Reports

  • Academic Networking Event Report

    Publication:

    Published in partnership with INSPIRE, Centre for Sustainability Transitions, & Power Futures Lab

    Year:

    2024

    Authors:

    Davies, M., Abrahams, Z., Pamla, A., Wlokas, H. & Adams, A.

    An extensive report by INSPIRE, the Centre for Sustainability Transitions at Stellenbosch University, and Power Futures Lab, has highlighted the importance and need for transformative and collaborative research within So [...]

  • Assessment Report on Diverse Values and Valuation of Nature

    Publication:

    Year:

    2022

    Authors:

    Pascual et al.

    Decisions based on narrow set of market values of nature underpin the current global biodiversity crisis.  Many opportunities exist to embed the diverse values of nature into decision making for navigating towards more just and sustainable futures.

  • Insights for food systems transformation from southern Africa Outcomes of the Southern African Resilience Academy

    Publication:

    GRP & CST Publications

    Year:

    2022

    Authors:

    Sabrina Chesterman, Maike Hamann, Albert Norström

    This insights brief presents key themes and recommendations that emerged from the SARA activities and discussions that were convened over the course of 2021 in order to explore ways of addressing barriers and unlocking key actions to transform food systems in southern Africa.

  • Insights for food systems transformation from southern Africa: Overview of southern African context

    Publication:

    GRP & CST Publications

    Year:

    2022

    Authors:

    Sabrina Chesterman, Maike Hamann, Albert Norström

    This report contextualises the actions of the Southern African Resilience Academy (SARA) in 2021, a year covering many pivotal events towards food systems transformation.

  • Centre for Complex Systems in Transition: 2015 – 2020

    Publication:

    CST

    Year:

    2021

    Authors:

    Carolyn Cramer

    A 5 year review of the history and work of the CST.

  • Youth Nature Futures for Southern Africa

    Publication:

    CST Publications

    Year:

    2022

    Authors:

    Nadia Sitas, Maike Hamann, Therezah Achieng, Joy Waddell, Hayley Clements, Odirilwe Selomane

    To capture visions of nature-futures as imagined by youth from the Global South, the CST facilitated a series of online events in 2021 with youth organizations and networks operating in southern Africa.

  • Russia’s Resurgent Interest in Africa: The Cases of Zambia and Tanzania

    Publication:

    SAIIA Report

    Year:

    2022

    Authors:

    Dzvinka Kachur

    This special report looks at Russia’s political, military and economic cooperation with Zambia and Tanzania. It also analyses the Soviet Union’s legacy, from which the Russian government and businesses can benefit in current relationships with African countries.

  • Resilience Policy Brief

    Publication:

    CST Publications

    Year:

    2021

    Authors:

    R. Biggs, C. Pringle, N. Sitas, H. Clements, B. Dube, M. Hamann, W. Malherbe, A. Manyani, R. Preiser, O. Selomane and J. Waddell.

    Use of the term “resilience” has grown rapidly over the past two decades and is currently something of a buzzword.

  • Systems approaches to food and nutrition security and urban resilience: Lessons from Cape Town, South Africa and Kumasi, Ghana

    Publication:

    LIRA

    Year:

    2020

    Authors:

    Kushitor, S.B,. Currie, P., Drimie, S., Badu, M., Faragher, T., Bhikoo, J. and Cramer, C.

    As part of the Inclusive Metabolism project, researchers and city officials from Cape Town, South Africa, and Kumasi, Ghana, shared their perspectives on how improving food systems can have wider socio- economic benefits for society, building resilience to shocks. Important approaches included adopting a food-water-energy nexus approach and embracing the value of informality to build resilience in city food systems.

  • The Ocean Transition: What to Learn from System Transitions

    Publication:

    Year:

    2020

    Authors:

    Mark Swilling, Mary Ruckelshaus and Tanya Brodie Rudolph

    This paper proceeds from the assumption that the ocean is a commons. The problem this paper seeks to address is the complex challenge of governing the ocean as a commons. Governance systems since the dawn of modernity have evolved to govern city-states nation-states and international relations. But the transformations to sustainability require governing interlinkages and interactions that have not previously existed across sectors, and scales with multiple actors.

