TY - JOUR
T1 - Advancing the research agenda on food systems governance and transformation
AU - van Bers, Caroline
AU - Delaney, Aogán
AU - Eakin, Hallie
AU - Cramer, Laura
AU - Purdon, Mark
AU - Oberlack, Christoph
AU - Evans, Tom
AU - Pahl-Wostl, Claudia
AU - Eriksen, Siri
AU - Jones, Lindsey
AU - Korhonen-Kurki, Kaisa
AU - Vasileiou, Ioannis
N1 - Funding Information:
This work was implemented as part of the CGIAR Research Program on Climate Change, Agriculture and Food Security (CCAFS), which is carried out with support from CGIAR Fund Donors and through bilateral funding agreements. For details, visit https://ccafs.cgiar.org/donors . The views expressed in this document cannot be taken to reflect the official opinions of these organisations. This work was also supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation (grant numbers SES-1360421 , SES-1360463 and BCS-1534544 ).
Publisher Copyright:
© 2019 Elsevier B.V.
PY - 2019/8
Y1 - 2019/8
N2 - The food systems upon which humanity depends face multiple interdependent environmental, social and economic threats in the 21st Century. Yet, the governance of these systems, which determines to a large extent the ability to adapt and transform in response to these challenges, is underresearched. This perspective piece synthesises the findings of two recent reviews of food systems governance and transformations and proposes a comprehensive research agenda for the coming years. These reviews highlight the influence of governance on food systems, methodological obstacles to explaining the effectiveness of governance in realising food sustainability, and conditions that have historically supported food system transformations. We argue that the following steps are key to improving our knowledge of the role of governance in food systems: (1) developing more comparable research designs for building generalisable explanations of the governance elements that are most effective in realising food systems goals; (2) using the lens of polycentricity to help disentangle complex governance networks; (3) giving greater attention to the conditions and pre-conditions associated with historical food system transformations; (4) identifying adaptations that strengthen or weaken path dependency; and, (5) focusing research on how transformations can be supported by institutions that facilitate collective action and stakeholder agency.
AB - The food systems upon which humanity depends face multiple interdependent environmental, social and economic threats in the 21st Century. Yet, the governance of these systems, which determines to a large extent the ability to adapt and transform in response to these challenges, is underresearched. This perspective piece synthesises the findings of two recent reviews of food systems governance and transformations and proposes a comprehensive research agenda for the coming years. These reviews highlight the influence of governance on food systems, methodological obstacles to explaining the effectiveness of governance in realising food sustainability, and conditions that have historically supported food system transformations. We argue that the following steps are key to improving our knowledge of the role of governance in food systems: (1) developing more comparable research designs for building generalisable explanations of the governance elements that are most effective in realising food systems goals; (2) using the lens of polycentricity to help disentangle complex governance networks; (3) giving greater attention to the conditions and pre-conditions associated with historical food system transformations; (4) identifying adaptations that strengthen or weaken path dependency; and, (5) focusing research on how transformations can be supported by institutions that facilitate collective action and stakeholder agency.
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U2 - 10.1016/j.cosust.2019.08.003
DO - 10.1016/j.cosust.2019.08.003
M3 - Review article
AN - SCOPUS:85073035556
SN - 1877-3435
VL - 39
SP - 94
EP - 102
JO - Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability
JF - Current Opinion in Environmental Sustainability
ER -