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A crucial task to accelerate global decarbonisation is to understand how to enable fast, equitable, low-carbon transformations in Coal and Carbon Intensive Regions (CCIRs). In this early literature review we underlined the relevance of the boundary concept of social-ecological tipping points (SETPs) and showed that the research and policy usage of SETPs applied to accelerate structural regional sustainability transformations faces three key challenges: (I) integrating theoretical and empirical contributions from diverse social and ecological sciences, together with complexity theory (II) designing open transdisciplinary assessment processes able to represent multiple qualities of systemic change and enable regionally situated transformative capacities, and (III) moving away from one-directional metaphors of social change, or static or homogeneous conceptions of individual agency and single equilibrium in energy transitions; and instead, focus on understanding the conditions and capacities for the emergence of systemic transformations and regenerative processes across multiple levels and forms of agency. We refer to these complex and place-situated processes as learning to enable regional transformative emergence., Organisation & Governance

Living within planetary limits requires attention to justice as biophysical boundaries are not inherently just. Through collaboration between natural and social scientists, the Earth Commission defines and operationalizes Earth system justice to ensure that boundaries reduce harm, increase well-being, and reflect substantive and procedural justice. Such stringent boundaries may also affect ‘just access’ to food, water, energy and infrastructure. We show how boundaries may need to be adjusted to reduce harm and increase access, and challenge inequality to ensure a safe and just future for people, other species and the planet. Earth system justice may enable living justly within boundaries.

Notions, such as leverage points, sensitive interventions, social tipping points, transformational tipping points, and positive tipping points, are increasingly attracting attention within sustainability science. However, they are also creating confusion and unresolved questions about how to apply these concepts when dealing with urgent global challenges such as rapid decarbonisation. We propose a relational methodology aimed at helping how to identify and support the emergence of positive ‘Social-Ecological Tipping Points’ (SETPs) that could bring about sustainability transformations. Our approach emphasises the need to pay attention to processes of social construction and to time dynamics. In particular, in a given social-ecological system, three key moments need to be considered: (1) The building of transformative conditions and capacities for systemic change, (2) A tipping event or intervention shifting the system towards a different trajectory or systems’ configuration, and (3) the structural effects derived from such transformation. Furthermore, we argue that the discovery and enactment of positive SETPs require considering multiple ontological, epistemological, and normative questions that affect how researchers and change agents define, approach, and assess their systems of reference. Our insights are derived from examining the implementation of household renewable energy systems at regional level in two rural areas of Indonesia and Bangladesh., Learning & Autonomous Control

Humanity has never lived in a world of global average temperature above two degrees of current levels. Moving towards such High-End Climate Change (HECC) futures presents fundamental challenges to current governance structures and involves the need to confront high uncertainties, non-linear dynamics and multiple irreversibilities in global social-ecological systems. In order to face HECC, imaginative practices able to support multiple ways of learning about and experiencing the future are necessary. In this article we analysed a set of arts-based activities conducted within the five-year EU-funded project IMPRESSIONS aimed at identifying transformative strategies to high-end climate change. The exploratory artistic activities were carried out alongside a science-led participatory integrated assessment process with stakeholders from the Iberian Peninsula. Our arts-based approach combined a range of performative, visual and reflexive practices with the ambition to reach out to more-than-rational but also practical elements of HECC futures. Our study suggests that the arts-based approach helped to bring out new ways of seeing, feeling and interpreting the world which may support the development of individual and collective sensibilities needed to address HECC.

Unidad de excelencia María de Maeztu MdM-2015-0552, The search for decisive actions to remain below 1.5 °C of global temperature rise will require profound cultural transformations. Yet our knowledge of how to promote and bring about such deep transformative changes in the minds and behaviours of individuals and societies is still limited. As climate change unravels and the planet becomes increasingly connected, societies will need to articulate a shared purpose that is both engaging and respectful of cultural diversity. Thus, there is a growing need to 'raise the temperature' of integration between multiple ways of knowing climate change. We have reviewed a range of literatures and synthesized them in order to draw out the perceived role of the arts in fostering climate transformations. Our analysis of climate-related art projects and initiatives shows increased engagement in recent years, particularly with the narrative, visual and performing arts. The arts are moving beyond raising awareness and entering the terrain of interdisciplinarity and knowledge co-creation. We conclude that climate-arts can contribute positively in fostering the imagination and emotional predisposition for the development and implementation of the transformations necessary to address the 1.5 °C challenge.

