This event will discuss transdisciplinary methods, global collaborations and the politics of transformative action for sustainability, drawing on experiences from around the University of Sussex campus. Through making meaningful connections between a variety of areas and projects, we aim to understand the strengths of Sussex work on transformative change and identify opportunities to build on them. This afternoon meeting presents the opportunity for Sussex and IDS colleagues and invited guests to discuss the following:

• The notion of ‘transformations’ (to sustainability) and the analytical contribution that different kinds of researchers can play in understanding them
• The potential political role that inter/transdisciplinary research can play in contributing to transformations and how this varies across different disciplines, cultures and contexts
• Challenges of international collaborative research of the kind practiced by the STEPS Centre and others on campus, and currently supported by the Global Challenges Research Fund.

Invited contributors from schools across campus will reflect on their own work and offer insights from different disciplinary and institutional perspectives.

STEPS colleagues will introduce the work that has been carried out under the Pathways Network in the context of the first year of the ESRC transition funding (2018), in which we have adopted ‘Transformations’ as the thematic focus of our work. Adrian Ely will report on the network’s research on transformations around food and agriculture, water and sanitation and energy and climate.

Confirmed speakers:

Andy Stirling (SPRU, STEPS Centre)
Adrian Ely (SPRU, STEPS Centre)
Melissa Leach (IDS)
Joseph Alcamo (Geography, Sussex Sustainability Research Programme)
Catherine Will (Sociology, Sussex Sustainability Research Programme, Sussex European Institute)
Rajith Lakshman (Health and Nutrition Cluster, IDS)

This event is part of the ESRC STEPS Centre’s programme for 2018, focusing on the theme of ‘Transformations’.

Faced with a series of social and environmental stresses and shocks, there are urgent calls for radical, systemic change. But, as past and present experience show, this can take many forms. What does it take to make sustainability transformations emancipatory (caring), rather than repressive (controlling)?

Find out more about our theme for 2018 on our Transformations theme page.