The two-volume book results from the SDPI’s concern for translating specialized multi and transdisciplinary research into effective policy measures in the global South. For this purpose, SDPI organized its 6th Sustainable Development Conference titled, “Sustainable Development: Bridging the research/policy gaps in Southern Contexts,” in December 2003 where researchers, academicians, creative writers, theorists, activists and policy-makers from different regions of the world met in Islamabad to debate and discuss issues such as translating research produced in the third world contexts into effective policy for sustainable development, sustainable development as a question of reorienting research/policy connection, and claiming and putting value into the fragmented and disparate work that speaks to and about the third world. The two-volume book is an end product of the above mentioned conference papers that were reviewed and approved for publication. The book was launched at the occasion of the SDPI’s Seventh Sustainable Development Conference on December 8th 2004 by Maj.(retd) Tahir Iqbal, Minister for Environment at the Holiday Inn.