Sustainability and Transition Archives - Page 2 of 4

Global Polycrisis as a Pathway to Economic Transition

In this report for the Strategic Innovation Unit of the United Nations Development Programme, Zack Walsh argues that the underlying driver of the polycrisis is our unsustainable and unjust economic systems, and the polycrisis opens opportunities to transform those systems. Additional drivers include overshoot, inequality, complexity, and uniformity and interconnectedness. The article then considers two […]

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Response Diversity as a Sustainability Strategy

The authors argue that the most effective way to build general resilience in an increasingly volatile and uncertain world is to foster “response diversity… a system’s variety of responses to disruptions of all kinds.” That entails maintaining a variety of ways to carry out key system process (ideally at different spatial and temporal scales) that

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The Fundamental Issue – Overshoot

Interviewed by Nate Hagens, William E. Rees argues that overshoot is a fundamental issue underlying all environmental problems. Our economy is premised on unlimited growth but the global human ecological footprint exceeds by 100% the biocapacity of Earth, and we are reaching a tipping point where nature will restore balance. He thus argues we must

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The Breakthrough Effect: How to Trigger a Cascade of Tipping Points to Accelerate the Net Zero Transition

This report analyzes actionable “tipping points” within global energy systems (fertilizer, shipping, power, etc.) that could produce a cascade of emissions reductions. The technology adoption needed to reach these positive tipping points is dependent on cost-effectiveness, attractiveness, and accessibility, but if these barriers are overcome, it could result in massive, self-reinforcing environmental improvements. The authors

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Why the impacts of climate change may make us less likely to reduce emissions

While increased climate warming may motivate ambitious actions that remediate the climate crisis, Millward-Hopkins proposes that it may have the opposite effect. He argues that the indirect impacts of warming, such as widening socioeconomic inequalities, increased migration, and heightened risk of conflict, interact with key drivers of authoritarian populism in ways that may foster resistance

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Replacing Sustainable Development: Potential Frameworks for International Cooperation in an Era of Increasing Crises and Disasters

Reviewing international cooperation on social and environmental change, and particularly the failure to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals, Jem Bendell argues that the Sustainable Development framework is unable to address the increasing crises and disasters faced by the world today. As an alternative, he proposes an upgraded form of Disaster Risk Management that is detached

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How the World Really Works

Against those who anticipate a smooth, timely transition to renewable energy and net-zero carbon emissions, Vaclav Smil argues that we are much more dependent on fossil fuels than we recognize so that an energy transition will be difficult and tumultuous. “The real wrench in the works: we are a fossil-fueled civilization whose technical and scientific

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Decline and Fall, Growth and Spread, or Resilience? Approaches to Studying How and Why Societies Change

Daniel Hoyer examines qualitative, case study, complex system, and societal dynamics approaches to explain “historical precedents of collapse, growth, and resilience.” He explains drawbacks to each method, and stresses “the importance of developing formal (especially mathematically articulated) mechanistic theory, as only by explicating what we think drives societal outcomes in a structured, formal way can

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