Social sustainability: Satisfying human needs

In this whiteboard animation, I present a way to use the fundamental human needs we need to satisfy in order to make sustainable decisions, design sustainable products and services and ultimately to progress toward sustainability.
Fundamental human needs (social needs) as developed by Manfred Max Neef are an alternative to Maslow's hierarchy of needs. This topic is related to sustainable development, sustainable community, triple bottom line.
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Explainer videos are created by Alexandre Magnin using years of experience drawing and working as a sustainability consultant with businesses and communities: www.amcreative.org
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In this video about social sustainability, I present a way to use the fundamental human needs we need to satisfy in order to make sustainable decisions and to design sustainability products and services.
This is an interesting theory about human needs developed by Chilean economist Manfred Max Neef. He published in 1991 a book called “Human scale development” demonstrating that human needs are finite and classifiable; there are 9 fundamental human needs that are constant through all human cultures and across historical time periods; and what changes is the ways these needs are satisfied.
These 9 human needs are: subsistence (we need food, water, shelter), protection (a safe place to live, social security), participation (being part of decisions that affect our life), idleness (some free time, relaxing), affection (we need friends, love), understanding (learning, meditating), creation (cooking, designing, inventing), identity (a sense of belonging, knowing oneself) and freedom (being able to choose how we live our lives).
It can be used for social sustainability because being sustainable is about being able to meet our needs within our ecological constraints. Manfred Max Neef’s human needs can be very useful to find ways to satisfy needs using fewer resources. They provide a new lens and help us take another look at the system we are trying to change, which is crucial to stimulate innovation and to avoid superficial problem solving. If you are interested in reading more about this, the book “Human scale development” is available as a free PDF online.
Resources:
Human Scale Developpement (PDF): www.wtf.tw/ref/max-neef.pdf
Manfred Max Neef: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Manfred_...
Brundtland Commission: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Brundtla...
Maslow's hierarchy of needs:
This video has references to:
The 4 root causes of un sustainability: • 4 root causes of unsus...
4 Principles to Win the Sustainability 'Game' (conditions of success): • 4 Principles to Win th...
Triple bottom line & sustainability: the science of good business: • Triple bottom line (3 ...

[@learnsustainability]

If you find this video useful, please subscribe alturl.com/jc8u6 and leave me a comment below... 😀

[@gingeranahisrivassanchez6131]

No tienes la traducción

[@user-gw4oz1rk3i]

I would rename the 9 Human needs to: subsistence, safety/security, power/contol, leisure, connection/love, knoledge, self-expression, significance, and freedom/spoteneiety! That would be my version of the 9 Human needs!

[@ivonnecruz6979]

Alex, you are the best! Manfred will be proud of your ability to condense his wise words in these minute illustration story! THANK YOU!!!

[@learnsustainability]

Thanks Ivonne! I hope you are right. May he rest in peace. He created a pretty fantastic framework! 👍

[@kevinmagron9032]

To think he made this 8 years ago? This video is so simple but so effective. I've struggled with understandning Max Neef theory for human needs, but this video was so clear and helpful. I wish I saw this at the beginning of my course

[@learnsustainability]

I am glad to hear. Thanks for taking the time to share feedback.

[@lee3363]

this has so much great information, i am glad there are videos like this on youtube.

[@numgun]

Hey, an excellent explanation of human needs! I was searching for a video via "manfred max need human needs" to find material that I could use to explain this to another person more intuitively and compactly... and this video fits the bill perfectly! Thank you so much for making it, I'll be sharing it whenever I need a clean and simple way to explain the human needs to someone. : )

[@learnsustainability]

+numgun Thanks for the feedback, I'm glad it is useful :-)

[@ecoalexandra]

Excellent, Alex, congratulations!! Gives people the basis to begin thinking about what really are the basic human needs!!

[@learnsustainability]

Thanks Alexandra :-)

[@LucasPinheiroV8]

Excellent Video!! Thanks!

[@nutandrai]

Thk u for sharing

[@phemelomabowa8612]

this is enlightening

[@koshilagallage7913]

Excellent videos Alex!!

[@learnsustainability]

Thanks! Glad you like them!

[@TheNaturalCapitalist]

Brilliant video!

[@learnsustainability]

Thanks Dirk!

[@ms1295]

I wonder how these 9 needs intersect with a much longer list of needs used by Non Violent Communication...

