Includes bibliographical references. Dodds, F., Donoghue, D., & Roesch, J. L. (2017). Negotiating the sustainable development goals: A transformational agenda for an insecure world. London: Routledge.

Introduction -- A new beginning: conceiving the Sustainable Development Goals -- Introduction -- The Millennium Development Goals -- The global financial crisis and the role of the UN -- The death and rebirth of sustainable development -- The Rio+20 preparatory process -- The UN Development Group's initial ideas on SDGs -- The birth of the SDGs -- Understanding complexity: development or sustainable development parallel paths emerging as one -- Introduction -- Preparations for 2015 -- The Open Working Group: an unusual negotiation process -- UN global compact consultations -- Financing for (sustainable) development -- Intergovernmental Committee of Experts on Sustainable Development Finance (ICESDF) -- The UN system task team -- Informal alliances: why are they important and how did they shape the process? -- Stakeholder preparation and influence in the policy definition process -- The big year: the preparatory process -- Introduction -- Moving forward from the OWG -- The Third International Conference on Financing for Development -- United Nations Sustainable Development Summit and the Pope's address -- Indicators: the Statistical Commission 2015 -- A transformational agenda: outcomes from 2015 and what they mean -- Introduction -- A journey finished, another one started: a retrospective look at what has been achieved -- Climate change and the 2030 agenda: competing or complementary agendas? -- Is the UN fit to implement the 2030 Agenda? -- Implementation at the national level -- Local and subnational levels -- The role of partnerships -- The private sector -- Understanding the future: from 2015 to 2030, the challenges ahead -- Introduction -- Global migration, forced displacement: a new phenomenon -- Nexus: climate, water, energy, food -- From exclusion to inclusion: a new policy response to peace and security challenges -- Health -- Disruptive industries -- Afterword: 2030 Agenda adoption poem

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are a universal set of seventeen goals and 169 targets, with accompanying indicators, which were agreed by UN member states to frame their policy agendas for the fifteen-year period from 2015 to 2030. Written by three authors who have been engaged in the development of the SDGs from the beginning, this book offers an insider view of the process and a unique entry into what will be seen as one of the most significant negotiations and global policy agendas of the twenty-first century. The book reviews how the SDGs were developed, what happened in key meetings and how this transformational agenda, which took more than three years to negotiate, came together in September 2015. It dissects and analyzes the meetings, organizations and individuals that played key roles in their development. It provides fascinating insights into the subtleties and challenges of high-level negotiation processes of governments and stakeholders, and into how the SDGs were debated, formulated and agreed. It is essential reading for all interested in the UN, sustainable development and the future of the planet and humankind.