The chapter seeks to understand how the 2030 Agenda expressed through the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and climate urbanism reconfigure urban planning and related processes in Zimbabwe. As discourses of climate change and sustainability have gained traction, urban planning plays a critical role in achieving carbon-free societies. Through the case study of three Zimbabwean cities (Harare, Bulawayo and Gweru), the chapter aims to highlight opportunities and challenges presented to urban planning by Agenda 2030. The chapter employs primary and secondary data sources to understand how urban planning in Africa, and particularly in Zimbabwe, is being shaped by the climate discourse. As such, the chapter contends that there is a seemingly discernible paradigm shift in terms of urban planning processes in Zimbabwe, which seems to be drifting towards a multilateral planning vision dominated by climate-centred urban planning policies. It must be noted that climate-centred urbanisation will be useful in future in curbing and dealing with pandemics like COVID-19. However, it should be noted that climate-centred urban planning processes seem to be more abstract thinking than operationalisation. Finally, the chapter suggests ways to promote a pragmatic shift from abstract thinking to operationalisation of climate-friendly urban planning.

Designed as a follow-up to the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs), which guided international development policies from 2000 to 2015, the 2030 Agenda proposed a new development road map for the subsequent fifteen-year period. The most iconic SDGs deal with the eradication of poverty and hunger, the fight against climate change, and the creation of a global partnership for sustainable development. The chapter shows that the SDGs’ script was not written in advance for the UN supertanker does not follow a predetermined route. The 2030 Agenda is also a useful reminder that for every global public policy adopted, alternative courses of action that were once part of the conversation are discarded along the way. Our analysis illuminates not only the experimental nature of the SDGs’ creation but also the power relations and the political choices that the SDGs reflected. Among other things, the 2030 Agenda was also profoundly marked by a set of practices related to goal-setting. In addition, convergence around sustainable development can be seen as the silver bullet of the 2030 Agenda, together with the idea that global poverty must be eradicated and that in this process, no one should be left behind.

The introductory chapter introduces the Agenda 2030 and its 17 SDGs and briefly presents the process that led to its adoption. It discusses the nature of the SDGs, recognising the great variation in the nature, scope and function of the SDGs and related targets, and drawing attention to the interlinkages among the goals and targets. Forests provide ecosystem services that are crucial for human welfare and for reaching the SDGs. The chapter gives a brief overview of the world’s forests and forests’ contributions to the SDGs. Forests are only mentioned in two SDGs (SDG 6 and SDG 15). However, due to the interrelated nature of the SDGs and targets, the implementation of the SDG agenda will inevitably influence forests and forest-related livelihoods and the possibilities to achieve the forest specific targets. Understanding the potential impacts of SDGs on forests, forest-related livelihoods and forest-based options to generate progress towards achieving the SDGs, as well as the related tradeoffs and synergies, is crucial for efforts undertaken to reach these goals. It is especially important for reducing potential negative impacts and to leverage opportunities to create synergies that will ultimately determine whether comprehensive progress towards the SDGs will be accomplished.

Chapter 4 – Global arenas of transformation – analyses how the transformation concept has been used to describe or advocate change towards sustainable development in international contexts. The chapter presents the development of the research field and provides an overview of how sustainability transformations have been approached in the news media in different parts of the world. Media texts also present a range of transformation goals that are of two types: those intended to prevent the risks of environmental degradation and human insecurity, and those that propose ideas on how to attain various sustainable futures. Finally, the chapter explores how sustainability transformations have been conceptualized in international politics, with particular focus on the variations in policy discourse in low–, middle–, and high-income countries, in Agenda 2030 and the Voluntary National Reviews of the Sustainable Development Goals as well as the Nationally Determined Contributions to the Paris Agreement.

Chapter 1 – How do we change the world? – presents the rationale of the book, its aim, and scope, introduces key concepts and outlines the state of research on and for transformations toward sustainability. The chapter highlights different calls for sustainability transformations in the United Nations 2030 Agenda, countries’ contributions to the Paris Agreement and subsequent negotiations within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The chapter further discusses the difference between the concepts of transformation and transition. The chapter argues that greater conceptual clarity on sustainability transformations across societies in the world facilitates decision-making and planning in form of democratization, organizational effectiveness and international cooperation.