Methodological Challenges in Sustainability Science: A Call for Method Plurality, Procedural Rigor and Longitudinal Research

Sustainability science encompasses a unique field that is defined through its purpose, the problem it addresses, and its solution-oriented agenda. However, this orientation creates significant methodological challenges. In this discussion paper, we conceptualize sustainability problems as wicked problems to tease out the key challenges that sustainability science is facing if scientists intend to deliver on its solution-oriented agenda. Building on the available literature, we discuss three aspects that demand increased attention for advancing sustainability science: 1) methods with higher diversity and complementarity are needed to increase the chance of deriving solutions to the unique aspects of wicked problems; for instance, mixed methods approaches are potentially better suited to allow for an approximation of solutions, since they cover wider arrays of knowledge; 2) methodologies capable of dealing with wicked problems demand strict procedural and ethical guidelines, in order to ensure their integration potential; for example, learning from solution implementation in different contexts requires increased comparability between research approaches while carefully addressing issues of legitimacy and credibility; and 3) approaches are needed that allow for longitudinal research, since wicked problems are continuous and solutions can only be diagnosed in retrospect; for example, complex dynamics of wicked problems play out across temporal patterns that are not necessarily aligned with the common timeframe of participatory sustainability research. Taken together, we call for plurality in methodologies, emphasizing procedural rigor and the necessity of continuous research to effectively addressing wicked problems as well as methodological challenges in sustainability science

Market transformations as collaborative change: institutional co‐evolution through small business entrepreneurship

Entrepreneurship may be one entry point to trigger transformations toward sustainability. Yet, there is limited knowledge on the ability of small- and medium-sized enterprises (SMEs) to play a role in transformation processes, beyond the initial stages of niche innovation. Building on data collected through 125 interviews in Toronto, Vancouver and London, we examine perceived contributions of SME-led sustainable entrepreneurship to market transformations. Our data show that sustainable entrepreneurs face significant constraints in individually exercising influence over mass markets, as they encounter social forces that generate resistance to change. However, SMEs are able to act collaboratively to shape transformation processes. We propose three mechanisms of institutional co-evolution that capture these contributions: network learning, collective norm-construction and collaborative advocacy

Conceptualizing the potential of entrepreneurship to shape urban sustainability transformations

Entrepreneurship has emerged as a key element for experimentation and niche innovation in sustainability transitions. Yet, its contributions beyond this initial stage and the multi-pronged role that entrepreneurs can play in transformation processes remain elusive. In response, we conceptualize and empirically illustrate how entrepreneurs can contribute to innovations within firms and to city-wide processes of change. With insights from small- and medium-sized enterprises in European and North American cities, we develop a framework encompassing eight intervention types through which entrepreneurs shape urban sustainability transformations. We propose avenues for future research to better understand the distributed role of entrepreneurship and how it can contribute to shaping and accelerating change toward sustainability across integrated levels of urban transformations

Networking Cities after Paris: Weighing the Ambition of Urban Climate Change Experimentation

Over the past few decades, cities have repeatedly demonstrated high levels of ambition with regard to climate action. Global environmental governance has been marked by a proliferation of policy actions taken by local governments around the world to demonstrate their potential to advance climate change mitigation and adaptation. Leading ‘by example’ and demonstrating the extent of action that it is possible to deliver, cities have aspired to raise the ambition of national and international climate governance and put action into practice via a growing number of ‘climate change experiments’ delivered on the ground. Yet accounts of the potential of cities in global environmental governance have often stopped short of a systematic valuation of the nature and impact of the networked dimension of this action. This article addresses this by assessing the nature, and challenges faced by, urban climate governance in the post-Paris era, focusing on the ‘experimentation’ undertaken in cities and the city networks shaping this type of governance. First, we unpack the concept of ‘urban climate change experimentation’, the ways in which it is networked, and the forces driving it. In the second and third parts of the article, we discuss two main pitfalls of networked urban experimentation in its current form, focusing on issues of scaling experiments and the nature of experimentation. We call for increased attention to ‘scaling up’ experiments beyond urban levels of governance, and to transformative experimentation with governance and politics by and in cities. Finally, we consider how these pitfalls allow us to weigh the potential of urban climate ambition, and consider the pathways available for supporting urban climate change experimentation

One transition, many transitions? A corpus-based study of societal sustainability transition discourses in four civil society’s proposals

When the civil society makes ‘transition’ its label, it cannot be assumed that different civil society actors share compatible varieties of localist or radical transformationists discourses. This study has comparatively analyzed the discourses in four civil society sustainability transition proposals using a corpus-based methodology. We found that the proposals are similar as they identify the economy as an object and an entry point for transition, frame the economy as embedded in the socio–ecological system, ascribe agency to grassroots movements for transitions from the bottom–up. We also found crucial differences among the discourses regarding the role of the State, the degree of reform or radical innovation, the degree of imaginative character of the sustainability vision, the degree of opposition to capitalism. We suggest that insights on how the civil society employs notions of transition with respect to the themes of politics, emotions and place can help advance theorizations and practices of societal sustainability transitions led by the civil society

Transformative capacity and local action for urban sustainability.

