From Political Fragmentation to Solidarity: Building Transition Initiative at the Regional Level

Current trends and past precedents indicate that the international community is unlikely to mount enough effective and timely countermeasures to address the polycrisis in ways that would facilitate a transition to a secure, sustainable future for humanity and the biosphere (Rees 2022). Programs coordinated by the United Nations, such as Agenda 2030, are hampered by internal contradictions and their resolutions remain non-binding (Lautensach & Lautensach, 2013; Montesano Montessori, 2023). Instead of prioritising long overdue measures to reverse ecological overshoot and environmental destruction, international politics and relations are increasingly fraught with divisions and fragmentation. At the regional and local levels, however, opportunities exist to compensate for those omissions. Green parties are gaining support, municipalities are implementing sustainability policies in collaboration with NGOs, local support groups are building solidarity, and intentional communities / ecovillages are proliferating. Those innovations are supported by processes of cultural change and collective learning that are spectacularly absent in most national governments, even though they are essential for any kind of ‘Great Transition’ (Raskin 2006). We explore this difference in resolve and learning through comparative critical discourse analysis (CDA) and to make the theoretical distinction between a deep and shallow ecology (Naess, 1998) as well as reiterating the plea to (re)introduce complexity in policy analysis and policy making and in education (Montesano Montessori, 2020, 2023). We determine the dominant values, assumptions and priorities that inform transition policies at the national and local levels in selected countries. Secondly, we identify probable explanations for the differences between the two levels and suggest ways how educational innovation and Deep Adaptation might address the shortfall. Lautensach, Alexander and Sabina Lautensach. (2013) Why 'Sustainable Development' Is Often Neither: A Constructive Critique. In: Challenges in Sustainability | 2013 | Volume 1 | Issue 1 | Pages 3–15 DOI: 10.12924/cis2013.01010003. Montesano Montessori, N. (2020). Opening up Spaces for Meaningful Engagement in Educational Praxis in Turbulent Times of Transition and Crisis. In: Montesano Montessori, N. & Lengkeek, G. (Eds.) (2020). Opening up spaces for meaningful engagement in the educational praxis. pp. 129-150. Utrecht: Eburon. Montesano Montessori, N. (2023): Critical Policy Discourse Studies. In: M. Handford & J.P. Gee (eds). Handbook of Discourse Studies. Routledge Naess, A. (1998). Ecology, Community and Life Style. Cambridge. CUP. Raskin, Paul. 2016. Journey to Earthland: The Great Transition to Planetary Civilization. Boston: Paul Raskin / Telus Institute. http://www.greattransition.org/publication/journey-to-earthland Rees, William E. 2022. The human eco-predicament: Overshoot and the population conundrum Vienna Yearbook of Population Research 21 (Nov): 1-19. DOI: 10.1553/p-eznb-ekgc