Sustainability Transitions in South Africa

Sustainability Transitions in South Africa PDF Author: Najma Mohamed
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351749625
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 222

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Book Description
South Africa’s transition to a greener economy features prominently in the long-term development vision of the country, and is an integral part of the country’s national climate change response strategy. Despite significant gains in socio-economic development since its transition to democracy, the country continues to face the triple challenges of rising unemployment, income inequality and poverty – amid a slowdown in economic growth. Sustainability transitions offer new ways of shifting the trajectory of South Africa’s resource-intensive economy towards low-carbon pathways linked to the country’s transformative development agenda. Calls for inclusive approaches to greening the South African economy, which addresses the most vulnerable in society and ensures that the benefits of sustainability innovations reach all South Africans, are becoming more pronounced as sustainable development policy reforms are being implemented. The question that should be placed centre stage in South Africa’s sustainability discourse is whether notions of justice and inclusivity are being sufficiently addressed in the design and implementation of policy and programme interventions. This book explores South Africa’s sustainability transition through reflections on critical policy, economic, technological, social and environmental drivers. It provides a synthesis of theoretical insights, including new models and concepts, and praxis through illustrations from South Africa’s growing landscape of sustainable development policies and programmes. Finally, it assesses whether these transition pathways are beginning to reconfigure the system-level structures hindering the country’s goal of ‘ensuring environmental sustainability and an equitable transition to a low-carbon economy’.

Sustainability Transitions in South Africa

Sustainability Transitions in South Africa PDF Author: Najma Mohamed
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351749625
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 222

Get Book

Book Description
South Africa’s transition to a greener economy features prominently in the long-term development vision of the country, and is an integral part of the country’s national climate change response strategy. Despite significant gains in socio-economic development since its transition to democracy, the country continues to face the triple challenges of rising unemployment, income inequality and poverty – amid a slowdown in economic growth. Sustainability transitions offer new ways of shifting the trajectory of South Africa’s resource-intensive economy towards low-carbon pathways linked to the country’s transformative development agenda. Calls for inclusive approaches to greening the South African economy, which addresses the most vulnerable in society and ensures that the benefits of sustainability innovations reach all South Africans, are becoming more pronounced as sustainable development policy reforms are being implemented. The question that should be placed centre stage in South Africa’s sustainability discourse is whether notions of justice and inclusivity are being sufficiently addressed in the design and implementation of policy and programme interventions. This book explores South Africa’s sustainability transition through reflections on critical policy, economic, technological, social and environmental drivers. It provides a synthesis of theoretical insights, including new models and concepts, and praxis through illustrations from South Africa’s growing landscape of sustainable development policies and programmes. Finally, it assesses whether these transition pathways are beginning to reconfigure the system-level structures hindering the country’s goal of ‘ensuring environmental sustainability and an equitable transition to a low-carbon economy’.

South Africa’s Energy Transition

South Africa’s Energy Transition PDF Author: Andrew Lawrence
Publisher: Springer Nature
ISBN: 3030189031
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 177

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Book Description
This book provides a succinct overview of the evolution of policies addressing energy and climate justice in South Africa. Drawing on a range of analytical perspectives, including socio-technical studies, just transitions, and critical political economy, it explains why South Africa’s energy transition from a coal-dependent, centralised power generation and distribution system has been so slow, and reveals the types of socio-political inequalities that persist across regimes and energy sources. Topics explored include critical approaches to the South African state and its state-owned energy provider, Eskom; the political ecologies of coal and water; the politics of non-renewable energy alternatives; as well as the trajectory and fate of the Renewable Energy Independent Power Producers Procurement Programme (REIPPPP), the country’s major renewable energy policy. The book concludes with reflections on alternative, neglected energy and development paths, suggesting how the political economy of South Africa’s energy system could be further transformed for the better.

Green Skills Research in South Africa

Green Skills Research in South Africa PDF Author: Eureta Rosenberg
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000764591
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 337

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Book Description
This book proposes transformative, realist methodology for skills research and planning through an analysis of case studies of the changing world of work, new learning pathways and educational system challenges. Studies of the green economy and sustainability transitions are a growing field internationally, however there are few books that link this interest to the development of skills. This book draws on, and showcases, the experience and insights of researcher-practitioners who are at the cutting edge in this emerging field, internationally and in South Africa. The context for this book is South Africa, but application is worldwide. In many ways indicative of the global picture, South Africa is in the grip of economic and environmental imperatives, searching for safe and just transitions. The authors present a new, embedded transitioning systems model for studying skills for a sustainable, just future. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of sustainable development, ecological economics and skills planning.

The Age of Sustainability

The Age of Sustainability PDF Author: Mark Swilling
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 042960372X
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 331

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Book Description
With transitions to more sustainable ways of living already underway, this book examines how we understand the underlying dynamics of the transitions that are unfolding. Without this understanding, we enter the future in a state of informed bewilderment. Every day we are bombarded by reports about ecosystem breakdown, social conflict, economic stagnation and a crisis of identity. There is mounting evidence that deeper transitions are underway that suggest we may be entering another period of great transformation equal in significance to the agricultural revolution some 13,000 years ago or the Industrial Revolution 250 years ago. This book helps readers make sense of our global crisis and the dynamics of transition that could result in a shift from the industrial epoch that we live in now to a more sustainable and equitable age. The global renewable energy transition that is already underway holds the key to the wider just transition. However, the evolutionary potential of the present also manifests in the mushrooming of ecocultures, new urban visions, sustainability-oriented developmental states and new ways of learning and researching. Shedding light on the highly complex challenge of a sustainable and just transition, this book is essential reading for anyone concerned with establishing a more sustainable and equitable world. Ultimately, this is a book about hope but without easy answers.

