Localizing and Achieving the Sustainable Development Goals at the National Level: Cases of Leadership

This article describes the experience of localization and implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) at the national level in the 10 countries which top the global SDG Index compiled by the Sustainable Development Solutions Network (SDSN) and the Bertelsmann Stiftung. The authors apply methods of comparative and content analysis of national and international documents and conclude that leading countries began to work actively on the transition toward sustainable development more than a decade ago, established effective inter-ministerial coordination in this area and have achieved significant success. Nevertheless, even they are still far from the full implementation of the SDGs. Moreover, not all of them have localized Agenda 2030 within their national sustainable development strategies. The authors identify three key SDG localization and implementation schemes: full localization (e.g. Germany), implementation of the SDGs without their formal localization (e.g. Sweden) and the complete absence of localization (e.g. Finland). The most preferable and effective scheme, according to the authors, is the first one. In the late 1990s, Russia could have become one of the pioneers of sustainable development. However, due to insufficient political will, Russia is still at the initial stages of its transition toward sustainable development. In order to catalyze progress in this area, Russia needs to urgently develop and adopt a national sustainable development strategy in which all of the SDGs are localized, take into account SDGs in other key strategic documents and set specific quantitative goals and designate ministries that will be responsible for achieving these goals.