Sustainability-oriented labs in transitions: An empirically grounded typology

Sustainability is high on the political agenda, with its analytical and practical importance underscored in the field of sustainability transitions. Experiments, arenas, and laboratories are frequently highlighted as real-world objects to investigate sustainability in place. Despite existing lab studies, attempts at comparison at the empirical level remain unconvincing. Here, sustainability remains oversimplified, warranting further investigation to unpack how labs compare in their orientation towards sustainability. This article presents a rigorous and transparent empirically grounded typology, intended to discern ways to engage with sustainability. We outline and elaborate upon six distinctive types entitled: 1) Fix and control, 2) (Re-)Design and optimize, 3) Make and relate, 4) Educate and engage, 5) Empower and govern, and 6) Explore and shape. This study highlights similarities and differences between labs, and across different types. These findings are discussed with reference to ongoing conceptualizations on directionality, providing a fruitful point of departure for ongoing transitions research

Beyond barrows

Europe is dotted with tens of thousands of prehistoric barrows. In spite of their ubiquity, little is known on the role they had in pre- and protohistoric landscapes. In 2010, an international group of archaeologists came together at the conference of the European Association of Archaeologists in The Hague to discuss and review current research on this topic. This book presents the proceedings of that session. The focus is on the prehistory of Scandinavia and the Low Countries, but also includes an excursion to huge prehistoric mounds in the southeast of North America. One contribution presents new evidence on how the immediate environment of Neolithic Funnel Beaker (TRB) culture megaliths was ordered, another one discusses the role of remarkable single and double post alignments around Bronze and Iron Age burial mounds. Zooming out, several chapters deal with the place of barrows in the broader landscape. The significance of humanly-managed heath in relation to barrow groups is discussed, and one contribution emphasizes how barrow orderings not only reflect spatial organization, but are also important as conceptual anchors structuring prehistoric perception. Other authors, dealing with Early Neolithic persistent places and with Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age urnfields, argue that we should also look beyond monumentality in order to understand long-term use of “ritual landscapes”. The book contains an important contribution by the well-known Swedish archaeologist Tore Artelius on how Bronze Age barrows were structurally re-used by pre-Christian Vikings. This is his last article, written briefly before his death. This book is dedicated to his memory

Understanding Local Knowledge – an Interdisciplinary Framework in the Context of Sustainable Development

