Barbara Christine Van Mierlo

• Doctor of social sciences
• Professor (Associate) at Wageningen University & Research

In-depth insight into the relationship between reflexivity, learning and reflection is needed to enrich governance approaches for persistent sustainability issues. However, current conceptualisations of reflexivity seem limited for the understanding of system innovation processes – reflexivity remains highly abstract and often gets conflated with r...

Many transitions scholars underscore the importance of learning in sustainability transitions, but the associated learning processes have hardly been conceptualised. The diverse, well-established research fields related to learning are broadly ignored or loosely applied. In this paper, we systematically explore four interesting learning traditions...

Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we use...

Effective management of crop diseases is a key precondition for sustainable crop production and to improve food security globally. However, learning approaches that improve smallholder farmers’ knowledge, perceptions, and practices to deal with crop diseases by fostering social and technical innovations are seldom studied. A study was conducted to...

There has been strong research interest in designing and testing learning approaches for enhancing and sustaining the capacity of communities to manage collective action problems. Broadening the perspective from well-known social learning approaches in natural resource management, this study explores how social learning as a communicative process i...

There are growing calls for societies to transform towards regenerative futures that support the flourishing of life and transcend interlinked social and ecological crises. Many actors are now trying to identify whether desired transformations are occurring, and how different interventions are contributing to transformation. These are questions of...

While transdisciplinary knowledge production is increasingly gaining traction in academic and policy environments, initiating and guiding such approaches is not straightforward and comes with challenges. These challenges concern, among other things, methodological and practical difficulties that arise in the ‘fuzzy reality’ of doing transdisciplina...

Literature on mission-specific innovation systems (MIS) highlights the crucial role of directionality when achieving sustainability transitions, while diversity literature emphasizes the need to keep diverse directions open. Like directionality, diversity is created by innovation system actors to tackle the complex and uncertain nature of transitio...

Social learning theory can support understanding of how a group of diverse actors addresses complex challenges related to public health adaptation. This study focuses on one specific issue of public health adaptation: oak processionary moth (OPM) adaptation. With a social learning framework, we examined how public health adaption strategies gradual...

Conflict lies at the core of urban sustainability transitions and the indispensable structural changes that accompany them. In this chapter we examine the RESILIO project, a multi-actor collaboration in Amsterdam aiming to transition towards a 'climate proof' city through smart water retention systems on urban roofs. The focus is on the conflict th...

This book examines the transition to sustainable protein systems in the broadest possible context. Perspectives from social scientists are presented alongside perspectives from technologists. Industry interviews highlight examples from practice. Some viewpoints are shared, some divergent, some polarising. The future will require a wide range of opt...

Sociologische inbreng in het duurzaamheidsdebat kan recht doen aan de complexiteit van maatschappelijke verandering. Sociologie is een discipline die goed is uitgerust om de heterogeniteit te duiden van oorzaken en gevolgen en onderlinge afhankelijkheden die duurzaamheidsvraagstukken kenmerken. Sociologie is immers ontstaan als reactie op grote, i...

We witness a promotion of hybrid partnerships, where actors with different competences and resources collaborate for smallholder inclusive value chain development. To better understand the functioning of these partnerships, we used institutional theory and studied the context of a global and emerging regional food value chains in Ghana, the blendin...

This article proposes that identity formation and reformation are important dynamics that influence and are influenced by the course of a sustainability transition. We study identity (re-)formation in the transition of the dairy sector in a rural area in the Netherlands: the Green Heart. Soil subsidence, high emissions, and economic pressures requi...

Introduction Learning is a process involving changes in knowledge, practices, and aspirations, also potentially influencing the institutional setting in which actors operate. Learning takes place in and through communication. It can be observed in interaction and in this way inform research that is aiming for inclusive innovation. In this chapter,...

Dominant agricultural and food systems lead to continuous resource depletion and unacceptable environmental and social impacts. While current calls for changing agrifood systems are increasingly framed in the context of sustainability transitions, they rarely make an explicit link to transition studies to address these systemic challenges, nor do t...

