ICS Working Paper Nº1/2018

ICS W O R K I N G P A P E R S 2018 6 This complex issue of triggering a transformative path-dependency towards sustainability has had multiple echoes in the largely overlapping body of literature including socio-ecological technical transitions (Geels and Schot, 2007), transition management (Kemp et al., 2007; Rotmans and Loorbach, 2009), sustainability transitions (Markard et al., 2012; Smith et al., 2005) and more recently transformative social innovation theory (Haxeltine et al., 2017). A prominent concept for depicting the systemic multilevel interplay between different societal subsystems across space and time is Geels’ Multilevel Perspective (MLP) framework (Geels, 2011). This helps to identify causalities of influence between micro-level actors and macro-level structures that underlie large system change processes. Yet, it depends on quasi linear assumption of decision-making processes and misses inquiry into the political nature of the sustainability transition (cf. Patterson et al., 2017) . Referring to Swyngedouw (2010; 2011), we can identify a similar risk for sustainability transition as he attributed to sustainability : namely, to turn it into a “rosy” global de-politicized “environmental consensus”. Yet, politics, policies and conflict are inherent to any social transformation shaping the extent to which any shift towards sustainability will ultimately be reached (Prugh et al., 2000; Avelino and Rotmans, 2009; O’Riordan, 2014). Yet there is a growing perception that governments and international institutions are unable to provide the necessary solutions and subsequent leverage to trigger such transformation (Blühdorn, 2007; Swyngedouw, 2010; 2011). Any shift towards a fully sustainable way of living on Earth without critically endangering the intertwined ecosystems that represent the life support for humans and all other species will not easily be self-starting. We therefore need to determine who can be the catalysts of change, and how they can better exert their influence. A significant body of literature (e.g. Geels and Shot, 2007; Olsson et al., 2006; Pelling et al., 2008; Smith et al., 2005; Göpel, 2016) has convincingly argued that socio-technical transformations originate mostly at the “niche or micro level, where small units or ‘situated groups’ experiment easily with alternative solutions, as long as the degree of interdependencies with overarching or neighbouring systems is not too strong” (Göpel, 2016: 22). Like Seyfang and Haxeltine (2012), we understand niches as protected spaces where alternative practices can form and develop, shielded from external system pressures, hosting actors and organisations who are free to pursue such place-based practices. A particularly visible niche dynamic is embodied in community-based initiatives (CBIs), who already foster complementary or alternative pathways to dominant development paradigms (c.f. Haxeltine et al., 2017; TESS, n.d.). As Göpel (2016: 45) and Minkoff (1997) observe, societal change often springs from alternative or radical socio- political movements that over time manage to gain momentum and mobilize enough critical mass to alter the status quo .