New Challenges of Sustainable Energy Transformations? Ambiguity, Contingency, and Politics

Recently, social science literature is particularly concerned with implementation processes of sustainable energy transformations. The crucial question is how to analyze these complex processes adequately in order to provide answers on urgent questions like successful governance of energy transformation processes, appropriate policies and political conditions, or how long the transformation process will take, or how much it will cost. These scientific disputes reveal the need to consider carefully socio-institutional processes in which sustainable energy transformations are embedded. In an age of populism, post-truth politics, and contestation the social-institutional environment is in turbulence. At the same time, countries all over the world but especially those from the Global South are facing climate change deteriorating living and production conditions and bringing about economic damage. Panels and Papers will analyze the challenges of sustainable energy transformations as well as the impact of these challenges on sustainable energy transformation processes. The overarching aim of the Section is for all Panels to draw together conceptual expertise and rigorous empirical analysis in order to explore if and how changes of the socio-institutional environment affect sustainable energy transformation processes or if and why these processes are resilient.