Soil acidity is one of the main constraints to crop production worldwide. In Ethiopia, the problem of soil acidity has been increasing. Currently, more than 40% of cultivated land in the country has a soil pH < 5.5. Recently, bacterial wilt (caused by Ralstonia solanacearum) has become a serious problem, reaching epidemic levels in some of the majo...

Formalised knowledge systems, including universities and research institutes, are important for contemporary societies. They are, however, also arguably failing humanity when their impact is measured against the level of progress being made in stimulating the societal changes needed to address challenges like climate change. In this research we use...

Potato late blight remains a threat to food security and livelihood of millions of people in Ethiopia. Despite a rapid dispersal of the disease pathogen and farmers' interdependency in managing it, the literature on agricultural extension and communication tends to frame the disease and its management as a problem of the individual farmer. This stu...

We investigate opening up, a crucial aim of responsible innovation, in the situation of companies initiating sector-wide change in order to take societal responsibility. Two case studies in agriculture were conducted, using a framing perspective that enlightens how issues are (re-)defined and acquire meaning in conversations. For both industry-led...

Collective action is required to deal with various complex agricultural problems such as invasive weeds and plant diseases that pose a collective risk to farmers. Monitoring systems could help to stimulate collective action and avoid free-riding. The paper develops a novel framework consisting of essential elements of a monitoring system for managi...

Since learning plays a key role in sustainability transitions, it is not surprising that it is frequently mentioned in the related literature. Studies in this respect are often conducted in the context of specific governance approaches. Learning is key to strategic niche management, transition management and the functions of innovation systems appr...

Growing empirical evidence suggests that innovation platforms can be effective in enhancing agricultural research impact by creating an enabling environment for scaling of innovations such as novel technologies, practices and business models. However, efforts to understand how these innovation platforms operate to scale innovations are insufficient...

Background: Meat, an important source of protein and other nutrients in human diets, is one of the major drivers of global environmental change in terms of greenhouse gas emissions, land and water use, animal welfare, human health and directions of breeding. Novel alternatives, including novel meat proxies (cultured meat, plant-based meat alternati...

Active involvement of users in smart grids is often seen as key to beneficial development of smart grids. In this paper, we investigate the diverse assumptions about how and why users should be active and to what extent these assumptions are supported by experiences in practice. We present the findings of a systematic literature review on four dist...

In this paper, a framework is presented for the evaluation of smart grid environment which is called the three-layer model. This three-layer model comprises three specific categories, or ‘layers’, namely, the stakeholder, market and technologies layers. Each layer is defined and explored herein, using an extensive literature study regarding their k...

A soft systems perspective is used to unravel the complex problem of potato bactetial wilt and late blight.

The most critical question for climate research is no longer about the problem, but about how to facilitate the transformative changes necessary to avoid catastrophic climate-induced change. Addressing this question, however, will require massive upscaling of research that can rapidly enhance learning about transformations. Ten essentials for guidi...

Potato is one of the most important food crops for smallholder farmers in the Ethiopian highlands. Diseases, particularly bacterial wilt (caused by Ralstonia solanacearum) and late blight (caused by Phytophthora infestans), are among the major constraints of potato production, despite continuous efforts to control them. Bacterial wilt and late blig...

Effective management of potato diseases such as bacterial wilt and late blight depends to a large extent on farmers’ knowledge of the diseases as well as on the integration of recommended management methods in their daily practices. Late blight has continued to be a dominant potato disease for many decades in Ethiopia, whereas bacterial wilt has em...

Creating institutional innovations in value chains is increasingly being pursued by multi-actor collaborative efforts, due to the failure of single actors to perform this task (Hall 2005; Pant 2012; Hounkonnou et al 2012). These diverse actors (business companies, donors and NGOs) collaborate as a 'means of developing strategic action' (Brinkerhoff...

To underline the need for radical, systemic changes, we have chosen the term “AgroEcological Transitions” for the title of this volume. It stresses that a transition towards sustainable agriculture requires more than improving agribusiness as usual. To us, agroecology refers to broad and varied processes of experimentation and innovation that often...

This chapter takes stock of the current knowledge and understanding of people's involvement in and experiences of photovoltaics (PVs), which is important for the design of PV systems as well as wise market introduction and support. It also takes an interest in everybody who is not professionally involved, as a 'prosumer', an active citizen or a gad...

