A new book published by Routledge discusses these transformations and what it will take to realise them.
The Politics of Green Transformations,
edited by Ian Scoones, Melissa Leach and Peter Newell, examines what
social and political alliances are required to undertake these green
transformations.
Recalling past
transformations, this book examines what makes the current challenge
different, and especially urgent. It examines how green transformations
must take place in the context of the particular moments of capitalist
development, and in relation to particular alliances. The role of the
state is emphasised, both in terms of the type of incentives required to
make green transformations politically feasible and in the way states
must take a developmental role in financing innovation and technology
for green transformations.
The book also
highlights the role of citizens as innovators, entrepreneurs, green
consumers and members of social movements. Green transformations must be
both ‘top-down’, involving elite alliances between states and business
as well as ‘bottom up’, pushed by grassroots innovators and
entrepreneurs, and part of wider mobilisations among civil society. The
chapters in the book draw on international examples to emphasise how
these contexts matter in shaping pathways to sustainability.
Professor Peter
Newell, University of Sussex said: “It is now received wisdom in most
quarters that we need to transform the global economy along more
sustainable lines. But who decides what is to be transformed and how,
and who will benefit from this? Questions of transformation are about
politics, power and coalitions as much as technology, markets and
innovation alone. This book shows how and why these matter and what’s at
stake in the politics of green transformations.”
The Politics of Green Transformations is part of the Pathways to Sustainability Series,
which is based on the work of the Social, Technological and
Environmental Pathways to Sustainability (STEPS) Centre, a major
investment of the UK Economic and Social Research Council (ESRC). The
STEPS Centre brings together researchers at the Institute of Development
Studies (IDS) and SPRU (Science and Technology Policy Research) at the
University of Sussex with a set of partner institutions in Africa, Asia
and Latin America.
For more information on The Politics of Green Transformations, please visit us at: http://www.routledge.com/u/
To request a review copy, or to schedule an interview with the authors, please contact Katy Kasle, Marketing Manager.
