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The impetus for addressing climate change is real and present, but its translation into action lacks immediacy and severity, and involves reorientating our lifestyles and economies towards sustainability. Drawing on focus groups conducted in seven UK communities, specific interventions were identified as encouraging change in the short-term, maintaining momentum in the medium-term and sustaining sustainability in the long-term to address various enablers of, and barriers to, sustainable lifestyles. The findings illustrate that there are multiple entry points and influencing periods for sustainable living. Given the importance of the temporal dimension in encouraging and sustaining practices for sustainable lifestyles, the paper advances a “what works” approach to sustainable lifestyles that can be embedded with practical solutions. This approach creates a synergy between what individuals want to do to live sustainably and how they want to do this with interventions that are known to create meaningful lifestyles changes and maintain sustainable living.

Since 31 October 2018, Extinction Rebellion has advocated in numerous examples of civil disobedience across the UK in an attempt to call for further action to address climate change. Following this example, similar activism has also been seen across Europe and North America. Such activism falls within the context of climate justice (the framing of climate change as an ethical and political issue); given the disproportionate impacts that climate change has on the most vulnerable people in society, e.g., low-income communities, women, and future generations. What is noticeable about Extinction Rebellion is its ability to place climate change on the social agenda, a task that has proven difficult in the age of denialism, skepticism, false-balance media reporting, and far-right politics. With reference to recent examples of civil disobedience and protests in 2019, this paper evaluates how climate justice movements, specifically Extinction Rebellion, change meanings of urban landscapes into becoming more contested places and disrupt the consciousness of everyday routines toward sustainability. This disruption and contested nature is brought about through changing the sociocultural dynamics of urban landscapes during, and after, such protests. The meanings of urban landscapes thus change from being viewed as purely sites of materialist consumption to sites of initial resistance against business-as-usual approaches to climate change leading to changes in policy. Through substantial public engagement with the narrative of climate justice, civil disobedience protests, and urban art, it is clear that urban areas “held” for a number of successive days have started to be perceived differently. This article concludes with implications for subsequent spatial disruption and civil disobedience advocating for stronger climate policy.

While there is growing consensus that human behaviours need to change to a more sustainable paradigm, community driven approaches, such as social enterprise, have yet to be explored as serious instruments of sustainability transition. Social enterprises sit within the third sector of the economy, typically where market or governmental failures exist in the provision of social welfare, and have increasingly become a key driver of social progress. The autonomous nature of the social-economic model applied by such organisations can represent a viable means to reduce state social welfare dependence, and is a proven model for social change. The capability of social enterprises to create both social and economic value is considered a `win-win'. Yet there are clear potentials for social enterprise models to be more extensively applied to address contemporary ecological challenges of neo-liberal market economies, moving towards `win-win-win' outcomes across social, economic and ecological domains. This paper investigates the value of social enterprises as drivers of low-carbon transition at the community level, with an emphasis on the energy sector. Evidence from seven organisations in the UK is presented and a socio-technical transitions conceptual framework is applied to analyse these social enterprise operations as a form of social innovation.

This chapter provides an overview of public engagement, its importance and effective approaches to meaningfully involve the public with coastal sustainability transitions. It presents two case studies, Guernsey, British Channel Islands and Cape Wind, Massachusetts. These illustrate how concepts of identity, marginality and engagement are essential to the development of coastal sustainability transitions. As the case study of Guernsey outlines, coastal sustainability transition-related public engagement should seek to enhance the local distinctiveness of coastal areas and 'fit within the wider narrative of place identity and how individuals feel attached to places that are ascribed with specific meanings'. Furthermore, as the case study of Cape Wind illustrates, coastal sustainability transitions need to connect with local communities in terms of addressing immediate social and economic concerns. Therefore, as a research agenda, the human geographies of coastal sustainability transitions can be of substantial value to the practical application of sustainability. © 2019 selection and editorial matter, C. Patrick Heidkamp and John Morrissey.

There is currently no generally accepted definition for the “blue economy,” despite the term becoming common parlance over the past decade. The concept and practice have spawned a rich, and diverse, body of scholarly activity. Yet despite this emerging body of literature, there is ambiguity around what the blue economy is, what it encapsulates, and its practices. Thus far, the existing literature has failed to theorise key geographical concepts such as space, place, scale, and power relations, all of which have the potential to lead to uneven development processes and regional differentiation. Previous research has sought to clarify the ontological separation of land and sea or has conceptualised the blue economy as a complex governmental project that opens up new governable spaces and rationalises particular ways of managing marine and coastal regions. More recently, geographers have called for a critical—and practical—engagement with the blue economy. This paper critically examines the existing literature of the geographies of the blue economy through a structured meta-analysis of published work, specifically its conceptualisations and applications to debates in the field. Results offer the potential to ground a bottom-up definition of the blue economy. In so doing, this paper provides a clearly identifiable rubric of the key geographical concepts that are often overlooked by researchers, policymakers, and practitioners when promoting economic development and technological innovation in coastal and marine environments. © 2019 The Author(s) Geography Compass © 2019 John Wiley & Sons Ltd

Behaviour, practices and culture constitute a powerful human factor in the energy system; in particular the interactions between technologies, practices and norms lock individuals in to certain patterns of (often inefficient) energy use. Consequently, behaviour change has gained traction amongst policy makers as a key area of intervention given the impact energy-related behaviours have on climate change. Given the increasing emphasis within policy perspectives in the European Union, it is surprising that a gap in understanding of the success factors of behaviour change initiatives remains. This paper addresses this gap by identifying and characterising behaviour change initiatives across five European countries (the UK, Ireland, France, Italy, and Spain). The paper provides insights into the success factors and commonly encountered barriers to behaviour change initiatives. Initiatives are classified into 6 broad categories (community-based interventions; information and awareness based interventions; eco-districts; show-case events; energy switching; and smart-technology focused interventions). The results suggest that there are significant knowledge gaps between what is known to work to engage individuals in behavioural change and what is currently being applied in practice. An over-reliance on education and awareness-raising projects is evident, illustrating that such projects do not sufficiently aim for sustained behavioural changes. A dearth of projects incorporating fiscal measures, regulations or legislation to drive behaviour change reflects reluctance on behalf of decision-makers to engage widely with diverse approaches to foster lifestyle change. This paper contributes understandings of the different models and delivery tools employed to change energy-related behaviours; insights into the critical success factors that underpin best practice and the barriers to action; and a `what works in practice' overview of the meaningful approaches to change behaviour. (C) 2018 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.