Sustainability Challenge Foundation and IPMS
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Since 1994, Larry Susskind, Bill Moomaw and David Fairman (and since 1999, Mieke van der Wansem) have joined the Netherlands based Sustainability Challenge Foundation (SCF) in teaching the annual International Programme on the Management of Sustainability (IPMS). IPMS is a 7-day high-level seminar for senior officials from the public, private and non-profit sectors about strategies to meet the challenges of sustainability. Since most efforts to meet sustainability targets inevitably generate conflict, decision makers need practical, state-of-the-art consensus building techniques to help stakeholders reach agreement on ways that they can meet their economic, social and environmental objectives simultaneously.
Each year approximately 45 carefully selected participants from 20 - 25 countries (many with responsibility for implementing Agenda 21 in their countries) enroll in this course in the Netherlands. Participants are senior professionals and managers from government, business, international organizations and NGOs. Selection is on the basis of professional experience, geographic and sector distribution to assure a participant mix that optimizes cross-cultural and cross-sector learning.
The objective of the IPMS is to train participants in the techniques of multilateral dialogue to resolve the conflicts that arise in the context of implementing sustainable development. The IPMS teaches a mutual gains approach to negotiation. On the basis of role-playing exercises, lectures and discussion groups an integration of theory and practice is achieved that enables a dynamic, interactive learning process.
Three day long multi-party simulations, designed by CBI staff, are the centerpieces of the curriculum. Participants are asked to take on roles, which are fundamentally different from those they play at home. During each simulation, they must reach agreement with other parties (government, NGOs, industry, and multi-lateral agencies) who bring different and often conflicting environmental, social and economic priorities to the negotiating table.
The Sustainability Challenge Foundation stays in touch with participants and facilitates contacts among them in a number of ways. First of all, former participants are contacted each year to nominate candidates for the IPMS. Secondly, some participants return to the Programme as Associate Faculty members. Thirdly, SCF publishes a tri-annual Participant Directory with updated information about each participant. If you are interested in receiving the Directory, please write to: ipms@scfoundation.org. Finally, the Foundation’s homepage serves as a point of reference and source of information worldwide. A separate page, SustaiNews, is dedicated entirely for messages from former participants.
For more information on this case, please contact CBI.
