Social representations of governance for change towards sustainability

Social representations of governance for change towards sustainability: perspectives of sustainability advocates

Fischer, Anke (The James Hutton Institute)
Spekkink, W.A.H. (TU Delft Energie and Industrie)
Polzin, Christine (Helmholtz Centre for Environmental Research - UFZ)
Díaz-Ayude, Alberto (University of A Coruna)
Brizi, Ambra (Sapienza University of Rome)
Macsinga, Irina (West University of Timisoara (UVT))

2018

There is a substantial body of literature on public understandings of large-scale ‘environmental’ phenomena such as climate change and resource degradation. At the same time, political science and economics analyse the governance arrangements to deal with such issues. These realms of research rarely meet: there has been little research into people’s understandings of the governance of environmental change. This study adds a psychological perspective to governance research by investigating social representations of governance that promotes societal change towards sustainability, and related practices. It examines data from qualitative interviews with sustainability-interested people in seven European countries (n = 105). The analysis identified building blocks of representations suitable as an analytical framework for future research on governance representations. The diversity of their content reflected a range of pathways to societal change. Representations often seemed to have a creative function as a guiding vision for individuals’ own practices, but their wider transformative potential was constrained.

Community initiatives
environmental governance
grassroots
practices
social psychology
transition management

http://resolver.tudelft.nl/uuid:dfe04787-bb79-4fe1-9645-3959034b368c

https://doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2018.1448559

2018-09-12

0964-4016

Global Environmental Politics, 1-23

Institutional Repository

journal article

© 2018 Anke Fischer, W.A.H. Spekkink, Christine Polzin, Alberto Díaz-Ayude, Ambra Brizi, Irina Macsinga