Bibliografia., Los problemas ambientales y de sostenibilidad son cada vez más globalizados en términos de intensidad, interconectividad, variedad y alcance de sus impactos, así como las fuerzas socioeconómicas que los generan. El cambio climático, la escasez de agua, la contaminación, la pérdida de biodiversidad o el cambio en el uso de la tierra son problemas ambientales que no necesariamente encajan con la soberanía nacional, las jurisdicciones administrativas o las fronteras territoriales. Para afrontar estos desafíos, han surgido nuevos ámbitos políticos y circunscripciones que ya no corresponden a las divisiones que una vez fueron útiles para los objetivos particulares de los antiguos Estados-nación, sino que ahora se crean con otros nuevos objetivos de cooperación (incluyendo el medio ambiente y la sostenibilidad) que trascienden las fronteras internacionales. Las regiones transfronterizas o transfronterizas, comúnmente conocidas en el contexto europeo como Euroregiones o Euregios, han sido creadas a través de las fronteras estatales para disminuir el efecto limitador de las fronteras nacionales que a menudo actúan como barreras para la cooperación en un intento de redefinir la territorialidad estatal inducida por la frontera. Estos diseños institucionales pueden proporcionar en este contexto el marco o las plataformas políticas e institucionales adecuadas para promover los vínculos necesarios entre las diferentes redes de actores y dominios políticos en un territorio fronterizo concreto. Esto se da es especialmente en aquellas Euroregiones que coinciden con los límites geográficos de los recursos naturales existentes. Esta tesis tiene la intención de explorar dos cuestiones generales entrelazadas. Por una parte, analizar en qué medida las iniciativas de la política de cooperación transfronteriza de la UE han sido y son capaces de establecer asociaciones de colaboración eficaces entre organismos públicos locales adyacentes sujetos a diferentes sistemas jurídicos nacionales e, Environmental and sustainability related problems are increasingly becoming globalized in terms of their intensity, interconnectivity, variety and scope of their impacts as well as the ultimate socioeconomic forces that generate them. Climate change, water scarcity, pollution, loss of biodiversity, or land use change all of these are environmental problems that do not necessarily fit with national sovereignty, administrative jurisdictions or territorial boundaries. To address such challenges, new political arenas and constituencies have appeared that no longer correspond to the divisions that once were useful to the particular goals of the old nation-states, but are now created upon other new cooperation goals (including environment and sustainability) that transcend international borders. Cross-border or transborder regions, commonly known in the European context as Euroregions or Euregios, have been created across state borders in order to decrease the limiting effect of nation-state borders which often act as as barriers for cooperation in an attempt to redefine fixed, border-induced state territoriality. These institutional arrangements may provide in this context the adequate political and institutional framework or platforms to promote the necessary linkages among different networks of actors and policy domains in a particular cross border territory. This is specially the case of those Euroregions that fall and match within the geographical limits of the existing natural resources. This thesis intends to explore two intertwined overarching questions. On the one hand, we intend to look to what extent EU cross-border cooperation policy initiatives have been and are able to establish effective collaborative partnerships between adjacent local public bodies subject to different national legal systems in the domains of climate, biodiversity and regional development in ways that contribute to sustainability And on the other, we want to explore to what extent sustain

Frente a las limitaciones de la ciencia convencional para abordar la complejidad y los retos del cambio socio-ambiental global, la ciencia de la sostenibilidad emerge como un enfoque científico estratégico. Desde este enfoque, se enfatiza la necesidad de conectar múltiples fuentes de conocimiento con la correspondiente acción en contextos específicos, para facilitar interacciones y transiciones hacia la sostenibilidad. Por su potencial transformador y de aprendizaje, la ciencia de la sostenibilidad ofrece oportunidades metodológicas para la generación de conocimiento práctico, la incorporación de múltiples perspectivas, también desde fuera de la academia, y la integración de distintos valores e intereses políticos. En este contexto, la presente tesis doctoral aporta una recopilación de tres artículos científicos que tratan el desarrollo de nuevas metodologías participativas que integran el arte, y más específicamente, el teatro participativo, para generar espacios abiertos de diálogo y aprendizaje en contextos específicos de acción relacionados con la sostenibilidad. El arte ha sido ampliamente reconocido por su capacidad de transformar la consciencia humana a través del refinamiento de los sentidos, la expansión de la imaginación colectiva y el establecimiento de conexiones significativas y emocionales entre las personas y su entorno. En el actual contexto de necesidad de herramientas y metodologías integradoras que aborden la complejidad del socio-ecosistema, el arte aporta un medio de exploración minucioso, capaz de combinar múltiples lenguajes y de conectarnos con nuestro pensamiento intuitivo y con formas de conocimiento emocional y vivencial. Teniendo estas premisas en cuenta, el primer artículo revisa y evalúa el potencial de métodos innovadores de aprendizaje para la sostenibilidad que integran el teatro participativo. La revisión incluye diversas experiencias en el mundo académico y en el campo de la sostenibilidad e introduce la noción de métodos performat, In face of the challenges posed by global socio-environmental change, participatory sustainability science emerges as a strategic scientific approach linking multiple sources of knowledge with action in specific contexts to foster transitions towards sustainability. Its transformative and learning potential provides methodological opportunities for the generation of actionable knowledge, the incorporation of multiple perspectives, also from outside academia, and the integration of different values and political interests. Within this context, this doctoral dissertation presents a compilation of three research articles that address the development of novel participatory methods integrating the Arts, and more specifically, participatory theatre, to facilitate engaging, open and creative learning spaces in specific contexts of sustainability action. The Arts are well-known for their potential to transform people's consciousness by refining the senses, expanding collective imagination and establishing meaningful and emotional connections between people and their environment. Faced with the necessity of integrative tools and methods to deal with social-ecological systems' complexity, the Arts can provide insightful explorative means and combine different system's languages, connecting us to intuitive thinking and emotional and experiential insight. With these assumptions in mind, the first article reviews and assesses the potential of innovative theatre-based participatory tools and methods aimed at supporting sustainability learning and agent transformations. Such review includes experiences applying theatre-based methodologies in the academic and sustainability fields and introduces the notion of performative methods as an integrative research and learning approach. Five potential functions of performative methods were identified and a general framework provided to assess to what extent these new approaches can be of relevance in participatory sustainability science an