IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - September 2019 - 70

hands, and it was assimilated to the principles of rationality and efficiency. Politics and economics were also
under this technocratic influence. Finally, a third stage
emerged at the end of the Second World War. The
euphoria of the first years of the century was over and
new social concerns were at stake, public safety, welfare, and social justice among them. Thus, engineering
also started to reflect these changes. Incorporation of
attention to the natural environment and sustainable
development were among its new concerns. Recently,
citizen participation in engineering decision-making is
also progressively being recognized as a desirable
democratization.

The social dimension becomes more
apparent when the profession is
considered a means to serve society.
Global Engineering and the UN 2030 Agenda
A feature that defines the beginning of the 21st century
is the growing acceptance that our world is one, diverse
but strongly interrelated and interdependent. This is
true not only when considering life and the environment, but also when analyzing economy, politics, or culture. This phenomenon of interaction is often referred
to as globalization. Together with the recognition of
interdependence comes the realization that many global issues (food and water, health, climate change, refugees and migration, and children and women, to name
a few) should be tackled jointly, although the different
groups involved should act according to their capacities
and responsibilities.
On September 25, 2015, the General Assembly of the
United Nations (UN) approved, unanimously, by the 193
countries represented there the resolution A/RES/70/1
Transforming Our World: The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development [3]. This Agenda defines seventeen
Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) expanded across
a set of 169 specific ends that seek to stimulate and
direct the initiatives and policies that should be carried
out in the world throughout the period 2016-2030. The
2017 official report on the results accomplished during
2016 and 2017 is already available [4].
Two characteristics distinguish the Agenda from
other previous international initiatives (e.g., the eight
international development goals established by the
United Nations Millennium Declaration [5]). First,
the formulation of the three pillars required for real
sustainable development: social, environmental,

and economic. These are so closely interrelated that
they must be tackled together. Second, the Agenda
is relevant to all countries in the world, not only to
developing nations, although each government will
set its own national targets in accordance with its
specific circumstances.
Many engineering tasks and projects are related to
the topics considered by the seventeen SDG. For
instance, SDG 6: Ensure access to water and sanitation
for all; SDG 7: Ensure access to affordable, reliable, sustainable, and modern energy for all; SDG 8: Promote
inclusive and sustainable economic growth, employment, and decent work for all; SDG 9: Build resilient
infrastructure, promote sustainable industrialization,
and foster innovation; SDG 11: Make cities inclusive,
safe, resilient, and sustainable; SDG 12: Ensure sustainable consumption and production patterns, and SDG
13: Take urgent action to combat climate change and
its impacts. For these reasons, engineers are also called
by the Agenda to take part in this endeavor, to assume
and use accordingly the power of their influence [6]. The
purposes, values, resources, means, processes, and
final products related to their professional activities
always have an influence on some aspects of sustainable development. A timely chance has arisen to make
the world a better place, and to enrich engineering practice. This is the new scenario where our main question
is put, namely: What are the features that competent
and committed professional engineers should consider
to adapt themselves to these global challenges?

Mindful Engineer
For the sake of simplicity, we will refer to mindful engineers as those engineers matching the profile of both a
competent and a committed professional and who are
willing to foster sustainable development in their professional practice. Likewise, we will refer to the professional performance of this mindful engineer as mindful
engineering. Probably the new characteristics required
by the mindful engineer can be better introduced when
they appear as complementary to the set of characteristics we find in the traditional engineer, the professional
historically situated in the 20th century. For this reason,
we start with a list of ten widely acknowledged characteristics in the profile of traditional engineers [7]-[9].
These characteristics are obvious and do not require
further explanation. Of course, this list is debatable and
other sets of characteristics could be presented instead.
But our purpose here is not to explore the traditional
features of engineering but the new ones, thus we use
the list just as a contrast, as an indication of what could
be expanded and enriched and how it could be done.
Our goal is not, in any sense, to replace these traditional characteristics.

IEEE TECHNOLOGY AND SOCIETY MAGAZINE

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SEPTEMBER 2019

IEEE Technology and Society Magazine - September 2019

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