Community-led initiatives’ everyday politics for sustainability – Conflicting rationalities and aspirations for change?

This project has received funding from the European Union’s 7th Framework Programme for Research, Technological Development and Demonstration (Grant Agreement no. 603705) through TESS (Towards European Social Sustainability, http://www.tess-transition.eu/).Community-based initiatives are widely seen to play an essential role in a societal move towards a low carbon, sustainable future. As part of this, there is often an assumption that such initiatives share expectations (i.e. a guiding vision) of large-scale change and that their activities contribute to this change. Here, we ask to what extent this assumption reflects members’ own perspectives on and interpretations of the aims and ambitions of their community initiative, and what this implies for a larger vision of sustainability transitions. In doing so, we respond to calls for a better understanding of the ‘everyday politics’ of what could be seen as processes of societal transitions in practice. We conducted qualitative interviews with members of five community initiatives in Italy, Finland and the UK. In each of these initiatives, we found a range of aspirations (i.e. outcome-related aims) and rationalities (i.e. procedural guiding principles). While some of these aims and ways of working were compatible with each other, we identified three major tensions that could be found across our study initiatives. These tensions centred on (i) the degree of politicisation of the initiative, (ii) the extent to which financial aims should take priority and (iii) questions of organisational form. We interpret these tensions as conflicting expressions of larger, societal-level discourses, and argue that this diversity and resulting conflicts need to be acknowledged – both in transition research and at the practical level – to avoid co-optation and disenfranchisement.PostprintPeer reviewe

‘Shift happens’: Co-constructing transition pathways towards the regional sustainability of agriculture in Europe

Farming systems have to face challenges that originate in changes of global dimension in both the bio-physical and the societal sphere, such as Climate change (leading to increasing weather uncertainty and raising average temperatures, thus impacting agro-ecosystems and water supplies); Food safety concerns (spreading in Europe while in other regions food security remains a challenge) and Changing consumption patterns and unequal purchasing power (contributing to the unsustainable use of natural resources in many countries). These changes have manifold implications and raise many questions with regard to agricultural land use

Resocializing digital water transformations : outlining social science perspectives on the digital water journey

Funding information: National Cyber Security Centre; Scottish Government, Grant/Award Number: Hydro Nation Scholars; University of Manchester, Grant/Award Number: Presidential fellowship; University of Manchester, Grant/Award Number: SEED PGR scholarship (Amankwaa).Digital water transformation is often written about as though universally desirable and inevitable, capable of addressing the multifaceted socioecological challenges that water systems face. However, there is not widespread reflection on the complexities, tensions and unintended consequences of digital transformation, its social and political dimensions are often neglected. This article introduces case studies of digital water development, bringing examples of technological innovation into dialogue with literature and empirical research from across the social sciences. We examine how Big Data affects our observations of water in society to shape water management, how the Internet of Things becomes involved in reproducing unjust water politics, how digital platforms are entangled in the varied sociocultural landscape of everyday water use, and how opensource technologies provide new possibilities for participatory water governance. We also reflect on regulatory developments and the possible trajectories of innovation resulting from public‐private sector interactions. A socially and politically informed view of digital water is essential for just and sustainable development, and the gap between industry visions of digital water and research within the social sciences is inhibitive. Thus, the analysis presented in this article provides a novel, pluralistic perspective on digital water development and outlines what is required for more inclusive future scholarship, policy and practice.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Community water governance in Scotland : exploring meaning, practices, and order

Amidst concerns about the global climate crisis, water allocation, management and governance have risen to the top of national and international agendas, including in countries traditionally viewed as having abundant water resources. Communities may – and some would argue should – be part of responding to these challenges. This research takes an interpretive approach to study how community involvement in water governance is understood and enacted. The research is set in the publicly managed and highly regulated context of water services, i.e., the activities associated with domestic drinking and wastewater provision and the avoidance and mitigation of harmful consequences of flooding in Scotland. This thesis provides a theoretically informed analysis of the role of communities in water governance using the concepts of meaning, practices and ordering derived from Emma Carmel’s Governance Analysis and grounded in wider interpretive policy theory. Building on data gathered from methods including interviews (walking and seated), observations, document analysis and systematic mapping, the study illustrates how governing takes place in real-life settings. The research provides much-needed insight into the practices and interactions of communities and practitioners, in particular, a subset of them called frontline workers. The thesis makes three contributions to scholarship. It deepens understanding of ‘community water governance’ based on multiple conceptual and empirical sources. Second, it presents new empirical insights into water services in Scotland, a setting which has received limited in-depth examination in academic literature. Finally, it enriches understanding of both communities and frontline workers and their contributions to addressing water challenges. The thesis shows that water governance is not solely a technical exercise but a social and political process of navigating social relations. Water governance needs to be understood first, as a contingent and relational practice in which communities and practitioners skilfully negotiate complex and ambiguous goals, and second, as having implications beyond the domain of water."I want to thank the Hydro Nation Scholars Programme. Not only for funding this PhD but for taking a chance to try something different and be open to what comes out in the end."--General acknowledgement

