Today’s society is faced with a multitude of compounding and inter-related socio-ecological challenges. In order to adequately navigate this ‘sustainability challenge’ and to capture the innovation opportunities that come with it, we need professionals from all sectors of society who can help plan and act strategically towards sustainability.

Sustainability handbook first outlines a structured, strategic approach to handling this complex reality known as the Framework for Strategic Sustainable Development (FSSD), including an operational definition of sustainability derived from foundational knowledge about the social and ecological systems. From there, the book shares examples of how the FSSD can be applied in a variety of situations, sectors, and scales and points to the self-benefit for companies, municipalities and other organizations of working strategically for sustainability. The readers are left with a solid understanding of how to define sustain­ability and how to plan and act towards it, including how to select from the vast array of sustainability-related concepts, methods and tools in the field today.

Sustainability handbook combines the academic and practical experience from a collection of authors. The content has been used, tested and refined over many iterations, and now serves as a resource for academic courses and programmes as well as work in practice around the world. Any student or practitioner looking for more clarity on how to strategically plan and act towards sustainability in a structured, scientific, and collaborative manner will find value inside. Because of the generic nature of the FSSD, it can be useful for any discipline, from engineering, to product-service innovation, to business management, to urban and regional planning, and beyond.

Second Edition – with revised and new content, for example, a new definition of social sustainability and a chapter on questions and answers about the FSSD.