This is a personal reflection from Lyla Mehta on the Transformations to Sustainability mid-term workshop, which took place virtually in June 2020. Find out more about the meeting and see all related content here. 

The world has changed dramatically since the Transformations to Sustainability projects started in late 2018. For one, we are witnessing a massive loss of lives and livelihoods due to the COVID-19 pandemic combined with ongoing climate-, water- and food-related uncertainties and crises. Two, the emergence of authoritarian leaders and far right politics in both the global North and South is promoting vigilante nationalism, violent acts against minorities and suppressing protest and dissent, including during the pandemic. Three, neo-liberal capitalist trajectories continue unabated, intensifying inequalities. These developments may on one hand curtail the possibilities for radical societal transformation, but on the other, can also be a pre-condition for something transformed and transformative to emerge. All these factors make transformative research and action difficult, both politically and practically, raising thorny issues concerning the ethics of co-production, and the imbalanced power, gender and social relations at play in multi-stakeholder research processes, especially with respect to our research partners.

The mid-term meeting of the projects gave us an opportunity to ask how we as a programme are doing in terms of generating new knowledge that is transformative, both in terms of challenging dominant political and economic paradigms affecting transformations to sustainability as well as in terms of its emancipatory potential to bring about structural change. It also offered a possibility to reflect on how to deal with the new challenges and ongoing crises that affect our work and ability to do research.

Much of our discussions focussed on the multi-faceted and various conceptualizations of transformation and how these are mediated on the ground. The keynote talk by Giuseppe Feola proposed a theorization of transformation that disentangles processes of construction (making) and deconstruction (unmaking), using the concrete case of an ongoing sustainability transformation driven by a peasant movement in Colombia. While he focussed on the ‘unmaking’ of capitalism, clearly there is also a need to ‘unmake’ notions of transformation in a range of contexts, including communitarianism, participatory development processes, etc.

Through the project presentations it became clear that all the projects are grappling with the politics of transformation and what it entails, both conceptually and practically. The projects highlight that both sustainability and transformation are diverse and heterogenous concepts, moulded by cultural, social, gender and power relations. While most projects take a normative view of transformation, seeking to advance social justice and sustainability outcomes, especially for vulnerable and marginalized social groups, a few take a different approach, focussing on immanent processes of change as they are unfolding, e.g. around urbanization or commercialization processes, and are not explicit about the ‘deliberate’ and normative content of transformation. This flags the need to distinguish between ‘change’ and ‘transformation’ and to articulate clearly what we mean when we talk about transformation.

Doing transformative research is political, and research needs to be mindful of contradictions on the ground. A longue durée historical perspective can help in observing making and unmaking over time. It also means looking at the dynamics of agency and structure and asking hard questions about how much deliberate transformation is possible in our sites or ‘patches’ (as conceptualized in the Tapestry project), given the contradictions arising due to authoritarian and right-wing government, neo-liberal trajectories and COVID-19. Even well-intentioned and deliberate ideas of transformation can legitimize vested and powerful interests and do not necessarily entail empowerment or address inequalities. In addition, there are risks to doing transformative research. These include being blind to the messy and fraught nature of the process as well as to its inherently political nature (e.g. shifts in power relations during transformative processes; and being attentive to who has agency, who not; who wins and loses; who decides the trajectory?); as well as the dangers of complacency, co-optation and lack of attention to gender and social differences, power and politics.

Another recurring theme across the projects was the need to make visible what is often invisible to powerful actors. That could be: people, such as herders and indigenous peoples who tend to be marginalized and neglected by the mainstream; rights to land, water and rivers that are embedded in informal property regimes and largely invisible to planners; or local / community driven perspectives and knowledge systems (e.g. around mangroves, flooding and tenure) that do not feature in scientific assessments and policy documents. In making the invisible visible, projects grapple with the role of agency, power, politics and also epistemic justice. This means looking at how dominant ideas or imaginaries travel and who is promoting them. Linked to this is the investigation of unravelling and lifting up of alternative pathways. For example, what alternative pathways for conservation, water management or mining are being missed in dominant assessments and policy processes? How do we lift up bottom-up, locally, culturally rooted perspectives, and how do we succeed in decolonizing dominant perspectives and imaginaries around flood control, agricultural production, tenure relations, or dryland management, to name a few?

While many projects focus on inclusiveness and participation, both in the research and wider planning and policy processes, participation needs to go beyond just being a ‘stakeholder’ or being invited to the table. It also means having one’s hitherto invisible perspectives count and shape dominant framings and narratives. In many cases, for example, in the realms of urbanization, pastoralism and agriculture, we noted how invisible power has led to the internalization of dominant norms and standards as well as the all-embracing nature of capitalist trajectories around consumption and growth. Many of the groups we are working with may not perceive the injustices that they are subjected to, and many, especially the younger generation, may reject livelihoods that researchers are promoting as sustainable (e.g. pastoralism in a dryland) and may have other aspirations towards consumption/growth and urban lifestyles.

