TY - JOUR

T1 - Earth stewardship: Shaping a sustainable future through interacting policy and norm shifts

AU - Chapin, F. Stuart

AU - Weber, Elke U.

AU - Bennett, Elena M.

AU - Biggs, Reinette

AU - van den Bergh, Jeroen

AU - Adger, W. Neil

AU - Crépin, Anne Sophie

AU - Polasky, Stephen

AU - Folke, Carl

AU - Scheffer, Marten

AU - Segerson, Kathleen

AU - Anderies, John M.

AU - Barrett, Scott

AU - Cardenas, Juan Camilo

AU - Carpenter, Stephen R.

AU - Fischer, Joern

AU - Kautsky, Nils

AU - Levin, Simon A.

AU - Shogren, Jason F.

AU - Walker, Brian

AU - Wilen, James

AU - de Zeeuw, Aart

N1 - We gratefully acknowledge the Beijer Institute of Ecological Economics of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences for sustained support of collaborations among ecologists and economists through their annual workshops on the island of Askö in the Baltic Sea. Publisher Copyright: © 2022, The Author(s).

PY - 2022/9/1

Y1 - 2022/9/1

N2 - Transformation toward a sustainable future requires an earth stewardship approach to shift society from its current goal of increasing material wealth to a vision of sustaining built, natural, human, and social capital—equitably distributed across society, within and among nations. Widespread concern about earth’s current trajectory and support for actions that would foster more sustainable pathways suggests potential social tipping points in public demand for an earth stewardship vision. Here, we draw on empirical studies and theory to show that movement toward a stewardship vision can be facilitated by changes in either policy incentives or social norms. Our novel contribution is to point out that both norms and incentives must change and can do so interactively. This can be facilitated through leverage points and complementarities across policy areas, based on values, system design, and agency. Potential catalysts include novel democratic institutions and engagement of non-governmental actors, such as businesses, civic leaders, and social movements as agents for redistribution of power. Because no single intervention will transform the world, a key challenge is to align actions to be synergistic, persistent, and scalable.

AB - Transformation toward a sustainable future requires an earth stewardship approach to shift society from its current goal of increasing material wealth to a vision of sustaining built, natural, human, and social capital—equitably distributed across society, within and among nations. Widespread concern about earth’s current trajectory and support for actions that would foster more sustainable pathways suggests potential social tipping points in public demand for an earth stewardship vision. Here, we draw on empirical studies and theory to show that movement toward a stewardship vision can be facilitated by changes in either policy incentives or social norms. Our novel contribution is to point out that both norms and incentives must change and can do so interactively. This can be facilitated through leverage points and complementarities across policy areas, based on values, system design, and agency. Potential catalysts include novel democratic institutions and engagement of non-governmental actors, such as businesses, civic leaders, and social movements as agents for redistribution of power. Because no single intervention will transform the world, a key challenge is to align actions to be synergistic, persistent, and scalable.

KW - Anthropocene

KW - Earth stewardship

KW - Institutions

KW - Market economy

KW - Social norms

KW - Transformation

KW - Environmental planning

UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85127542545&partnerID=8YFLogxK

UR - https://www.mendeley.com/catalogue/bc207aab-6470-3005-be70-b42af42a49e3/

U2 - 10.1007/s13280-022-01721-3

DO - 10.1007/s13280-022-01721-3

M3 - Journal articles

C2 - 35380347

AN - SCOPUS:85127542545

VL - 51

SP - 1907

EP - 1920

JO - Ambio

JF - Ambio

SN - 0044-7447

IS - 9

ER -