Future-proofing the farm:On-farm wind turbine development in farm business decision-making

The European Union is committed to increasing the renewable energy produced and consumed within its territory, creating an opportunity and demand for renewable energy production on agricultural land. In this paper, Ajzen's theory of planned behaviour (TPB) is utilised to structure qualitative research on the role of renewable energy production in farm business decision-making, through a case study in North East Scotland. Qualitative interviews were undertaken with 23 farmers who had pursued wind energy production, and a further nine key informants. It is found that farmers undertake wind energy production primarily to 'future proof' their farms, increasing the long-term economic viability of their farms through business diversification and profitable capital investment. Although environmental considerations were not the primary consideration in turbine development, respondents recognised the energy dependence of farming and the depletion of world energy resources, including these issues in their rationales. The primary obstacles to turbine development focused around economic risks and transaction costs, which some respondents moderated by reducing turbine size or renting land to developers, thus increasing their 'perceived behavioural control'. Relationships between intention and behaviour are thus found to be multi-directional. The authors argue that on-farm renewable energy production could lead to increased environmental awareness among farmers (and thus more economically and environmentally sustainable agricultural practices), as well as providing a potential economic boost for local economies, but that these opportunities are at risk of being co-opted by large-scale energy companies, which are better able to negotiate the growing complexities and risks of turbine development.</p

Discourses of on-farm wind energy generation in the UK farming press

As the owners of the majority of land in the U.K., farmers are well placed to contribute to renewable energy targets. Media coverage can both drive and reflect farmers’ views about renewable energy but has been largely unexplored to date. This article uses discourse analysis to examine the evolution of coverage of one form of renewable energy – on-farm wind – in the U.K. farming press from 1980 to 2013. We identified a diverse debate with five major discourses. On-farm wind turbines are alternatively represented as: profitable farm diversification opportunities; producers of clean energy; important for rural development and sources of conflict. Although press coverage predominantly encourages wind energy production, a further discourse advises farmers to ‘Proceed with Caution’. While emphasising images and values which have widespread affinity among U.K. farmers, the press have increasingly employed an economic frame, constructing wind energy generation as a farm diversification strategy. The most recent farming press coverage predominantly encourages an instrumental approach to wind energy, crowding out other (non-economic) rationales and marginalising local community concerns. This appears to reflect the financial orientation of recent policy support (particularly Feed-in Tariffs), and may have long-term costs in enabling sustainable energy production systems

Transforming knowledge systems for life on Earth : Visions of future systems and how to get there

Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we used a novel futures-oriented and participatory approach that asked what future envisioned knowledge systems might need to look like and how we might get there. Findings suggest that envisioned future systems will need to be much more collaborative, open, diverse, egalitarian, and able to work with values and systemic issues. They will also need to go beyond producing knowledge about our world to generating wisdom about how to act within it. To get to envisioned systems we will need to rapidly scale methodological innovations, connect innovators, and creatively accelerate learning about working with intractable challenges. We will also need to create new funding schemes, a global knowledge commons, and challenge deeply held assumptions. To genuinely be a creative force in supporting longevity of human and non-human life on our planet, the shift in knowledge systems will probably need to be at the scale of the enlightenment and speed of the scientific and technological revolution accompanying the second World War. This will require bold and strategic action from governments, scientists, civic society and sustained transformational intent.Peer reviewe

Transforming knowledge systems for life on Earth: Visions of future systems and how to get there

Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we used a novel futures-oriented and participatory approach that asked what future envisioned knowledge systems might need to look like and how we might get there. Findings suggest that envisioned future systems will need to be much more collaborative, open, diverse, egalitarian, and able to work with values and systemic issues. They will also need to go beyond producing knowledge about our world to generating wisdom about how to act within it. To get to envisioned systems we will need to rapidly scale methodological innovations, connect innovators, and creatively accelerate learning about working with intractable challenges. We will also need to create new funding schemes, a global knowledge commons, and challenge deeply held assumptions. To genuinely be a creative force in supporting longevity of human and non-human life on our planet, the shift in knowledge systems will probably need to be at the scale of the enlightenment and speed of the scientific and technological revolution accompanying the second World War. This will require bold and strategic action from governments, scientists, civic society and sustained transformational intent