This thematic research cornerstone of the program explores the structural conditions in place for sustainable development policies. It inquiries about the conditions necessary to implement social policies and it identifies possible obstacles. It studies in what way the measures financed by the State contribute to the reduction of poverty, to social inequalities (in life chances, income, education, health, infrastructure, wages and labor standards), or to the increase in material and immaterial welfare.

The relationship between both dimensions and the possibilities of sustainable development will be studied through three levels:

• Individual level: studies will focus on individual behavior (patterns of consumption and debt, lack of savings, strategies to perpetuate and increase the wealth of economic elites, strategies of globalization from below, etc.), their causes and the consequences for sustainable development.
• Public policy level: research will focus on the role of the State in promoting sustainable development, ranging from various public welfare policies (aimed at reducing poverty, promoting education, health, infrastructure, labor standards And wages), diversification of exports to cyclical fiscal policy or limited / fragmented social spending. Emphasis will be placed on the governance of natural resources.
• Spatial level / territorial perspective: the work of this level will focus on the dynamics of territorial inequalities and territorial economic disparities. It will explore how the different temporalities of structurally heterogeneous economies and the actors in these economies (in economic sectors and between economic sectors) as well as political reactions (systems of equalization, transfers, other incentives) to these phenomena reinforce or impede sustainable development.