This special issue of Natural Resources Forum, a United Nations Sustainable Development Journal, is devoted to institutions for sustainable development. The leading article notes that there is a consensus that sustainable development has not progressed fast enough; many agree that a major cause of the observed shortcomings is an inability to both mainstream sustainable development principles in the work of existing institutions and achieve the degree of coordination, coherence and integration required. A common thread linking the papers in this special issue is the influence of politics on the way rules, institutions and processes are designed, function and influence outcomes. While this idea underlies most of the academic literature on institutions, it has not been adequately reflected in the process of rule-making for sustainable development.