Steps Methods: Building Pathways to Sustainability
Date:
12/10/2015
Organised by:
University of Sussex
Presenter:
Prof Andrew Stirling and Dr John Thompson
Level:
Intermediate (some prior knowledge)
Contact:
Grace Jones, 01273 877376, esrcdtc@sussex.ac.uk
Map:
View in Google Maps (BN1 9RE)
Venue:
Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex, Library Road, Brighton
Description:
Prof Andrew Stirling and Dr John Thompson
Mon 12 October 2015 10:00 - 16:30
Institute of Development Studies, University of Sussex.
Over the past ten years, the Sussex-based ESRC-funded STEPS Centre has developed a distinctive ‘pathways approach’. Drawing on many strands of work across a diversity of disciplines, this aims to understand the complex, non-linear interactions between social, technological and environmental systems. Some pathways may threaten poor peoples’ livelihoods and health, while others create opportunities for sustainability.
Of all the diverse pathways that are typically viable in any given setting, various self-reinforcing dynamics typically mean that only a few ‘lock in’. Many others are ‘crowded out’. The strongest pressures ‘close down’ attention around those pathways that are favoured by the most powerful interests. The practical challenge tackled by ‘STEPS methods’, then, is to find ways to ‘broaden out’ the ways in which possible pathways are understood; and to ‘open up’ more accessible and accountable political debates about which to pursue.
This one-day workshop will explore some key guiding principles for identifying methods that can help in these tricky tasks – and for designing more detailed methodologies for how these might be used together in transdisciplinary ways. In this, it will also draw on work undertaken by the Sussex-based part of the leadership team for ESRC Nexus Network on building transdisciplinary capabilities.
The scope of methods involved is in principle very wide – including qualitative and quantitative, natural and social scientific, analytic and interactive. But the main points will be illustrated by a grounded case study. And participants will get the chance to share their own experiences and play with an illustrative hands-on approach.
Cost:
The workshop is FREE for students from the Universities of Essex, Goldsmiths, Kent, Reading, Royal Holloway, Surrey, Sussex, UEA.
All other students: £30
External members of staff: £100
Website and registration:
http://onlineshop.sussex.ac.uk/browse/extra_info.asp?compid=1&modid=1&catid=108&prodvarid=149
Region:
South East
Keywords:
Case Study, Mixed Methods, Interdisciplinary and Multidisciplinary Research
Related publications and presentations:
Case Study
Mixed Methods
Interdisciplinary and Multidisciplinary Research