The Multi-level perspective on socio-technical transitions

The multi-level perspective (MLP) on socio-technical transitions is one of the more recent articulations on socio-technical relations, that incorporates macro-factors, localised factors, a range of human and non-human factors and also focuses on the process of transition – i.e. gradual and incremental change to socio-technical systems over time. It attempts to deal with the constant batting between socio-technical approaches that focus on structure (SST) and those that focus on agency (ANT) by combining the two into one framework (Coenen et al, 2012).

72 Figure 7 The multi-level perspective on socio-technical change

It does this through the systematic analysis of a range of processes at three ‘levels’ (see Fig. 7): the ‘landscape’ – broad macro-societal configurations, the ‘regime’ – a stable set of existing configurations of people, technologies, governance structures and so forth that are established around a particular socio-technical issue, and ‘niches’ or ‘niche innovations’ which are localised, small –scale socio-technical experiments that provide potential alternatives to the existing ‘regime’ (Geels, 2002, 2005 and Geels and Schot, 2007).

The idea behind these three levels is that when changes in the landscape combine with the emergence of viable niches, the existing regime can be altered and a new stable norm achieved. A vast array of case studies of socio-technical transitions have been conducted using the MLP, from transitions from paper to email, from mixed farming to pig husbandry, and from sail boats to engine ships, but of particular relevance to this research because of its focus on sustainability and low carbon issues, is Verbong and Geels’ (2007) case study of the transition of the Dutch energy system. It paints a picture of the changes and similarities

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in key figures and actors in the energy system regime between the 1970s and the present day, investigates the visions that have changed over time, the drivers of a ‘co-evolutionary’, incremental transition which they claim is underway, and identify support for niche

alternatives such as CHP and changes in the supply of electricity in a liberalised market as key factors in positive changes towards a more sustainable system. It also, however, highlights primary drivers for transitions in the electricity system as being Europeanisation and liberalisation rather than environmental concerns, and the resistance that this provides to radical shifts towards sustainability.

The MLP, with its focus on ‘systemic’ change being achieved through a change in the regime, provides an understanding of the difficulties in changing established, obdurate socio-technical norms, by acknowledging the issues of lock-in and path dependency (Geels, 2002, Sims, 2012 and Graham and Thrift, 2007). This is potentially helpful for assessing whether domestic retrofit schemes actually contribute to low carbon transitions, or

preserve the current norms, by establishing the kinds of effects that each case study has on existing configurations around energy efficiency. It is also particularly helpful that the perspective is well established as a lens through which to view efforts towards sustainability and low carbon futures, and indeed has been used in specific relation to domestic retrofit: Swan (2013) used the MLP to firstly establish an existing energy efficiency regime (See Fig. 8) and secondly, to investigate innovation processes in domestic retrofit in social housing, finding that often domestic retrofit innovations were conservative or piecemeal rather than ‘radical’, because of the complexity of the issue and the existing regime, effects of lock-in, risk, and the policy climate they were acting in. He also found that innovations formed in networks rather than in isolation, as different niches worked on different parts of the problem such as financing, technical issues, behavioural change and so on, concluding that radical and speedy transformation of the existing domestic energy system would be unlikely.

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Figure 8 The socio-technical system for domestic energy use (Swan, 2013, p 41)

The MLP and related literature also provides a very useful differentiation between three different kinds of change processes: transformation, reproduction and transition (Geels and Kemp, 2007). Geels and Schot (2007) also differentiated between different transition

pathways, from transformation, technological substitution, reconfiguration and de-

alignment/realignment. These relate specifically to transitions, however, and also to more specific systems or technologies than the broader change processes in the first example. What both typologies have in common, though, is an appreciation of different components of change – directions, degrees and speeds, and different distributions of agency and power among the levels in terms of the changes generated. So a transformation – a change in direction - is likely to originate from a wholesale change in rules from within the regime than a reproduction, which changes incrementally, but along the same trajectory. A transition on the other hand results from a combination of landscape and niche pressures and regime shifts – as previously described. (see Table 2 below)

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Reproduction Transformation Transition

Levels

involved Regime dynamics Pressure from landscape Adaptation and

reorientation in regime

Pressure from landscape

Increasing problems in regime, and attempts at re-orientation New innovation in niches that eventually break through

Role of

actors Incumbent regime actors Pressure from outsiders Incumbent regime actors respond through re-orienting innovative trajectories

Pressure from outsiders

Incumbent actors fail to solve regime problems

Outsiders develop new innovations

Table 2 - Different mechanisms in change processes. (Adapted from Geels and Schot (2007) p414)

However, the MLP has been criticised for placing heavy expectation upon niches alone to generate transitions, being too heavily focussed on technological rather than social

innovation, and encouraging assumptions that transitions can be actively stimulated and/or managed (Shove and Walker, 2007 and Smith et al, 2010). It is also less helpful for

understanding place-based transitions, due to a distinct lack of context-sensitivity, little clarity on spatial boundaries of landscapes, regimes and niches, or where cities fit in, and has been accused of being inherently apolitical (Smith et al, 2010, Hodson and Marvin, 2012, and Bulkeley, 2005). In later years the perspective has developed a greater sensitivity to political economy (Geels, 2010 and 2014), which acknowledges that the influences of dominant and vested interests often prevent meaningful systemic change because different forms of power from material and instrumental, to discursive and institutional, help to reinforce existing norms, habits and practices that preserve those interests – usually economic ones. The MLP is still lacking awareness of place (Coenen et al, 2012) in particular of cities, apart from as loci for experimental niches (Geels, in Bulkeley et al, 2011). Debates using the MLP in relation to cities as being part of, or enacting for themselves, low carbon

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transitions (Hodson and Marvin, 2010 and Bulkeley et al, 2011) tend to focus on the processes of constructing visions and intermediaries that are specifically designed to enact these transitions and the voices and priorities that are or aren’t included in these processes. This is a necessary component of the MLP analysis, particularly when investigating

configurations of interests around socio-technical issues in cities, but it still finds place- based studies somewhat incompatible with literal applications of the MLP: regimes can be both national and regional, or indeed multi-scalar, and niches (despite the impression of being ‘small’) have no spatial limits (Smith et al, 2010, and Shove and Walker, 2007).

Notions of space and scale as being politically or socio-technically constructed or – crucially – of that construction being relevant to the transition process, are also notably absent. Nonetheless, the MLP provides many helpful concepts, encouraging a generally multi-level approach, and in particular introducing the concept of the ‘landscape’ to capture the broad pressures on domestic energy efficiency schemes and how they impact particular city contexts. It also is helpful for exploring different forms of sociotechnical change, and especially for exploring resistances and obstacles to change. Swan’s (2013) findings that innovations and processes of decision making in social housing retrofits were conservative and piecemeal are helpful for articulating these effects on particular projects, and relating them to the issues of co-option and dependency emerging from the literature review. Furthermore, the concept of the niche experiment captures many of the experimental characteristics of the case study initiatives in this thesis. It is clear that, whilst working in an extremely similar area, the three case studies had very different ideas about the function of their experimental activities, with different kinds of relations between local actors,

corporations, national policy and international issues/organisations. There is therefore a need to explore further the particular characteristics of niche experiments and their potential role in providing explanatory power to this framework.

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3.4. Incorporating attention to context and people – paying closer