• Definitions
   
  
  • Sustainable development
     
    
  • Carrying capacity
     
    
  • Community capital
     
    
  • Weak vs. strong sustainability
     
    
• Traditional vs. interconnected view
   
  
• Sustainable business, production, agriculture
   
  
• Examples of indicators of sustainability

• Sustain means to nourish (not maintain the status quo)
   
  
• Develop means to improve (not grow)
   
  
• Sustainable development, not sustained growth
   
  
• Carrying capacity: living within the means of the ecosystem
   
  
• Community capital: natural, social/human, and financial/built
   
  
• Traditional vs. sustainable community indicators

So far we have reviewed definitions of various aspects of sustainability. The key points to remember are:

• Sustain means to nourish (not maintain the status quo)
   
  
• Develop means to improve (not grow)
   
  
• Sustainable development means continuing to get better (not sustained growth)
   
  
• Carrying capacity is the ability of a particular population living within the means of the ecosystem in which it exists
   
  
• Community capital includes three types of capital: natural, social/human, and financial/built

A sustainable community is one that lives off the interest of its community capital and maintains or enhances principal.

We also defined weak and strong sustainability. Weak sustainability assumes that built capital can replace natural capital, while strong sustainability is the idea that there are some things in nature that cannot be replaced.

We talked about traditional, one-dimensional measures of the economy, the environment, and society. These measures do not take into account the connections among the three facets of a community and frequently result in solutions in one area that work at cross purposes to another area. We then talked about the web of interconnections among these three facets of the community and the need for indicators that reflect the connections.

Finally, we looked at a number of different ways that communities and organizations have defined sustainability and some of the ways that they have come up with to measure progress towards sustainability.