To See a World in a Grain of Sand—The Transformative Potential of Small Community Actions

Atsushi Watabe,Simon Gilby

doi:10.3390/su12187404

Abstract

The recognition of the urgent need for more sustainable lifestyles dates from the late 20th century, originating in concerns about resource depletion and climate change. Research and policy measures have evolved since then, paying increasing attention to systemic change over individual behaviour. However, as individual behavioural change is constrained by the systems within which choices are made, more study is needed to understand better how systemic changes occur. Drawing on the experiences of the Sustainable Lifestyles and Education Programme of the UN-led One-Planet Network in collaborating with small collective actions for sustainable lifestyles, the paper analyses the needs and approaches for sustainable lifestyles and opportunities for the local actors to grow their capacities in developing ways of living sustainably. These experiences show that the pursuit of sustainable lifestyles is not a one-shot change in behaviour. It is a continuous process where actors identify and tackle locally specific opportunities for responsible and sustainable ways of living, and through a process of mutual learning and experimentation gradually shape shared visions of sustainable living. Systemic changes for sustainable living are ultimately neither about simply improving people’s awareness or attitudes or replacing some components of the external systems. They are the creation of capacities and aspirations of people actively and continuously engaging to shape alternative systems of living.

Highlights

Today, our global footprint is about one and a half times the Earth’s total capacity to provide renewable and non-renewable resources to humanity
This paper aims to contribute to the discussion of sustainable lifestyles through gaining a deeper understanding of the changes of “systems” that eventually propel the shift in lifestyles and draws on the lessons learned from the projects supported under the framework of the Sustainable Lifestyles and Education Programme (SLE Programme) of the UN 10-Year Framework of Programmes on Sustainable Consumption and Production Patterns (One-Planet Network)
Twenty-four projects supported under the SLE Programme and 30 cases of initiatives we learned about through the call for submissions and desk-based research aimed at enabling sustainable lifestyles in one or more “domains” of living, such as energy consumption, water use, wasting and recycling, food production and consumption, housing, purchasing of consumer goods and livelihoods

Summary

Introduction

Our global footprint is about one and a half times the Earth’s total capacity to provide renewable and non-renewable resources to humanity. During the past two decades, research focus has shifted from individual behavioural change to the changes in “systems” that shape the enabling and constraining contexts of lifestyles [11,12,13,14], or the entangled elements that shape the possibilities and limitations of our ways of living [15,16]. Equipment, or facilities that enable changes to the current patterns of behaviour that were visualised. The project in Armenia is another case, where it introduced cheap tools to turn sunshine into energy, and provided other benefits for local living. Another project in Chile established two facilities utilising geothermal energy, namely, a firewood drier and a greenhouse producing leafy vegetables. These facilities brought together local farmers in the experimental production of firewood and vegetables

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