After decades of incremental progress, it is now clear that achieving a sustainable relationship between people and planet will require a transformative response. Transformations towards sustainability involve profound, systemic changes that reach across social, cultural, political, economic and technological domains.
Navigating and facilitating transformations towards sustainability requires a systemic approach and a deep understanding of how change happens. Working with transformation often means developing our personal capacity to work with complexity, uncertainty and plurality.
At ISF, we focus on five key dimensions of sustainability transformations:
- Transformative learning experiences, to build individual and group capacity to work towards sustainability transformations
- Monitoring and evaluation of sustainability projects and programs including international development projects
- Supporting the emergence of new economic and finance systems to deliver human wellbeing
- Developing and researching participatory governance, deliberative democracy and community engagement approaches that involve people in the transformative decisions that affect them
- Futures thinking and strategic planning.
The goal of our work on sustainability transformations is to find ways for humanity to live within planetary boundaries while delivering social justice for all.
Our approach to sustainability transformations
Working on sustainability transformations means having the big picture in mind. Our projects in this space vary in scale, but they are designed to contribute towards change at sectoral scales.
Each project is unique, but we typically draw on some of the following approaches:
- Situation analysis to identify what is known about a sector or challenge and what needs to transform
- Stakeholder and community engagement and social research to understand the perspectives of those affected by a potential transformation
- Futures thinking to explore possible, probably and preferable futures
- Applying social theories, such as transition theory, social practice theory and narrative theory, to diagnose the current situation and generate options for change
- Capacity building to support those who will need to deliver transformative change
- Action research to learn by doing.
What does this mean for you?
For our clients, this means working closely with you to understand the transformations that you are seeking or experiencing, and how those connect to the bigger picture. When you partner with us, we’ll work with you to achieve your desired project outcomes, but we will also push you to ensure your project achieves its full potential for positive transformation.
Leaders in theory and practice
ISF is recognised as a leader in the theory and practice of sustainability transformations. ISF’s Professor of Sustainability Transformations, Chris Riedy, is an Advisor to the international Transformations Community and leads a working group on transforming narratives as part of the SDG Transformations Forum. He also works with the New Economy Network Australia on transforming economic systems.
Research news and projects
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PROJECT | 2019
Sustainable Sydney 2050 megatrends and scenarios
To help the City of Sydney incorporate realistic pathways to sustainability in their vision for 2050, ISF researchers modelled four possible futures.
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Leading Deliberative Democracy short courseA new educational offering helps decision-makers learn how to be a driving force for positive democratic change.
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Distributed energy resources customer insightsGathering crucial information about consumers' perceptions, habits and needs will inform the way forward for distributed energy resources.
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Co-housing for seniorsAs Australia's housing market continues to rise, co-housing offers older people a solution to insecurity while allowing them a mixture of independence and communal living.
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Let's collaborate
Whether you have a problem that needs support or an idea for change, our innovative and solutions-focused approach can help you achieve your goals.
Contact Chris Riedy on Christopher.Riedy@uts.edu.au or + 61 2 9514 4962 for more information.
Planning to undertake graduate research?
ISF has an award-winning graduate research program for Masters and Doctoral students.
Discover the ‘big picture’ research questions for Sustainability transformations