This dissertation undertakes an in-depth analysis of the notion of ‘local knowledge’ on which basis it develops a structured, comprehensive, interdisciplinary conceptual-analytical framework on ‘understanding local knowledge’. This framework goes not only beyond typically encountered simplifications and the often seen prioritization of the factual perspective or the ecological dimension, but is also compatible with principles of sustainable development. Local knowledge – understood in this research as an overarching term for forms of knowledge such as e.g. traditional, indigenous, traditional ecological, folk or farmers’ knowledge – is locally adapted knowledge developed over time by people living in close interaction with their natural surroundings. Such knowledge proves vital in a myriad of ways and on various societal levels: Not only does it sustain local communities in their livelihoods and, thus, survival, it also is at the base of what is commonly called ‘ecosystem management’. These services are carried out by local communities at local and regional scales, thereby contributing to advancing environmental conservation and sustainable development. Lastly, with respect to the global level, local knowledge also acts as a vast, highly diversified and locally adapted knowledge repository with many current and potential future applications such as e.g. the development or introduction of novel materials, agricultural products or pharmaceuticals. Regrettably, despite its vital multi-functionality and -valency and a certain global recognition through the official integration of local knowledge into the ‘Convention of Biological Diversity’ at the Rio Earth Summit in 1992, local knowledge continues to experience serious marginalization, devaluation and, as a result, an ongoing and almost world-wide erosion and decline. Reasons for this development are to be located not only in real-world power dynamics and vested interests at all societal levels, but also in a limited understanding of the actual character of local knowledge. The latter often stems from a lack of insight by the generally highly specialized Western actors into local knowledge’s complexity and the influence of their own biases and constraints on how a given local knowledge form is perceived and made sense of – biases and constraints rooted in their disciplinary, organizational, structural and personal backgrounds. This research contributes to tackling the latter issue by developing a multidisciplinary-based framework approach to ‘understanding local knowledge’. The heuristic instrument is designed generically such that it is applicable to a broad range of local knowledge forms in rural and urban areas in industrializing and industrialized countries and can be applied in the context of research as much as conservation and development cooperation. Methodically, the dissertation is based on extended literature analyses across sociology, philosophy, anthropology, geography, the ethno-sciences and development, cultural and area studies in order to conceptualize and theoretically inform the notions formative for ‘understanding local knowledge’ as broadly and inclusively as possible, namely ‘knowledge’, ‘locality’ and, to a lesser extent, ‘understanding’. In this process, a total of 16 theory-based generic dimensions characterizing and specifying the three notions are identified. In a second step, these 16 dimensions are aggregated in a conceptual-analytical framework whereby I follow the methodology outlined by Jabareen, Dowding and Stanley. This dissertation’s contributions concern various levels. First, on an analytical level, the heuristic developed facilitates the understanding of principally any given form of local knowledge through a theory-based minimal set of interconnected key dimensions and questions. Second, in view of its normative foundation in sustainable development, the framework provides interested parties with a differentiated way to gain comprehensive insights into local contexts as basis for collaboratively determining sustainable conservation, management and/or development strategies. Third, its structured and systematic approach facilitates comparative studies and forth, its interdisciplinary foundation is expected to promote the uptake of scientific findings across disciplinary boundaries, counteracting tendencies of disciplinary isolation. Fifth, by including the aspect of ‘understanding’, the framework also allows for a critical reflection on the contingency of one’s own understanding on pre-existing biases and constraints, thus also taking account of challenges related to understanding across epistemologies. Approaching the topic of ‘understanding local knowledge’ with an instrument specifically developed to analyze local knowledge forms comprehensively and systematically promises to provide a more complex, transparent and at the same time balanced notion of a given local knowledge form that thus contributes to facilitating collaboration, be it in research, conservation or development cooperation

Beyond barrows

Europe is dotted with tens of thousands of prehistoric barrows. In spite of their ubiquity, little is known on the role they had in pre- and protohistoric landscapes. In 2010, an international group of archaeologists came together at the conference of the European Association of Archaeologists in The Hague to discuss and review current research on this topic. This book presents the proceedings of that session. The focus is on the prehistory of Scandinavia and the Low Countries, but also includes an excursion to huge prehistoric mounds in the southeast of North America. One contribution presents new evidence on how the immediate environment of Neolithic Funnel Beaker (TRB) culture megaliths was ordered, another one discusses the role of remarkable single and double post alignments around Bronze and Iron Age burial mounds. Zooming out, several chapters deal with the place of barrows in the broader landscape. The significance of humanly-managed heath in relation to barrow groups is discussed, and one contribution emphasizes how barrow orderings not only reflect spatial organization, but are also important as conceptual anchors structuring prehistoric perception. Other authors, dealing with Early Neolithic persistent places and with Late Bronze Age/Early Iron Age urnfields, argue that we should also look beyond monumentality in order to understand long-term use of “ritual landscapes”. The book contains an important contribution by the well-known Swedish archaeologist Tore Artelius on how Bronze Age barrows were structurally re-used by pre-Christian Vikings. This is his last article, written briefly before his death. This book is dedicated to his memory

In search of seeds: Exploring and classifying sustainability-oriented labs in real-world contexts

