IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jsusta/v7y2015i3p3269-3289d46973.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Transition Thinking Incorporated: Towards a New Discussion Framework on Sustainable Urban Projects

Author

Listed:
  • Sophie Devolder

    (Centre for Sustainable Development, Ghent University, Poel 16, 9000 Ghent, Belgium)

  • Thomas Block

    (Centre for Sustainable Development, Ghent University, Poel 16, 9000 Ghent, Belgium)

Abstract

Today, cities worldwide are engaged in urban projects and activities in a concerted drive towards sustainable development. However, the concept of “sustainable urban projects” is inherently normative, subjective and ambiguous. Furthermore, the popularity of sustainable urban initiatives does not guarantee that increased pressure on dominant unsustainable urban systems will occur. In this article, we argue that strong urban debates on these initiatives and on urban sustainability are required to facilitate and stimulate urban systems towards a more socially just and environmentally sustainable future. When we say “urban debates” we mean substantive talks and detailed discussions about the type of cities we want to live in and about a shared understanding of sustainable urban projects and how they affect urban systems. We aim to contribute to that objective by developing a discussion framework on sustainable urban projects that frames sustainable development as a challenge that concentrates on both ecological and social concerns and that avoids a sole reliance on technology fixes. But above all, we also incorporate insights and findings from transition thinking to focus on radical changes or transformations of urban systems and to acknowledge the importance of so-called “niches”. In this article we describe the fundamentals, the surplus value and the utility of the framework. The article contains empirical material from a pilot-study in Ghent, Belgium.