Most of the projects reveal that local wellbeing and identities are linked to rights, resources, place attachments and territories, but it’s important to pay attention to how these are in flux due to intergenerational differences and differences related to gender/caste/class. Local solidarities and civic action allow for transformation from below but, in most cases, we are all grappling with distinguishing between incremental and long-term changes, and ensuring that changes in particular places and localities can then endure and go to scale. Further, what could seem to be a small incremental change could be a step towards long-term shifts and transformations, underscoring the need for an historical perspective.

While at a programme level, we are seeking to come up with heuristics around transformation, as social scientists we need to avoid being hubristic about what is possible or not. Hubristic research has served to control and colonize. Transformation may be like a kaleidoscope with multiple facets that are contested and in flux. We need to exercise humility in our perspectives. Thus, there are multiple trade-offs linked with ethics, methods and policies.

In sum, social science perspectives on transformation are perhaps less ‘grand’ than in the earth system or natural sciences. It is normative and concerned with deliberate change. We may deliberately seek to be more modest in terms of what is possible, and while we may want a universal framework, social science tells us to avoid trusting too much to the capacity of science and technology to provide universal solutions. Instead, it means being aware of the complexity and pitfalls of research for transformation.

Finally, can doing research in the midst of a pandemic be seen as an opportunity for transformation? The pandemic has laid bare problems of inequalities, from local to global level, unequal access to public goods such as health, water and sanitation, and the unsustainable nature of human-nature relations. The pandemic has also intersected with ongoing crises of food, water and climate, thus threatening already fragile livelihoods, especially in marginal environments, compounding uncertainties and vulnerabilities for marginalized people. COVID-19 has highlighted the key but invisible, neglected role played by informal workers and informal economies in propping up capitalist systems. In most countries, the responses from above have been inadequate, too late, or complete failures. In some cases, authoritarian leaders have used the pandemic to ‘other’ and victimize certain groups and polarize society along racial, ethnic and religious lines. While responses from ‘above’ have been inadequate, in many cases – even in our research sites – there has been a burst of local forms of mutual aid and solidarity as well as civic action. There are also many examples of resilience at the local level, especially amongst communities that have largely relied on subsistence production. Large-scale protests from all walks of life have also challenged racial inequality and injustices (e.g. the Black Lives Matter protests in the USA and around Europe). These have called for a fairer and more just future. COVID-19 has also highlighted the need for investment in public goods such as public health systems, water and sanitation. Behaviour change concerning mobility, travel and consumption, which can drastically address climate change, took place almost overnight in response to COVID-19. Lockdown isolation and webinars connecting people from all around the world have allowed many to reflect on the possibilities for reimagining transformative pathways towards just and sustainable futures. Historical studies of epidemics have shown how they can lead to protest and also new visions about political and societal organization. The post-COVID recovery period should thus build on these reflections, trends and lessons and hopefully bring about the systemic shifts badly needed to address locally appropriate and socially just transformations to sustainability.

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Photo by drmakete lab on Unsplash.

A recent paper by members of the T2S AGENTS project argues that the COVID-19 crisis is a symptom of deep-rooted challenges resulting from contemporary production and consumption structures, social inequalities, degradation of nature, and global connectivity. In the Brazilian Amazon, these challenges have been thrown into sharp focus by the pandemic.

Brazil has been hit hard by the COVID-19 pandemic, with the second-highest number of cases in the world as of August 2020. Tragically, the official death toll now stands at over 111,000, but infection rates have not yet reached a peak and the virus appears to still be spreading across the country.

In the Brazilian Amazon, one of the poorest and politically marginalized regions of Brazil, halting the spread of the pandemic has exposed the numerous challenges facing its inhabitants, including threats stemming from pursual of an aggressive development model based around exploitation of the region’s land and commodities.

The Amazon region currently accounts for around 15% of all COVID-19 cases in the country (STATISTA, 9 August 2020), principally in the large Northern states of Amazonas and Pará. Most of the inhabitants of the Amazon live in urban areas, many of which are quite densely populated. Precarious livelihoods are common, meaning that changing patterns of working and travelling to limit the spread of the virus and accommodate physical distancing may not be a realistic prospect for people worried about falling into poverty. Although public transportation between cities and rural areas has been halted during the peak of the pandemic, locals report that private, irregular forms of transport, such as passenger boats, are still running, and infections seem to be progressively spreading to more rural areas, where limited health services are already struggling to cope.

