“It Is Essential to Invest in Promoting Inclusive & Sustainable Thinking”

Britta Holzberg is an experienced leader in social transformations across Europe, the Middle East, and North Africa. At CSCP, she is dedicated to driving inclusive sustainability initiatives by leveraging her expertise in stakeholder engagement and passion for creating sustainable solutions that benefit both people and the planet.

You have years of experience in supporting sustainable transformations in Europe, Middle East, and North Africa. What are some key takeaways that you bring along in your new role at the CSCP?

In my previous work I experienced that most decision makers aren’t actually really opposed to sustainable transformation. Often, it is more about lack of awareness, lack of capabilities, or concerns about changing familiar or seemingly essential practices.

For instance, when I worked with general managers of garment supplier firms, they generally agreed on the importance of improving labour standards. However, they often lacked the knowledge and resources to implement changes effectively.

So, I have learned that it is crucial to listen to people, meet them where they are, help them understand the need for sustainability transformations, and empower them to make these changes. This approach requires engaging not just with individual stakeholders but with entire networks – companies, consumers, researchers, and product developers – to co-create a shared vision of a sustainable solution that benefits everyone involved.

These lessons are directly applicable to my new role at the CSCP, where stakeholder engagement is a key focus. I’m thrilled to be part of a team that brings people together to achieve sustainable outcomes.

Despite its significance, social sustainability is often not given due attention as compared to economic or environmental sustainability. How can we change that?

I believe that the importance of social sustainability is already gaining more recognition in both scientific and practical discussions. We’re seeing that environmental transformations that neglect social aspects, such as the affordability of solutions for low-income communities, often fail. This oversight contributes to reduced public support for important sustainability initiatives.

Many EU-funded environmental projects now explicitly call for the inclusion of social considerations. I’m hopeful that this shift will continue to grow, with social indicators being integrated into sustainability projects, policies, and objectives.

To further this progress, decision makers and sustainability experts should enhance their ability to address social issues. Increasing the emphasis on social sustainability in academic programs, such as master’s and bachelor’s degrees in sustainability is crucial. Celebrating successful transformations that balance social, environmental, and economic factors can also help drive the public discourse in this direction.

Additionally, it’s important to involve organisations and experts who have long focused on social issues – whether they’ve labeled it as social sustainability or not – into the sustainability debate. Many have worked for years on social sustainability issues like poverty reduction, human rights, decent work, diversity, non-discrimination, gender equality, and education. Their expertise would greatly benefit the broader sustainability conversation.

Driving positive change requires a balance of diverse stakeholder interests – how can we shape processes that are inclusive to both people and places?

Balancing diverse stakeholder interests is a challenging task. One effective approach is to continue investing in multi-stakeholder engagement within transformation projects and fostering initiatives where economic, social, environmental, political, technological, and legal actors collaborate to develop and implement sustainable solutions.

While this trend is promising, it does make processes more complex and time-consuming. Given the growing diversity of people and places in today’s society, it can be difficult to inclusively consider all interests.

That’s why I believe it’s essential to additionally invest in building people’s capacity to think inclusively – taking into account both the diversity within a single place and the varying contexts and interests across different countries.

Growing up in Germany and temporarily living in the United States, South Africa, the United Kingdom, and Egypt as well as studying in different academic disciplines, have shown me that there are many different ways to view an issue, each shaped by a person’s background and environment. These experiences have greatly enhanced my ability to think inclusively, and I believe we need more opportunities to explore diverse perspectives.

I strongly support efforts that encourage perspective shifts, such as student exchange programs, internships in fields outside our primary focus, (virtual) travel experiences, and programs that allow us to understand the experiences of others, like walking in the shoes of disabled individuals. I believe that developing inclusive thinking skills will be critical for a good life in the future.

Outside office life, how do you engage with sustainability?

I have two small children and one area of engagement with sustainability that I focus on outside of work is children’s clothes. I make an effort to buy most of my children’s clothes second-hand and recycle as much as possible, but I’m constantly surprised by how challenging this can be.

While high-quality clothes can be sold to second-hand stores, many items can only be donated, and even then, they often end up in the trash. For damaged clothes, the options are even more limited. I’m glad to see that some stores nowadays accept donations of damaged clothing and work to reintegrate them into the garment lifecycle.

I’m hopeful that once I’ve settled into my current projects at CSCP, I can develop a project aimed at finding a sustainable solution to make it easier to recycle and reuse second-hand children’s clothing, ensuring they stay in the lifecycle longer.

For further questions, please contact Britta Holzberg.