  • Towards nature-based resilience in infrastructure development and assessment

    Publication:

    GRAID Policy Brief

    Year:

    2020

    Authors:

    Dr Michelle Audouin and Dr Nadia Sitas

    Infrastructure is critical to Africa’s development and its ability to address poverty. Achieving Africa’s development aspirations hinges on ensuring equitable access, not only to basic infrastructure such as water and sanitation systems, new electricity lines, roads and storm water drainage; but also to enhanced access to telecommunications and modern agricultural technologies for food security.

  • Resilience and Sustainable Peace

    Publication:

    GRAID Policy Brief

    Year:

    2020

    Authors:

    Downing, A.S., Spijkers, J., Norström, A. & Preiser, R.

    A system in conflict can also be resistant to peacebuilding efforts, locked into dynamics that reinforce and reproduce causes of tensions. Resilience thinking and the science on transformations can help identify leverage points for change and inform on how to use shocks and disturbances to spur renewal and innovative thinking.

  • Youth attitudes towards agricultural careers in South Africa

    Publication:

    CST Research insights

    Year:

    2019

    Authors:

    Metelerkamp, L., Biggs, R. and Drimie, S.

    The development of local support networks and visible role models offers a promising entry point for supporting increased youth participation and systemic change in the food system.

  • The multiple dimensions of equity in sustainable development

    Publication:

    CST Key Concepts

    Year:

    2019

    Authors:

    Wong, G., Downing, A., Selomane, O. and Sitas, N.

    This brief aims to clarify some of the key dimensions of the concept of equity.

  • CST RESEARCH INSIGHTS: Biological Invasions – Implications for biodiversity, ecosystem services and human well-being

    Publication:

    CST Research Insights

    Year:

    2019

    Authors:

    Shackleton, R. and Biggs, R.

    Biological invasions arise from the human-mediated spread of organisms out of their native range to new areas of the world whether purposefully or accidentally.

  • CST TOOLKIT: NET-MAP – A frontline tool for supporting place-based learning in spaces of uncertainty

    Publication:

    CST Toolkit

    Year:

    2019

    Authors:

    Metelerkamp,L. and Biggs, R.

    Net-Map is an easy to use social network mapping tool that can be used to assist grass-roots educators develop place-based, action learning in spaces where traditional structures of support are weak or absent. This toolkit provides an introduction to the use of Net-Map as a learning support tool

  • Generating visions of Good Anthropocenes: The Mānoa Mash-up Scenarios Methodology

    Publication:

    CST Toolkit

    Year:

    2019

    Authors:

    Hichert, T., Biggs, R. and Preiser, R.

    The Anthropocene poses highly uncertain, high stakes futures (one always refers to multiple futures, because we influence the future through our choices and actions in the present, and multiple different futures are therefore always possible). Given the Anthropocene context, it becomes vitally important for communities, citizens, policymakers, leaders and individuals to have visions of positive, hopeful futures that can help guide our choices and actions towards creating more just and sustainable futures.

  • CST POLICY BRIEF: Framework for resilient essential services

    Publication:

    CST Policy Brief

    Year:

    2019

    Authors:

    Van der Merwe, L., Biggs, R., and Preiser, R.

    Essential services, like water and electricity, underpin modern life. Disruption in service delivery exposes critical inter-dependency, ranging from community level to the national economy.

  • CST Toolkit: A formative resilience assessment approach

    Publication:

    CST Toolkit

    Year:

    2019

    Authors:

    Van der Merwe, L., Biggs, R., and Preiser, R.

    A resilience building workshop was designed to enhance the resilience of essential service delivery in a sociotechnical systems context through ongoing formative resilience assessments. The workshop utilizes seven generic resilience building principles, derived from social-ecological systems, found to enhance the resilience of ecosystem services.

  • T-labs for Alternative Food Systems in the Western Cape

    Publication:

    Year:

    2018

    Authors:

    Zgambo, O., Pereira, L., Boatemaa, S., Drimie, S.

    There is a growing body of experience feeding the design of and motivation for social innovation labs as spaces that can be used to enable transformation or change. Olsson et al. (2004) have described transformation as...

  • Regime shifts in social-ecological systems

    Publication:

    Year:

    2018

    Authors:

    Regime shifts are sudden, long-lasting changes in the structure and function of social-ecological systems that may have profound effects on human economies and societies. Regime shifts have been documented in a variety o [...]