In some areas, poverty and a lack of social services are exacerbated by conflict and violence, which has increased in recent years, fuelled by the current government’s dismantling of environmental regulation, and a ‘climate of impunity’ for developers involved in illegal deforestation, mining and land-grabbing.

Seen in this context, the pandemic is not a stand-alone disaster, but rather a new challenge to add to a list of existing threats and structural problems, and one which interacts with underlying conditions such as inequality, insecurity and poverty that have been building up for decades to become a crisis. The phrase ‘We won’t go back to normal, because normal was the problem’ is a powerful call for change.

The virus also poses a particular risk for Indigenous populations, who are described as being extremely vulnerable in a recent paper by researchers from the T2S AGENTS project:

“Their [Indigenous peoples] realities vary from large to extremely small groups, some with intense interaction with urban areas, others in relative isolation. Death rate among this group is twice higher than the national average of 6.4%. As of 23 May, 1,140 indigenous from 61 ethnic groups were infected and 131 have died, mostly in the Amazon (APIB, 2020). These figures contrast with official reports which do not account for the approximately 35% of the Indigenous population that live in urban areas. Cases in Indigenous Territories, however, are particularly worrisome because of a combination of low immunity and their social life based on collective practices. As the history of indigenous genocide associated with infectious diseases reminds us, eventual cases of COVID-19 infection in indigenous territories could mean the extinction of a whole community.”

Ultimately, say the researchers, the pandemic is a reminder that we have ‘crossed the line’ of sustainability, safety and justice. In order to face the challenges of COVID-19 and to start moving towards recovery, we need to address the root causes of the crisis in the Amazon region, and to start rethinking our relationship with nature.

“The message is clear: a major societal transformation towards socially just sustainability is needed, one that addresses our current relation with Nature and with ourselves.”

But this need, say the authors of the paper, offers a glimmer of hope – it’s where the affected communities in the Amazon are showing their strengths.

The AGENTS project is exploring the role of individual and collective action by studying local initiatives that aim to address local social needs at the same time as environmental sustainability. AGENTS have already identified more than 200 initiatives in the state of Pará alone, and are witnessing a “new era of local initiatives emerging from genuine participation and management, that reflect rural communities’ goals and visions of quality of life. In this sense, the Amazon has been not only a living lab for conflicts but also for innovations. These include transformation of production systems, forms of cooperation, gender empowerment, value-aggregation arrangements, application of local biodiversity knowledge, and alternative forms of relationship with Nature.”

Many of these innovations are invisible, and borne out of a need to address a lack of economic opportunities in the region, at the same time as to respect human-nature relationships and cultural differences.

“Local communities and indigenous groups in the Brazilian Amazon are a source of much-needed social innovations that rely on alternative views of Nature and social relations,” say the paper’s authors.

The local initiatives being documented by the AGENTS project are typically designed to achieve multiple goals that are relevant at the local level, such as transitioning from annual agriculture to agroforestry systems that support both food security and access to markets, or forming associations and cooperatives to give women economic independence or help producers commercialise their products. Local people living with issues such as land-grabbing know all too well how economic, food, health, climate and personal security issues are interconnected, and this is reflected in the kind of local initiatives that are springing up. At the same time, for such an initiative to be sustainable, there’s also an understanding that actions must adhere to local values, such as ideas around a ‘good life’ or gender equity. By nurturing such initiatives, say the AGENTS team behind the paper, we can help to create transformative opportunities for the region in the post-pandemic world.

Most importantly, recovering from the COVID-19 pandemic and addressing the root causes of the crisis calls for “a new vision of the future that comes from and that is for the Amazon. (…) Confronting the post-pandemic reality of the region demands attention to structural problems emerging from this vision and empowering the people of the region as agents of change.”

The evidence indicates that global COVID-19 crisis stems from a zoonotic disease, transmitted from animal to human, possibly while a person in south-west China was searching for wildlife to eat or to sell. It has revealed the extent to which human lives and livelihoods are connected to nature. Its global spread has exposed the extent of global travel and trade, and just how interconnected our societies are.

Recovering from the pandemic calls upon us to reshape our relationship with nature, to recognise the structural issues affecting the way the virus is spreading, and to work cooperatively internationally and in solidarity with the communities affected.

Further reading

Castro, F., Russo Lopes, G., Sonnewend Brondizio, E. [AGENTS project] (2020) The Brazilian Amazon in Times of COVID-19: from crisis to transformation? [A Amazônia Brasileira em Tempos de COVID-19: Da Crise à Transformação?], Ambiente & Sociedade, http://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1809-4422asoc20200123vu2020l3id

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Header photo: Bruno Kelly/AmazoniaReal via Flickr.