H. (1987) Our Common Future: Report of the World Commission on Environment and Development. Geneva, UN-Dokument A/42/427.
Cambridge business English dictionary. (2011). Cambridge University Press.
Oxford English Dictionary, (2023) “sustainability (n.), sense 2.a,” https://doi.org/10.1093/OED/5634386273.
University of Waterloo. (2017, November 6). Environmental sustainability strategy. University of Waterloo Sustainability Office. https://uwaterloo.ca/sustainability/sites/default/files/uploads/documents/environmental_sustainability_strategy_accessible.pdf