Methodology for developing solution pathways towards system transformations

Global decision makers need a systemic approach to address the global environmental crises of climate change, biodiversity loss, land degradation and desertification, pollution and waste, and their intersections. The economic and financial, energy, food, material resources and environmental systems driving these environmental crises are interconnected and therefore require integrative and systemic transformation. Such a transformation of the current systems would alleviate their adverse effects on the environment and the human population, while further improving their sustainability and resiliency to future shocks and disruptions. The transformation needs to effectively integrate, among other factors, knowledge about climate change, including scenarios, trajectories, and adaptation options. This chapter proposes a 7-step methodology to guide such a system transformation {13.8}. The proposed methodology addresses a pressing policy need to accelerate the pace of change (well established but incomplete). It supports a paradigm shift from evolution to transformation, at a time when environmental crises are deepening, in part because past methods have failed to yield the desired results. These past failures have been tied to a lack of strong institutions and legislation, insufficient financial resources and infrastructure, weak enforcement capacity, difficulties in changing habits, values and lifestyles towards sustainable consumption patterns, and vested interests {13.2.1,13.2.2}. Breaking away from the past, this chapter presents a new framework for designing and implementing interventions to drive system transformations. Developing transformative solution pathways requires fundamentally new ways of thinking and acting. For this reason, operational steps for the roll out of solution pathways were developed, based on theoretically grounded requirements for system transformation (12.3). This framework is designed to be future-proof, anticipating challenges, complexities, and the implications of system transformations.