Looking back to move forward: sustainable consumption from Rio 92 to a post SDGs agenda

Call for sessions and abstracts

The Fifth International Conference of Sustainable Consumption Research and Action Initiative, SCORAI Global, will take place in Sao Paulo, Brazil, the country that hosted the first United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development (UNCSD) in 1992 and its third rendition in 2012. The 1992 conference was the first to call attention to unsustainable consumption levels in the industrialized countries and their impacts on the countries of the Global South and the world ecological system. Its landmark report “Agenda 21” called for addressing this major barrier to sustainable development; but little follow-up was achieved.

In 2012, at the 3rd UNCSD conference, again in Rio, the Sustainable Development Goals were launched, an ambitious attempt to address environmental degradation, poverty and inequality across the 193 member states. Also at this conference the 10 Year Framework for Sustainable Production and Consumption (10YFP) was launched.

Today, nearly fifteen years later, some progress has been made toward the objectives of the SDGs, but little has been achieved toward the objectives of the 10YFP, and overconsumption is rampant.  While the deployment of renewable energy and efficiency technologies have increased exponentially, they are barely keeping up with the increasing global demand for energy and minerals, much less reversing the ecological overshoot beyond the planetary boundaries. For SDG 12, Responsible Consumption and Production, 60% of the targets are in stagnation or regression.

It is now possible to quantify carbon and ecological footprints from consumption and lifestyles with ever-increasing precision, owing to new research and methods development. These studies allow scientists to estimate the necessary reductions in the overconsuming parts of the world as well as plan the development paths in the underconsuming regions. The results show that nothing has fundamentally changed at the household or at the macro levels in the Global North. Dwellings are still getting bigger, purchases of material stuff are soaring, and flying and eating red meat show few signs of abating. Advertising and social media promote these lifestyles across the world, crowding out local solutions and luring people toward overconsumption with promises of a lush material lifestyle. At the same time, citizens in the Global South countries are increasing their carbon footprint in tandem with their growing economies.              

This conference will explore approaches to the transition toward a non-consumerist      economy and social life. This includes an exploration of ways to reduce inequality in economic and political power and in opportunity, including social movement and policy interventions; generational engagements in shifting the social norms and ways of life; the role of community in dominant lifestyles; and reducing concentration of wealth, which contributes to consumerist lifestyles and political apathy. 

Other topics for exploration at the conference may include: critical assessment of small-scale initiatives to adopt different lifestyles and policies, and their potential for scaling up and out; alternative cultural norms; changes in institutions and policies, and political and economic barriers to change. We especially welcome the perspectives from communities that already practice sustainable lifestyles under different names, such as thrift, simplicity, communalism and many others.

This conference will be held in Brazil, a country of deep inequalities and which, despite undergoing major political and economic upheavals, belongs to the BRICS group challenging the hegemony of the US-led global economic order. Being in Brazil will give the participants the opportunity to meet local initiatives and activists in a different historical and cultural context, including community values and pace of life. It will enable us to strengthen bonds globally, to get inspiration and opportunities for new types of research and actions, and to rethink our frames of reference. 

The conference will be held from 8th to 10th of June 2026 at the University of Sao Paulo. The deadline for paper abstracts and session proposals is September 15. We welcome academic research, reports on successful experiments and actions, and interactive sessions to explore specific issues.