[@learnsustainability]

Marianna Shvartsapel Good question Marianna! Although I read the NVC book a few months ago, I have not tried to compare the needs yet... Please share if you have an opinion about it.

[@tiagodavidfernandes]

+Marianna Shvartsapel In one of his audio courses, Marshall Rosemberg recognizes that you can group NVC's longer needs list into the broader 9 Max Neef's list.

[@learnsustainability]

+Tiago Fernandes Great! Thanks a lot Tiago!

[@rotiwokeman]

The one about idleness hurts...I love to travel, and I'm among other travellers quite often. The flip side of tourism and related topics is a highly controversial pain point for us.

[@learnsustainability]

+Bradley Stone I understand: travelling & tourism have their issues. It also raises an interesting question about how can we satisfy our need for idleness in a sustainable way? I like the music festival example. Satisfying human needs can definitely shift the perspective when attempting to tackle an unsustainable practice :-)

[@Tommykee999]

With out socia desires I be so happy

[@Icosindaba]

What about the tenth fundamental human need that Max-Neef proposes as emergent in homo sapiens? Transcendence?

[@learnsustainability]

Good question! I would have to create a new video to cover it :-)

[@motherpandayourconfusedmom]

🙏🙏🙏 beautiful

[@kandflauretti9598]

Great video. Thank you. I love Max Neef's system of human needs, but he also has drawn a symbol which represents technology, human needs, and the environment as a management system that I do not quite yet understand. I understand the environment as it's own system that has it's own needs, but do not understand technology as it's own system. Is technology just a way of meeting environmental and human needs? Is that how it's its own realm to monitor? Is it related to money or trading goods which is how a lot of our systems are set up? Does Max Neef have an environmental needs matrix like he does for humans? How about technology? And finally are there governmental or community systems that have started using Max Neef's matrix in making group decisions? I see it some in urban planning, but not at a country or city level. I have lots of questions that unfortunately I wasn't able to ask before he died last year and I don't speak Spanish. I understand he has a school in Argentina but do not understand what it does and cannot read publications to get more insight into my questions. Since I see urban planning already using his needs matrix at some level, ideally I would like to get other governmental systems to think beyond individual faction needs and money to consider human and environmental needs as part of their analysis with individual citizen input.

[@learnsustainability]

Thank you for your comment and questions. I can't answer everything but I can say this: I would think technology is a way for us to meet some of our human needs. For instance a long time ago technology for agriculture helped us meet our need for subsistence while spending less time growing food and therefore helping us meet additional needs such as idleness and creativity. Nowadays we can think as the Internet as a technology that helps us meet our needs for participation, understanding and creativity. I don't know that Max-Neef has done any work on environmental needs. I am sure some local governments have used Max-Neef's matrix. I know I have worked with Canadian communities over the years and used these human needs with them as a way to look at how they can help their citizens meet their needs in different ways in order to avoid the current environmental impacts. I personally think it is a powerful tool and a great way to take a different look at how we do things in our society and to invite people to think differently.

[@kandflauretti9598]

Thanks. yes, technology is an obvious way of meeting needs. So much in fact that it can make us less purposeful which is why people like the Amish are skeptical about technology. This is the video I watched where I saw that he had three different needs and talks about harmony and interdependence between human needs, technology, and environment. Which made me think that the environment should have it's own set of needs and same for technology because this way we understand better how to keep them all in harmony and interdependence. kzbin.info/www/bejne/oHu3p5dmjsxlns0

[@kandflauretti9598]

Also, sorry but wanted to point out that technology covers many needs. In some ways it covers all of them. I would say technology actually replaces human work. Which is why it needs to be monitored.

[@learnsustainability]

@@kandflauretti9598 Personally, the best framework I know for the "needs of the environment" is the one I presented in this video kzbin.info/www/bejne/m5bGYYiPfK6YpZY the three things that the environment needs + social needs.

[@learnsustainability]

@@kandflauretti9598 Agreed!

[@AhouHila]

love it!!!!

[@learnsustainability]

Awesome! Thanks :-)

[@michaelwright9432]

These needs were invented by the society.

[@991270913sj]

My understanding is that these needs were written by indigenous people in response to first world development. Have you read Max-Neef?

[@20IA]

Hey how long till we all die

[@learnsustainability]

A very long time I hope!

[@johanotterlund2267]

någon från sus här? fattar nada