Considering the Human-Dimension to Make Sustainable Transitions Actionable

María Elena López Reyes, Willem A. Zwagers and Ingrid J. Mulder
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María Elena López Reyes: Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering, Delft University of Technology, 2628 CE Delft, The Netherlands
Willem A. Zwagers: Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering, Delft University of Technology, 2628 CE Delft, The Netherlands
Ingrid J. Mulder: Faculty of Industrial Design Engineering, Delft University of Technology, 2628 CE Delft, The Netherlands

Sustainability, 2020, vol. 12, issue 21, 1-25

Abstract: Sustainable innovation and transitions are increasingly gaining traction within academia, industries, and policymakers. Despite the research efforts, sustaining innovation and operationalizing transitions still remains a barely explored field. The pragmatic step from understanding towards doing is often not made explicit in the literature. In fact, it results in an unclear and vague grip on how to operationalize these understandings, or differently put on how to make this understanding pragmatic. In the current article, we conducted an integrative literature review using human-centeredness lenses that informs the so-called ‘Human-Dimension’ framework. We argue that adding the Human-Dimension to the existing models for analysis, such as the Multi-Level Perspective framework, might clarify the different meanings that emerge within the network of actors in a transition, and knowing how to translate those individual meanings towards a collective construction of meaning might be enabled. To illustrate the framework’s contribution, we applied it to the context of a local sustainable development project. The results show how human-centeredness could serve as a domain to make the Human-Dimension of sustainable transitions actionable.

Keywords: human-centeredness; human-dimension; multi-level perspective; actionable; sustainable innovation; sustainable transitions (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: O13 Q Q0 Q2 Q3 Q5 Q56 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (3)

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