  • Stewardship of the earth’s social-ecological systems

    Publication:

    Year:

    2018

    Authors:

    Clements, H

    Human actions have affected the earth’s climate and environment in ways that threaten the ecosystem services on which human well being depends. This has necessitated a dramatic change in human relationships both with eac [...]

  • Key features of Complex Adaptive Systems and practical implications for guiding action

    Publication:

    Year:

    2018

    Authors:

    Preiser, R

    The growing recognition of the intertwinedness of society and the environment is driving a reframing of the conventional divide between social and natural systems and has given rise to the study of social-ecological syst [...]

  • How One Word Can Change The Game: A Case Study Of State Capture And The South African Social Security Agency (SASSA)

    Publication:

    How One Word Can Change The Game: A Case Study Of State Capture And The South African Social Security Agency (SASSA)

    Year:

    2018

    Authors:

    Swilling, M., Foley, R.

    The State Capacity Research Project today released a new report, How One Word Can Change The Game:  A Case Study Of State Capture And The South African Social Security Agency (SASSA), which provides a rare detailed examp [...]

  • The Weight of Cities: Resource Requirements of Future Urbanization

    Publication:

    A report for the International Resource Panel. Paris: United Nations Environment Programme.

    Year:

    2018

    Authors:

    Swilling, M., Hajer, M. et al.

    This report looks at the resource implications of projected urbanization, and calls for substantial changes in urban form, governance and design. Coordinated by Mark Swilling and Blake Robinson of the Sustainability Inst [...]

  • City-level decoupling: urban resource flows and the governance of infrastructure transitions

    Publication:

    A report of the working group on cities of the international resource panel. United Nations Environment Program.

    Year:

    2013

    Authors:

    Swilling, M., Robinson, B., Marvin, S., Hodson, M. & Hajer, M.

    [...]

  • Decoupling Natural Resource use and Environmental Impacts from Economic Growth

    Publication:

    Report for the International Resource Panel. Paris: United Nations Environment Programme.

    Year:

    2011

    Authors:

    Fischer-Kowalski, M. & Swilling, M.

    [...]

  • Betrayal of the Promise: How South Africa is being stolen

    Publication:

    Betrayal of the Promise: How South Africa is being stolen

    Year:

    2016

    Authors:

    Bhorat, H., Buthelezi, M., Chipkin, I., Duma, S., Mondi, L., Peter, L., Qobo, L., Swilling, M., et al.

    A major new study on the country's emerging Shadow State by the State Capacity Research Project.   [...]

  • A review of the local community development requirements in South Africa’s renewable energy procurement programme

    Publication:

    WWF Technical Report ZA

    Year:

    2015

    Authors:

    Holle Linnea Wlokas

    By May 2015, the renewable energy independent power producer procurement (REIPPP) programme had approved 79 wind, solar and hydro projects and asked each of them to contribute towards local community development through [...]

  • Guidance for Resilience in the Anthropocene: Investments for Development

    Publication:

    Centre for Complex Systems in Transition (CST), Stellenbosch University

    Year:

    2017

    Authors:

    Rika Preiser, Laura Pereira, Oonsie Biggs Scott Drimie, Luke Metelerkamp, Maike Hamann, Kristi Maciejewski, Deon Cloete

    [...]

  • Generating and Disseminating Scientific Policy

    Publication:

    Centre for Complex Systems in Transition (CST), Stellenbosch University

    Year:

    2016

    Authors:

    Rika Preiser and Reinette (Oonsie) Biggs

    [...]

  • Report on the Anthropocene Visioning Workshop

    Publication:

    Centre for Complex Systems in Transition (CST), Stellenbosch University

    Year:

    2016

    Authors:

    Hamann M., Biggs R., Pereira L., Preiser R., Hichert T., Merrie A., Cloete D., Poskitt S., Loubser G., Salley R., Blanchard R., Coetzee H., Fioramonti L., Gomera M., Hermanus L., Johnson G., Johnson L., Karakashian A., Khan Z., King N., Nkontwana, P.

    [...]

  • The Resilience Approach

    Publication:

    Pan European Networks: Government 13

    Year:

    2015

    Authors:

    Biggs R

    [...]

  • Building Resilience to Regime Shifts

    Publication:

    Pan European Networks

    Year:

    2015

    Authors:

    Biggs R

    [...]