What is a Cambridge Sustainability Commission?

There is a rising recognition of the necessity and value of synthesizing the state of scientific knowledge, in a world of rapidly rising volume of research outputs across the world. Global assessments, such as the IPCC, MEA, GEA, are increasingly complemented by focused fast-track assessments, such as the IPCC SREX report and the IPES recent report on sustainable agriculture. We still face though, a scientific gap between reviews led by single authors, on the one hand, and global assessments, on the other hand. 

 

To address this, Cambridge University Press has launched Cambridge Sustainability Commissions.

A Cambridge Sustainability Commission is a scientific assessment of any global sustainability issue pertaining to planetary and societal resilience, or any solutions for societal transformations. The CSC’s attempt to identify, appraise and synthesize all the evidence-based natural and/or social science expertise to answer specific research questions on the themes of global sustainability. 

A Cambridge Sustainability Commission can only "come to life" after an approval by the Editorial leadership of the journal Global Sustainability of a project proposal. The journal is now open to receive proposals for new Cambridge Sustainability Commissions. 

Such proposals need to present:

1. the scientific rationale for a Cambridge Sustainability commission (should focus on topical key social-environmental research gaps in the context of global sustainability), 
2. the proposed scholars to be invited as members, 
3. one or more host institutions for the commission, 
4. a budget and secretariat staffing to run the commission and financed (this budget is NOT financed by Cambridge University Press or by Global Sustainability),
5. a time-line, 
6. description of output(s) and strategy for outreach. 

Normally a Cambridge Sustainability Commission will operate over a 12-18 month period. 

For further inquiries or submission of proposals, please contact [email protected]

The reviewers of the project include: the Editor in Chief of Global Sustainability, the deputy editors and at least one Section Editor that is closest to the proposed commission theme; and from Cambridge University Press, the managing editor for the journal, currently Alison Paskins.

All outputs will be peer reviewed. They can be: 

(1) Cambridge Sustainability Commission Report (50 page or so report including the following):

• Title
  Authors and affiliations
• Abstract 
• Introduction 
• Scope and limitations (subsection of the above)
• Methodology/Methods (this can be integrated in each section or be separated on its own) 
• The main suggestions/conclusions: I would suggest to divide these into sections equivalent to your main objectives. In each section, you may want to add subsections on the estate of the knowledge and uncertainty regarding each topic. 
• Conclusion 
• Contributors 
• All the mandatory statements expressed in Instructions for Authors such as a declaration of interests, etc. 
• References
• Not mandatory: Glossary - we advise this, but not a requirement

(2) Cambridge Sustainability Commission Paper: a 5000-7000 word synthesis paper in Global Sustainability