RS450 – Sustainable Communities Spring, 2011
Final Exam Study Questions
Essay questions. Closed notes. Answer fully in complete sentences. Use terms utilized in
the course from the readings, discussions and presentation lectures. Cite specific points
made in the course material for all answers. You may use symbols to supplement any of
your answers.
1. Summarize your understanding of sustainability using models, symbols,
characteristics, design approaches, language, theory, phrases and values.
2. Compare the linear and systems views utilizing 3 different examples. What are
runaway loops? What is a stabilizing loop? Why is an understanding of systems
essential to an understanding of sustainability?
3. Sketch the systems loop of our dominant economy, with appropriate labels. What
kind of a loop is it? Explain how one part of the loop leads to the next.
4. What do ecosystems, marketplaces, democracies, societies and individual human
beings have in common that makes them sustainable? For each of these systems,
describe the common activities that contribute to their sustenance. How are these
designs similar to nature’s design?
5. What is the difference between conventional and emergent sustainability based on the
ideas of William McDonough, Ashok Khosla, John Lyle, Annie Leonard, Janine
Benyus, Jane Jacobs, Stephen Wheeler, and the reading from Natural Capitalism, and
other course material? What are points made by each? Why must a clear distinction
be made between the two?
6. What does it mean to use Nature as a Model? Identify and describe the characteristics
of this approach as presented in class. What is and what is not biomimicry, according
to Janine Benyus? Give one example that meets the criteria of both Nature as a Model
and biomimicry?
7. Briefly describe the oil network, the industrial model and de facto plans. What does
each of these contribute to our understanding of sustainability? Cite points made in
The Story of Stuff and The Corporation that contribute further.
8. Discuss why there is resistance to certain sustainable ideas or practices. Provide 2
examples from the course material of resistance to such efforts. Who resisted and why
did they resist? What is the best way to overcome resistance?
9. What is consilience and why is it important to the sustainability effort? Provide one
example of consilience and one example of a lack of consilience.
