3rd International Conference on Sustainability Transitions

Sustainable Transitions: Navigating Theories and Challenging Realities

August 29-31, 2012, Technical University of Denmark, Copenhagen, Denmark

Mail to organizers info@ist2012.dk

The need for societal sustainability strategies is globally recognized and reflected in the coming Rio+20 Earth Summit. In the wake of the current international economic crisis such strategies are increasingly framed in a âgreen growthâ discourse, where economic and ecological problems are addressed through the promotion of clean technologies and âsmartâ solutions: Smart cities, smart grids and smart growth. While such efficiency strategies may provide for changes in specific sectors and cross-sector practices, they are not likely to facilitate the type of pervasive transformative changes at the system level needed to deal with the entrenched character of the current climate and resource utilisation challenges.

Previous STRN conferences in Amsterdam and Lund have explored the plurality of issues related to such transition processes. Various approaches have been developed to describe the path-dependency of socio-technical systemsâ developments and to explore and engage in transitionâs challenges.

This third IST conference hosted by the âSusTransâ research alliance in Denmark welcomes further explorative studies. Furthermore, it also aims to engage in the core research program of the community through deepening the analysis of how opportunities for transformative change of systems reconfigurations may be recognized and exploited. This includes strategies for changing or dismantling existing systems as well as nurturing diversity in solution frames.

The organizers encourage both contemporary and historic studies aiming to understand how societies have organised their socio-material interactions and how transitions evolve.

The ambition of IST 2012 is to offer a space for the exchange of experiences with a broad range of empirical investigations and interventions in the field of transition studies. These include studies of the contributions from firms, industries, organisations, social practices, consumption, civil society and social movements. It should also include studies of the territorial and spatial distribution of transition processes and the implications of transitions in the context of developing countries.

Important dates

Abstract submission:

31 January 2012

Notification of review:

28 February 2012

Full paper submission:

1 July 2012

Abstracts must be submitted to this conference site which will open for submissions from 12 January 2012.

Website: http://www.ist2012.dk/index.php/IST/IST2012