C OLLECTIVE A CTION AND THE TRANSITION TO A SUSTAINABLE SOCIETY : A RESEARCH AND ACTION PROPOSAL Sander van der Leeuw Arizona State University Santa Fe Institute

Participants Alan AtKisson (AtKisson Group) Ilan Chabay (Chalmers University of Technology) John Finnigan (CSIRO, Canberra, Australia) Carlo Jaeger (PIK, Potsdam) Pamela Matson (Stanford University) Elinor Ostrom (Indiana University) Johan Rockström (Stockholm Resilience Center) Marten Scheffer (Wageningen University) Sander van der Leeuw (Arizona State University) Frances Westley (University of Waterloo) Oran Young (UC Santa Barbara) 3/27/122

Goals Research: What has prevented a groundswell, rapid transition to sustainability? – Why do such changes occur, or don’t? – Can one stimulate them in certain directions? – All scales, all disciplines Action: Transition as core urgency – Social Science challenge – Emergence by Design 3/27/123

Some of the barriers difficulty of anticipating unintended consequences path-dependency of our societies difficulties of preparing for and dealing with major catastrophes lacunae in our governance system for global issues role of technology and our (over-) confidence in it tendency to strive for panaceas and silver bullets difficulty of anticipating impact of societal dynamics 3/27/124

What kind of transition? Incremental or quantum jump? Top-down, bottom-up or sandwiched? How to match scales to local circumstances? How to instantiate the transition? – What normative goals? – How to create ethics of stewardship? – How to deal with cultural differences? 3/27/125

How to convince? Would one use tools integrating persuasion, dialogue, policy debate, culture and custom? How to identify innovative and exciting accelerators of change? Could we build positive, plausible scenarios for transition to a sustainable society ? Would we need to explore how to deconstruct institutions? What strategies for avoidance, adaptation, and transformation are effective at large scales? 3/27/126

What is the role of science? To what degree can science contribute? – The role of the citizen/scientist What will it take to have scientific leadership that really leads to change? – Do we have to transform our scientific institutions? What is the role of scientific education? – How to educate most effectively? 3/27/127

The role of government? How to manage for emergence? – How to learn for the future? How to focus innovation? – Innovation got us into trouble How to articulate normative and practical? – What kind of future do we want, and how do we get it? How to make participation fun? – Transition town movement 3/27/128

The role of business? Business is seeing the writing on the wall It can contribute a lot: – The Sustainability Consortium – WBCSD But, will it control the movement? – Turn it into a profit? – How about ‘greenwashing’? – Will it be able to deviate it? 3/27/129

Culture, perception, decision-making It’s all about changing mindsets! We need to become more effective: – Better understand and handle the media – Better understand decision-making – Better understand how to involve diverse partners – Find new, stimulating ways of educating – Focus education on creativity – Harness universities to find solutions 3/27/1210

9 Problem-driven Acknowledges full systemic complexity Studies dynamics of systems Has a long-term perspective Is steeped in inter-/transdisciplinarity Anticipates the future Goal-oriented Action-oriented Engages in stakeholder collaboration at all times Makes contributions to real-world solutions Qualities of sustainability scientists