Why aren’t we acting for the climate? From knowledge-action gap to agency-action gap

Acts aimed at mitigating climate change (CC) and promoting sustainability—or the absence of such acts—are frequently discussed in relation to what is typically called the knowledge-to-action gap (e.g., Mastrángelo et al., 2019). One could argue that the predominant approach to advancing sustainability—understood here broadly as a response to CC and other ongoing and enduring aspects of the polycrisis—has been to accumulate and disseminate ever more knowledge. This includes knowledge of the specific issues at stake and the severity of the situation, what could and has been done by whom, and what would even constitute as an effective structure for determining which knowledge is needed and how to utilise it. Meanwhile, the sustainability knowledge-action gap itself has been investigated in, for example, education, research agendas, and decision- and policy-making. On the one hand, CC mitigation and sustainability efforts and their ultimate impact can be debated; for instance, whether there are enough tangible measures or just talk (e.g., Hoffman et al., 2022), or whether current initiatives will indeed bring about sustainability (e.g., Salovaara and Hagolabi-Albov [in review]). Yet the core question remains: are the called-upon acts grounded in rational, knowledge-based considerations? On the other hand, knowledge has undoubtedly guided these (and all) forms of agency (e.g., Giddens, 1979): where an actor—individual, communal, or institutional—applies their expertise and resources to depart from established norms, i.e., generates transformation that fundamentally underlines sustainability. However, it appears evident that knowledge alone does not guarantee the realisation of transformation. Whether one refers to multi-level perspective (Geels, 2002), actor-network (Latour, 2007), or social practice theory (Shove et al., 2012)—each elaborating on socio-technical changes emerging through scaled structures or simultaneous enactments and practices—it remains theoretically (and observably) clear that current institutionalised knowledge, along with the structures shaped by it, have also become barriers to the transformation. For example, an individual may be knowledgeable of the existing structures and the direction to change them, but their agency is limited by dominance over resources for implementing those changes. This limitation might result from structural misalignments that either promote a different notion of sustainability or fail to promote sustainability at all (Salovaara & Hagolani-Albov [in review]). Consequently, our hypothesis—which we plan to investigate in theoretical and action-oriented future research—is that, beyond the knowledge-to-action gap, the global sustainability movement is at a stalemate because of an agency-to-action gap.

 

Keywords: sustainability agency, action gap, transformation

 

References: 

Mastrángelo, M. E. et al. (2019). Key knowledge gaps to achieve global sustainability goals. Nature Sustainability

Hoffman, S. J. et al. (2022). International treaties have mostly failed to produce their intended effects. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences

Giddens, A. (1979). Central problems in social theory: Action, structure, and contradiction in social analysis. University of California

Geels, F. W. (2002). Technological transitions as evolutionary reconfiguration processes: a multi-level perspective and a case-study. Research policy

Latour, B. (2007). Reassembling the social: An introduction to actor-network-theory. Oxford.

Shove, E. et al. (2012). The dynamics of social practice: Everyday life and how it changes. Sage.