Urban Sustainability Transitions

Urban Sustainability Transitions PDF Author: Niki Frantzeskaki
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 1351855964
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 403

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Book Description
Balanced Perspectives on Different Urban Ecosystems

The Governance of Transitions - The Transitions of Governance

The Governance of Transitions - The Transitions of Governance PDF Author: Martijn van der Steen
Publisher: AFRICAN SUN MeDIA
ISBN: 1928480047
Category :
Languages : en
Pages : 283

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Book Description
Why is societal transition not simply a matter of change management or normal policy design? South Africa is living proof of the ability of a society to reinvent and reinstall itself. With the advent of new societal challenges, came the need for real societal innovation, especially in sectors where it was never deemed necessary or possible before. This book asks: What type of governance is helpful for developing new societal institutions and systems that can overcome systemic crises in emerging economies and fragile communities? What emerges is a compilation of chapters that introduce different parts of a solution which can be used in developing both a growing body of practices of ?governed? societal transitions and the associated transition of governance. The Governance of Transitions ? The Transitions of Governance, in part, aims to provide building blocks which government and society could use to develop strategies for creating sustainable outcomes. It considers what kind of leadership, organisation or methods for accountability enable new types of governance and what the most important barriers are.

Handbook on Sustainability Transition and Sustainable Peace

Handbook on Sustainability Transition and Sustainable Peace PDF Author: Hans Günter Brauch
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319438840
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 1014

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Book Description
In this book 60 authors from many disciplines and from 18 countries on five continents examine in ten parts: Moving towards Sustainability Transition; Aiming at Sustainable Peace; Meeting Challenges of the 21st Century: Demographic Imbalances, Temperature Rise and the Climate–Conflict Nexus; Initiating Research on Global Environmental Change, Limits to Growth, Decoupling of Growth and Resource Needs; Developing Theoretical Approaches on Sustainability and Transitions; Analysing National Debates on Sustainability in North America; Preparing Transitions towards a Sustainable Economy and Society, Production and Consumption and Urbanization; Examining Sustainability Transitions in the Water, Food and Health Sectors from Latin American and European Perspectives; Preparing Sustainability Transitions in the Energy Sector; and Relying on Transnational, International, Regional and National Governance for Strategies and Policies Towards Sustainability Transition. This book is based on workshops held in Mexico (2012) and in the US (2013), on a winter school at Chulalongkorn University, Thailand (2013), and on commissioned chapters. The workshop in Mexico and the publication were supported by two grants by the German Foundation for Peace Research (DSF). All texts in this book were peer-reviewed by scholars from all parts of the world.

The Political Economy of Clean Energy Transitions

The Political Economy of Clean Energy Transitions PDF Author: Douglas Jay Arent
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0198802242
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 631

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Book Description
A volume on the political economy of clean energy transition in developed and developing regions, with a focus on the issues that different countries face as they transition from fossil fuels to lower carbon technologies.

The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods for Social-Ecological Systems

The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods for Social-Ecological Systems PDF Author: Reinette Biggs
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1000401510
Category : Nature
Languages : en
Pages : 526

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Book Description
The Routledge Handbook of Research Methods for Social-Ecological Systems provides a synthetic guide to the range of methods that can be employed in social-ecological systems (SES) research. The book is primarily targeted at graduate students, lecturers and researchers working on SES, and has been written in a style that is accessible to readers entering the field from a variety of different disciplinary backgrounds. Each chapter discusses the types of SES questions to which the particular methods are suited and the potential resources and skills required for their implementation, and provides practical examples of the application of the methods. In addition, the book contains a conceptual and practical introduction to SES research, a discussion of key gaps and frontiers in SES research methods, and a glossary of key terms in SES research. Contributions from 97 different authors, situated at SES research hubs in 16 countries around the world, including South Africa, Sweden, Germany and Australia, bring a wealth of expertise and experience to this book. The first book to provide a guide and introduction specifically focused on methods for studying SES, this book will be of great interest to students and scholars of sustainability science, environmental management, global environmental change studies and environmental governance. The book will also be of interest to upper-level undergraduates and professionals working at the science–policy interface in the environmental arena.

South Africa’s Energy Transition

South Africa’s Energy Transition PDF Author: Tobias Bischof-Niemz
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 0429872232
Category : Business & Economics
Languages : en
Pages : 162

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Book Description
South Africa’s energy transition has become a highly topical, emotive and politically contentious topic. Taking a systems perspective, this book offers an evidence-based roadmap for such a transition and debunks many of the myths raised about the risks of a renewable-energy-led electricity mix. Owing to its formidable solar and wind resources, South Africa has an almost unparalleled opportunity to turn solar photovoltaic and onshore wind generators into the country’s power generation workhorses – a role hitherto played by coal. This book shows that a renewables-led mix will not only provide the lowest cost, but will also create more jobs than any of the alternatives currently under consideration. In addition, it offers a glimpse of how South Africa’s low-cost and decarbonised electricity system can power a competitive industrial economy, an electric-mobility revolution and, in the long run, create new export opportunities. This book will be of great interest to energy industry practitioners, as well as students and scholars of energy policy and politics, environmental economics and sustainable development.