In 2015, the necessity of fundamental change was outlined in the universal, transnational agreement, Agenda 2030, under the headline of “transforming our world”. Underlying transformation, integration, and universality, Agenda 2030 calls for guided ethical and moral action in addition to earnest scientific and technological change. Sustainability transitions provide an organizing frame to conceptualize change at the level of systems. It does this within an explicitly normative field of research and practice, committed to understanding and navigating transitions towards sustainability.Alongside socio-technical niches and experiments, labs in real-world contexts have emerged as appealing entities that situate and localize around complex sustainability challenges. Their diverse form and positive connotations suggest a novel form of experimentation with purposeful and transformative aspirations. Yet, labs in real-world contexts hold different normative commitments, many of which are arguably tangential to sustainability. The purpose of this thesis is to establish a normative understanding of laboratories in real-world contexts through the adoption of sustainability as an organizing concept. Methodologically, my research emerged from and was shaped by one interconnected process, a systematic yet exploratory review. In this thesis, I generate knowledge claims on a collection of labs that intersect disciplines and areas of application. I derive seven research communities linked to sustainability-oriented labs in real-world contexts, and present labs as a combination of spaces, processes and ways of organizing. I develop an empirically grounded typology of labs according to engagement with sustainability as a generic matter of concern, substantiated in place. This typology illuminates similarities and differences across six different lab types. I then point towards reflexive governance as a helpful extension for further understanding labs in the context of transitions towards sustainability. Moving forward, I plan to adopt learning as a lens for qualitative case-based inquiry, enabling a contextual understanding of lab processes in practice

Music and arts festivals as platforms for enhancing Sustainable Development

Humanity is going through a complex process of historical transformation in which the consolidation of a new paradigm – Sustainable Development – is required in order to tackle current unprecedented global crises such as Climate Change and the COVID-19 pandemic. In congruence with this harsh reality, the 2030 Agenda on Sustainable Development can be regarded as an urgent call aimed at individuals, communities, institutions and nations, centred on the imperative need to create the structural foundations of a socially just and environmentally safe world. This research explores different ways in which contemporary music and arts festivals might operate as platforms for enhancing Sustainable Development. The central idea is to explore the way in which music and arts festivals, through strategies of socio-environmental awareness and education, community building and social participation, contribute to the consolidation of sustainable development as a new paradigm. This specific research is centred on the analysis of three organizations, Greenpop and Cape Town Carnival based in South Africa and Green Music Initiative based in Germany: organizations that actively participate in the arrangement and operation of different music and arts festivals. This selection was based on the belief that the analysis of cross-cultural cases enriches the understanding of the way in which festivals can effectively contribute to the process of encouraging the emergence and consolidation of a more sustainable world view. These three organizations are currently facing challenges and opportunities that arise from local and global processes of environmental damage and social exclusion. The key learnings of this research reflect the important role that festivals, through their promotion of creativity and community building, play in the generation of socio-environmental knowledge, in the generation of social cohesion and social capabilities, also in the experimentation and action of possible solutions to environmental global crises such as climate change and land use change. In its final section, this document also presents some of the key learnings that the festival industry has developed from the current COVID-19 pandemic and reflects upon the way in which these learnings can strengthen its role in the consolidation of the sustainable development paradigm

Exploring Institutional and Organizational Complexity: A Study of Sustainability in English Public Universities’ Campus Operations