There is a consensus about the strategic importance of cities and urban areas for achieving a global transformation towards sustainability. While there is mounting interest in the types of qualities that increase the capacity of urban systems to attain deep transformations, empirical evidence about the extent to which existing institutional and material systems exhibit transformative capacity is lacking. This paper thereby seeks to determine the extent to which sustainability initiatives led by local governments and their partners reflect the various components that the literature claims can influence the emergence of transformative capacity as a systemic property of urban settings. Using an evaluative framework consisting of ten components of transformative capacity and associated indicators, the specific objective is to identify patterns in these initiatives regarding the presence of individual components of transformative capacity and their interrelations with other components. The analysis of 400 sustainability initiatives reveals thin evidence of transformative capacity. When detected, evidence of transformative capacity tended to emerge in relation to wider processes of institutional- and social-learning and initiatives that linked outcomes to a city-wide vision of planning and development. However, instances of such initiatives were rare. This widespread lack of evidence for transformative capacity raises concerns that this set of attributes normalised in the literature is in fact rarely found in sustainability action on the ground

Assessing the Potential of Regulating Ecosystem Services as Nature-Based Solutions in Urban Areas

Mounting research assesses the provision of regulating ecosystem services by green infrastructure in urban areas, but the extent to which these services can offer effective nature-based solutions for addressing urban climate change-related challenges is rarely considered. In this chapter, we synthesize knowledge from assessments of urban green infrastructure carried out in Europe and beyond to evaluate the potential contribution of regulating ecosystem services to offset carbon emissions, reduce heat stress and abate air pollution at the metropolitan, city and site scales. Results from this review indicate that the potential of regulating ecosystem services provided by urban green infrastructure to counteract these three climate change-related pressures is often limited and/or uncertain, especially at the city and metropolitan levels. However, their contribution can have a substantially higher impact at site scales such as in street canyons and around green spaces. We note that if regulating ecosystem services are to offer effective nature-based solutions in urban areas, it is critically important that green infrastructure policies target the relevant implementation scale. This calls for a coordination between authorities dealing with urban and environmental policy and for the harmonization of planning and management instruments in a multilevel governance approach. Regulating ecosystem services • Urban green infrastructure • Global climate regulation • Local climate regulation • Air quality regulation • Multi-scale assessmentpublishedVersio

Navigating between adaptation and transformation: How intermediaries support businesses in sustainability transitions

Small and medium sized enterprises (SMEs) often require external support to make progress on sustainability and contribute to both environmental integrity and social well-being. Previous research has highlighted the important role of local governments and business networks as intermediaries in facilitating sustainability-action in SMEs and the pursuit of sustainability transitions in society. Missing, however, is a clear understanding of how other forms of organizations help SMEs perform sustainability-oriented actions and how various intermediaries can collectively support businesses as they contribute to social and environmental well-being. The objective of this study is to investigate the role of organizations acting as intermediaries in supporting SMEs to contribute to transitions towards sustainability. We build on the results of a large-n survey and semi-structured interviews with SMEs, non-governmental organizations, and relevant units in local government in the Greater Toronto Area (GTA) Canada. Using qualitative content analysis, our results show that local government, and more specifically economic development units and sustainability units within local government, often are disengaged from encouraging SMEs to take on sustainability-oriented initiatives. Other types of intermediaries fill knowledge and resource gaps, and act as boundary spanners in an increasingly complex web of actors, actions, and sustainability driven goals. This analysis calls for a new understanding of the role of intermediaries in sustainability transitions, in particular with regards to the relationship between incumbents and niche innovators

Pathways of organisational transformation for sustainability: a university case-study synthesis presenting competencies for systemic change & rubrics of transformation

This research article presents a diagnosis and synthesis of three case studies of universities that have transformed themselves as organisations towards sustainability with signature pathway approaches. These took place in 2016 at Leuphana Universitat Luneburg, Arizona State University, and Hong Kong University of Science and Technology. These universitiesfirstinvested significant time, energy, and human resources in learning about and researching themselves,beforeembarking along differentiated pathways of transformation, in turn, made up of common patterns of rubrics in specific action strategies. The common patterns delineated by the action strategies can be understood as intrinsic competencies for systemic change. These describe the assets of, for example, actors researching, learning about, and diagnosing their own organisations, their awareness of system boundaries and qualities, and the relationship and interdependency between the organisation and its surrounding society and ecosystems. Any blueprint of organisational transformation for sustainability should, therefore, be rooted in the intrinsic logic of the organisations in question. 33 tangible systemic rubrics of transformation also emerged which could be useful for actors (whether student, administrative, academic, entre/intrapreneur, leadership or activist) to prioritise asset development within their organisations, and which might act as pragmatic design aspirations, guiding and encouraging university actors along transformation pathways