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Transforming Innovation for Sustainability

Melissa Leach, STEPS Centre, University of Sussex
Johan Rockström, Stockholm Resilience Centre
Paul Raskin, Tellus Institute, Boston
Ian Scoones, STEPS Centre, University of Sussex
Andy C Stirling, STEPS Centre, University of Sussex
Adrian Smith, STEPS Centre, University of Sussex
John Thompson
Erik Millstone
Adrian Ely
Elisa Arond
Carl Folke
Per Olsson

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.5751/ES-04933-170211

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Abstract

The urgency of charting pathways to sustainability that keep human societies within a "safe operating space" has now been clarified. Crises in climate, food, biodiversity, and energy are already playing out across local and global scales and are set to increase as we approach critical thresholds. Drawing together recent work from the Stockholm Resilience Centre, the Tellus Institute, and the STEPS Centre, this commentary article argues that ambitious Sustainable Development Goals are now required along with major transformation, not only in policies and technologies, but in modes of innovation themselves, to meet them. As examples of dryland agriculture in East Africa and rural energy in Latin America illustrate, such "transformative innovation" needs to give far greater recognition and power to grassroots innovation actors and processes, involving them within an inclusive, multi-scale innovation politics. The three dimensions of direction, diversity, and distribution along with new forms of "sustainability brokering" can help guide the kinds of analysis and decision making now needed to safeguard our planet for current and future generations.

Key words

development goals, grassroots, planetary boundaries, sustainable innovation, sustainability

Ecology and Society. ISSN: 1708-3087