The aim of this study is to explore the rationales for English public universities to engage in campus operational sustainability (OS) activities and the barriers to progressing OS, mainly based on the perceptions and experiences of university personnel directly involved in these activities at a managerial level. Some scholars criticize that the previous application of organizational legitimacy theory in the field of sustainability research is more concerned with society as a whole and does not examine particular stakeholder groups. There is also a lack of research empirically investigating the reasons for OS engagement in higher education institutions through neo-institutional perspectives. More in-depth engagement based empirical research on various barriers to progressing OS is needed. This study adopts neo-institutional theory and organizational legitimacy theory to help explain the rationales for English public universities’ OS engagement. The researcher draws on insights from sustainability literature, so as to better understand a range of barriers to OS progress in universities. The philosophical stances of this study are based on constructionism and interpretivism. The research adopted a qualitative research approach and used semi-structured interview and document analysis to gather data. The semi-structured interview was the main data collection method and document analysis was the additional, supporting method to supplement the interviews. A purposive sampling strategy was employed to select participants. The researcher conducted in-depth interviews with one experienced manager directly involved in OS from each of 20 English public universities with different organizational characteristics. Additionally, a large number of relevant external and internal documents were gathered and analyzed. Template analysis was used as the main method to analyse data. Prior to the main study, a pilot study of three universities was undertaken. Moreover, a number of approaches were applied to ensure research ethics and research quality. This research identifies a range of coercive, normative and mimetic institutional mechanisms, influencing the universities’ rationales for OS engagement. In this context, the government, students and media are perceived as influential sources of legitimacy. The analysis also reveals conflicts between managers’ attempts to pursue moral legitimacy for substantive OS changes and universities’ pragmatic self-serving benefits. When facing such conflicts, universities may sometimes engage in symbolic OS activities for maintaining legitimacy in a superficial way, with limited substantive actions. In addition, the researcher divides the barriers to OS progress into organizational-related and social institutional-related barriers and proposes a number of approaches which could address the barriers

Effects of social skills training program designed to improve the social status of isolated and rejected children

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of a social skills training program designed to improve the social status of isolated and rejected children. Subjects were fourth and fifth grade students from two different elementary schools. One school served as the control group and the other one was the experimental group.;The sample consisted of 91 identified students from both schools. A nonequivalent control group research design was used. Pre- and posttest information was gathered using the Piers-Harris Self-Perception Questionnaire, Achenbach\u27s Teacher\u27s Report Form, and Sociogram. Dependent variables were children\u27s self-perception, level of popularity, level of happiness, and social status. Analysis of covariance was chosen to control pre-existing differences between the groups.;The students in the control group were exposed to the same guidance program, educational curriculum and school activities as the experimental group, the only exception was the treatment intervention which was delivered to the experimental group in six weekly sessions of thirty minutes.;The results of this study indicated that students in the experimental group improved their social status when compared with the children from the control group. The intervention program was effective in decreasing the level of rejection in the identified students. The scale of social problems was higher indicating an increase of identified social difficulties by the classroom teachers of the students in the experimental group. The treatment program was not effective in the improvement of level of happiness, popularity and self-concept

Perceptions of sustainability within the English Further Education sector

This study investigates the relationship between college leader’s perceptions of sustainability and sustainable development in the English Further Education (FE) sector, and the nature of its practice within individual colleges and the sector as a whole. Previous research investigating perceptions and practice of sustainability within education has almost exclusively focussed on Higher Education (HE) institutions, with much research also focussing on describing institutional progress without investigating the facilitating leadership conditions. This study makes a unique contribution to knowledge by investigating a previously unexplored sector through the use of the Transition Management Framework as the study’s conceptual framework. A key outcome of this study is the adaptation of the Transition Management Framework that could be used by the sector and its leadership structure to facilitate a reassessment and reinvigoration of sustainability leadership within the sector. The research design is based on a Grounded Theory methodology that used semi-structured interviews and focus groups as the primary method of data collection, with content analysis of significant sector stakeholders’ websites and publications forming a secondary method of data collection. The first key finding of this research was that the relationship between how sustainability is conceptualised and how it is practised is weak, with perceptions often referring to two different interpretations, neither of which fully addresses the social, economic and environmental aspects of sustainable development. Indeed, whilst perceptions focus on the environment, it is to this that the sector appears least accountable. This power pointing and a lack of accountability held by all levels of management within FE toward the environment was the study’s second key finding. Both of these findings are intrinsically linked to the third, which is that the Transition Management Framework’s focus on incremental change may sufficiently be able to change practices at a niche level, but unless operating within a more sustainable economic paradigm, the reach of incremental action may always be limited