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same year under the chairmanship of Gro Harlem Brundtland. In 1987, a report
known as ‘Our Common Future’ and ‘Brundtland Report’ was published by
World Commission on Environment and Improvement (Kaya and Ek 2021:82).

b. Brundtland Report
Published by the World Commission on Environment and Development,
a subsidiary of the United Nations, “Our Common Future Report” or more
commonly known as the “Brundtland Report”, referred to by the surname of
Commission Chairman and Prime Minister of Norway at the time Gro Harlem
Brundtland, it was emphasized that environmental problems threaten the well-
being of humanity, continuous and balanced development is needed, but
the needs of future generations should not be unfairly compromised for the
sake of development, and sustainable development is defined as the ability of
meeting today’s needs and expectations without compromising the needs and
expectations of future generations (Güneş 2021:333; Yıldırım and Nuri 2018:9).
Brundtland Report which is significant in regard to defining and elaborating
the sustainable development at global level for the first time, and described as
an axial shift from “human environment” approach at the center of Stockholm
Declaration towards focusing on the environment and development concepts
(Boyar 2020:1928-1929); is also remarkable in terms of specifying a series of
legal principles as well as imposing the relevant states the obligation to inform
the international society by means of cross-border natural sources with healthy
and sufficient environmental rights that supports sustainable development, in
addition to its current definition (Skalar 2015:25-26). The Report consisting of
three sections including “Common Concerns”, “Common Challenges” and
“Common Endeavors” (Yıldırım and Nuri 2018:9) is directly associated with the
elimination of poverty, equality in the use of natural sources, controlling the
population growth rate and developing environmental-friendly technologies
with the principle of sustainable development (Skalar 2015:26; Yıldırım and
Göktürk 2004:450). In the Report, ensuring the development that sustains
the deterministic relation between ecology and economy is related to the
harmonization of environmental goals and economic goals. According
to the Report, which claims that these three components, determined as
environmental protection, economic growth and social equality, constitute
the three basic pillars of sustainability, it is considered that the current system
becomes unsustainable if one of them is ineffective (Yıldırım and Nuri 2018:10).
Finally, the Brundtland Report was adopted by the United Nations General
Assembly on December 11, 1987 and it was decided to determine the long-
term strategies for sustainable development. It was considered to organize
a conference on the twentieth anniversary of Stockholm Conference, and
environment and development was selected as the main theme of the

44 Journal of Environment, Urbanization and Climate