In this paper we present our project on interdisciplinary evaluations of existing smart grid environments regarding (1) the technical performance of smart energy products and services, (2) end users perceptions, (3) stakeholder processes and (4) market aspects. Our evaluations are based on data and information originating from real life pilots and...

This article investigates the ways in which innovating incumbents address and deal with tensions in their daily conversations in a case of an dairy initiative aiming for sector transformation. Analysis of meetings shows that innovating incumbents employ three strategies to address and deal with tensions such as concerns about the initiative’s impac...

Sustainability transitions go hand in hand with learning. Theories in the realm of sustainability sciencesmostly concentrate on diversity and learning outcomes, whereas theories from the educational sciences mostly focus on learning as an interactive process. In this contribution, we aim to benefit from an integration of these perspectives in order...

While evaluation is seen as a mechanism for both accountability and learning, it is not self-evident that the evaluation of niche experiments focuses on both accountability and learning at the same time. Tensions exist between the accountability-oriented needs of funders and the learning needs of managers of niche experiments. This article explores...

This is a supplement to the guide Reflexive Monitoring in Action (RMA) , a methodology to support initiatives for system innovation, whether projects, programmes or movements. As the other tools the Learning Mirror aims at 1) keeping the ambition of achieving structural change high and preventing innovators to relapse into old, unsustainable patter...

In natural resource management facilitation literature, little attention is paid to sensitive issues in multi-stakeholder interaction and learning. This article aims to fill this gap. It discusses the variety of discursive strategies used by stakeholders to address sensitive issues with regard to fishery management in Benin, in three different sett...

Within development cooperation, development issues are increasingly recognized as complex problems requiring new paths towards solving them. In addition to the commonly used two dimensions of complex problems (uncertainty and disagreement), we introduce a third dimension: systemic stability; that is, stability provided by rules, relations and compl...

Met de invoering van het topsectorenbeleid wordt Publiek Private Samenwerking (PPS) breed ingezet in de uitdaging om de Nederlandse landbouw te ontwikkelen tot een duurzame sector. In publiek private samenwerking werken ondernemers, onderzoekers en de overheid samen aan innovatie; dit wordt wel de gouden driehoek genoemd. Trekkers van innovatieproc...

In Benin, a combination of governmental programmes effectively stimulated rice intensification by providing relevant institutional arrangements such as subsidized seed, credit and a market outlet. In this paper, the authors investigate the institutional character of these programmes by unpacking the rules embedded in them and by showing how farmers...

Rice production in inland valleys in Southern Benin was initiated by the public sector. The subsequent devolution of responsibility for maintaining the collective irrigation infrastructure to farmers created an opportunity to study the factors that affect cooperation in canal maintenance. We used a social dilemma perspective to compare three rice p...

Bij de transitie naar duurzame landbouw spelen agrarische ondernemers een belangrijke rol. Maar ook de betrokkenheid van andere actoren in de agrarische productie- en consumptieketen is essentieel. Wageningen UR heeft nu een handboek uitgebracht om projectleiders, beleidsmakers en anderen die in hun dagelijkse werk de transitie naar duurzame landbo...

This article discusses the extent to which a responsive evaluation (RE) approach contributed to learning by stakeholders in a case of high complexity. Fishery management in Grand-Popo, Benin is characterized by ambiguity, that is contrasting views among fishery stakeholders about what should be done, why, how, where, and when to resolve fishery pro...

This study investigates the technical and institutional factors that hinder the effective use of irrigation water and the development of the local rice value chain in an inland valley of Benin. Primary data have been collected in three areas: Koussin-Lélé, Bamè and Zonmon. The diagnosis indicates that both local and higher level institutional barri...

A proposed strategy to facilitate the use and development of radical new sustainable technologies is the creation of niches. Learning in these niches and the social embedding of learning experiences can stimulate changes in existing sociotechnological regimes. Pilot projects in which new technologies are used may form part of these niches. This art...

Over the years, there has been an evolution of systemic thinking in agricultural innovation studies, culminating in the agricultural innovation systems perspective. In an attempt to synthesize and organize the existing literature, this chapter reviews the literature on agricultural innovation, with the threefold goal of (1) sketching the evolution...

