Uncovering Ordering Principles

Abstract

The energy transition involves a complex societal transformation encompassing changes in production, distribution, consumption, and behaviour. It necessitates collaboration among private and public stakeholders as well as the adoption of technical and non-technical innovations to combat climate change. While new technologies are being developed, progress towards a low-carbon energy system is slow due to technological, economic, and political barriers. The energy transition affects all systems interconnected with energy, such as transportation, housing, and spatial planning. Stakeholder involvement is crucial to connect these systems in policy but coordination and consensus are lacking, leading to paralysis and a lack of progress. Existing literature, focusing on innovation and technological barriers, lacks a comprehensive systems perspective. Traditional frameworks for change and transition in such complex systems often assume a rational and manageable system, overlooking the interconnectedness and interdependence of individual elements and their influence on the overall system, as well as the thorough interconnection with the political domain. They are built on the assumption that there is a (sub)system subject to transition and there is consensus on what the goal is. In the energy transition, neither is often the case and thus these traditional approaches to governing transitions have resulted in incoherent policy. This thesis utilises an abductive approach to identify design principles for transitions and their overarching themes to guide the energy transition. This method is exploratory in nature and uses empirical data in the form of case studies to develop new theoretical insights.