Rethinking sustainability: recalibrating the global SDGs to align with local principles for Buen Vivir

The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were developed as a post-2015 response to growing global climate change and social justice issues, but the little progress made has been thrown off course by the COVID-19 pandemic. To achieve environmental and social transformation, we must recalibrate the global approach to include a contextual, bottom-up and wellbeing-oriented alternative to development that embraces holistic visions of wellbeing. This article advocates Buen Vivir as a localized approach to social and environmental wellbeing, but one that can plurally cooperate with other knowledges and frameworks such as the SDGs. It examines how the global SDGs can align with locally implemented principles for Buen Vivir to achieve effective and timely transformative change for communities and nature.