Suggested Citation

  • Sophie Devolder & Thomas Block, 2015. "Transition Thinking Incorporated: Towards a New Discussion Framework on Sustainable Urban Projects," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(3), pages 1-21, March.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:7:y:2015:i:3:p:3269-3289:d:46973
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/7/3/3269/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/2071-1050/7/3/3269/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Nathaniel Baum-Snow & Ronni Pavan, 2013. "Inequality and City Size," The Review of Economics and Statistics, MIT Press, vol. 95(5), pages 1535-1548, December.
    2. Geels, Frank W. & Schot, Johan, 2007. "Typology of sociotechnical transition pathways," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 36(3), pages 399-417, April.
    3. Geels, Frank W., 2002. "Technological transitions as evolutionary reconfiguration processes: a multi-level perspective and a case-study," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 31(8-9), pages 1257-1274, December.
    4. Eric Neumayer, 2013. "Weak versus Strong Sustainability," Books, Edward Elgar Publishing, number 14993.
    5. Daly, Herman E., 1992. "Allocation, distribution, and scale: towards an economics that is efficient, just, and sustainable," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 6(3), pages 185-193, December.
    6. Bill Hopwood & Mary Mellor & Geoff O'Brien, 2005. "Sustainable development: mapping different approaches," Sustainable Development, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., vol. 13(1), pages 38-52.
    7. Hodson, Mike & Marvin, Simon, 2010. "Can cities shape socio-technical transitions and how would we know if they were?," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 39(4), pages 477-485, May.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Steffen Lehmann, 2015. "A New Urban Agenda: Introduction to the Special Issue on “Sustainable Urban Development”," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 7(8), pages 1-7, July.
    2. Franziska Ehnert & Niki Frantzeskaki & Jake Barnes & Sara Borgström & Leen Gorissen & Florian Kern & Logan Strenchock & Markus Egermann, 2018. "The Acceleration of Urban Sustainability Transitions: A Comparison of Brighton, Budapest, Dresden, Genk, and Stockholm," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-25, February.
    3. Yuanli Li & Pengcheng Xiang & Kairui You & Jin Guo & Zhaowen Liu & Hong Ren, 2021. "Identifying the Key Risk Factors of Mega Infrastructure Projects from an Extended Sustainable Development Perspective," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(14), pages 1-29, July.
    4. Maarten Crivits & Charlotte Prové & Thomas Block & Joost Dessein, 2016. "Four Perspectives of Sustainability Applied to the Local Food Strategy of Ghent (Belgium): Need for a Cycle of Democratic Participation?," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 8(1), pages 1-21, January.
    5. José Luis Fuentes-Bargues & Mª José Bastante-Ceca & Pablo Sebastián Ferrer-Gisbert & Mª Carmen González-Cruz, 2020. "Analysis of the Situation of Social Public Procurement of Works at the Valencian Region (Spain)," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(1), pages 1-23, December.
    6. Miho Kamei & Alessio Mastrucci & Bas J. van Ruijven, 2021. "A Future Outlook of Narratives for the Built Environment in Japan," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(4), pages 1-20, February.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Barbanente, Angela & Grassini, Laura, 2022. "Fostering transitions in landscape policies: A multi-level perspective," Land Use Policy, Elsevier, vol. 112(C).
    2. André Sorensen & Anna-Katharina Brenner, 2021. "Cities, Urban Property Systems, and Sustainability Transitions: Contested Processes of Institutional Change and the Regulation of Urban Property Development," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 13(15), pages 1-19, July.
    3. Geels, Frank W., 2012. "A socio-technical analysis of low-carbon transitions: introducing the multi-level perspective into transport studies," Journal of Transport Geography, Elsevier, vol. 24(C), pages 471-482.
    4. Lee, Junmin & Kim, Keungoui & Kim, Jiyong & Hwang, Junseok, 2022. "The relationship between shared mobility and regulation in South Korea: A system dynamics approach from the socio-technical transitions perspective," Technovation, Elsevier, vol. 109(C).
    5. Frank W. Geels, 2013. "The Impact of the Financial and Economic Crisis on Sustainability Transitions: Financial Investment, Governance and Public Discourse. WWWforEurope Working Paper No. 39," WIFO Studies, WIFO, number 47014, April.
    6. Fuenfschilling, Lea & Binz, Christian, 2018. "Global socio-technical regimes," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 47(4), pages 735-749.
    7. Christopher M. Chini & James F. Canning & Kelsey L. Schreiber & Joshua M. Peschel & Ashlynn S. Stillwell, 2017. "The Green Experiment: Cities, Green Stormwater Infrastructure, and Sustainability," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 9(1), pages 1-21, January.
    8. Kivimaa, Paula & Kern, Florian, 2016. "Creative destruction or mere niche support? Innovation policy mixes for sustainability transitions," Research Policy, Elsevier, vol. 45(1), pages 205-217.
    9. Kompella, Lakshminarayana, 2017. "E-Governance systems as socio-technical transitions using multi-level perspective with case studies," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 123(C), pages 80-94.
    10. Nilsson, Måns & Nykvist, Björn, 2016. "Governing the electric vehicle transition – Near term interventions to support a green energy economy," Applied Energy, Elsevier, vol. 179(C), pages 1360-1371.
    11. Jonathan Silver & Simon Marvin, 2017. "Powering sub-Saharan Africa’s urban revolution: An energy transitions approach," Urban Studies, Urban Studies Journal Limited, vol. 54(4), pages 847-861, March.
    12. Luis Felipe Cândido & Jose Carlos Lazaro & Adriano Olivier de Freitas e Silva & José de Paula Barros Neto, 2023. "Sustainability Transitions in the Construction Sector: A Bibliometric Review," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 15(17), pages 1-26, August.
    13. Suleiman, Lina, 2021. "Blue green infrastructure, from niche to mainstream: Challenges and opportunities for planning in Stockholm," Technological Forecasting and Social Change, Elsevier, vol. 166(C).
    14. Yekang Ko & Brendan F. D. Barrett & Andrea E. Copping & Ayyoob Sharifi & Masaru Yarime & Xin Wang, 2019. "Energy Transitions Towards Low Carbon Resilience: Evaluation of Disaster-Triggered Local and Regional Cases," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 11(23), pages 1-23, November.
    15. Markus Milne & Rob Gray, 2013. "W(h)ither Ecology? The Triple Bottom Line, the Global Reporting Initiative, and Corporate Sustainability Reporting," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 118(1), pages 13-29, November.
    16. Griet Juwet & Michael Ryckewaert, 2018. "Energy Transition in the Nebular City: Connecting Transition Thinking, Metabolism Studies, and Urban Design," Sustainability, MDPI, vol. 10(4), pages 1-20, March.
    17. Vandeventer, James Scott & Cattaneo, Claudio & Zografos, Christos, 2019. "A Degrowth Transition: Pathways for the Degrowth Niche to Replace the Capitalist-Growth Regime," Ecological Economics, Elsevier, vol. 156(C), pages 272-286.
    18. Berkeley, Nigel & Bailey, David & Jones, Andrew & Jarvis, David, 2017. "Assessing the transition towards Battery Electric Vehicles: A Multi-Level Perspective on drivers of, and barriers to, take up," Transportation Research Part A: Policy and Practice, Elsevier, vol. 106(C), pages 320-332.
    19. Lachman, Daniël A., 2013. "A survey and review of approaches to study transitions," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 58(C), pages 269-276.
    20. Goulet, Frédéric, 2021. "Characterizing alignments in socio-technical transitions. Lessons from agricultural bio-inputs in Brazil," Technology in Society, Elsevier, vol. 65(C).

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jsusta:v:7:y:2015:i:3:p:3269-3289:d:46973. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.