Previous studies of system innovations mainly focused on historical cases that were driven by commercial motivations of pioneers and entrepreneurs. This article investigates a system innovation in the making that is driven by normative concerns, such as sustainability or animal welfare, initially formulated by outsiders like special-interest groups...

The aim of many agricultural innovation networks is to realize a system innovation. With system innovation, whole production and consumption systems change, including social relationships, division of roles, formal rules and values, and the technical artefacts and infrastructure. This type of innovation takes place when stakeholders learn from each...

In order to be able to adapt successfully to eco-challenges, interest in change-oriented learning is growing around the world. The authors of this paper aim to assess the occurrence of learning for effective action-taking in successive fishery problem-solving interventions in the municipality of Grand-Popo, South-Western Benin, where interventions...

In this paper we suggest that system innovation projects take ambition as their focal point of attention. The ambition in the goals and activities of system innovation projects contains three dimensions: deviation from rules in the incumbent system; inclusiveness of elements and actors; and exploration. Reflexive Monitoring in Action (RMA) is a met...

Networks aiming for fundamental changes bring together a variety of actors who are part and parcel of a problematic context. These system innovation projects need to be accompanied by a monitoring and evaluation approach that supports and maintains reflexivity to be able to deal with uncertainties and conflicts while challenging current practices a...

In this paper we develop an analytical framework for studying learning processes in the context of efforts to bring about system innovation by building new networks of actors who are willing to work on a change towards sustainable development. We then use it to evaluate two specific intervention programmes carried out by a self-proclaimed ‘system i...

“Researchers at Wageningen University and the VU University Amsterdam, the Netherlands, have been working together on a type of monitoring that they have called reflexive monitoring in action (RMA). RMA has been developed especially for projects that aim to contribute to the sustainable development of a sector or region by working on system innovat...

Handboek over en voor monitoring van projecten die willen bijdragen aan een duurzame ontwikkeling van een sector of een gebied door te werken aan systeeminnovatie. Naast een beschouwing over het karakter en de waarde van dit type monitoring, biedt dit boek praktische richtlijnen die helpen om monintoring uit te voeren en bijpassende instrumenten te...

Previous studies of system innovations mainly focused on historical cases that were driven by commercial motivations of pioneers and entrepreneurs. This article investigates a system innovation in the making that is driven by normative concerns, such as sustainability or animal welfare, initially formulated by outsiders like special-interest groups...

Vernieuwingen ontstaan wanneer stakeholders in een proces van samen denken en doen van elkaar leren. Om beter grip te krijgen op dit soort leerprocessen worden steeds vaker monitoring- en evaluatiemethodieken ingezet. Welke methoden zijn er zoal te gebruiken, wat zijn de belangrijkste verschillen en in hoeverre zijn methoden uit de verschillende st...

To make the agricultural sector more sustainable requires system innovations, i.e. new technologies as well as institutional change. The dynamic of such system innovations can be understood using the `multilevel perspective¿ (MLP). The two key levels in the MLP are the so-called `socio-technical regime¿ (an existing system) and `technological niche...

Hoe kun je vanuit een innovatieproject tot institutionele veranderingen komen? Voor deze vraag staan projectteams die streven naar een duurzame ontwikkeling in een sector of gebied. Speciaal voor hen is reflexieve procesmonitoring in ontwikkeling, een nieuwe methode van monitoring en evaluatie voor trajecten gericht op systeeminnovatie. De methode...

This case study concerns the Dutch glasshouse horticulture sector which is responsible for 10% of the country’s natural gas consumption. Various developments resulted in internal as well as external pressures to bring this down. This has led to a variety of ‘alternative energy approaches’ for the sector. The interactions between niche and regime, h...

Transities en systeem-innovaties in de landbouw zijn het thema van dit rapport. Klimaatverandering, energiegebruik, methaan-emissies, dierenwelzijn, economische concurrentie, voedselschandalen (BSE, dioxine), verzuring, stankproblemen, landschapsinrichting, en rurale ontwikkeling zijn enkele van de socio-economische ontwikkelingen die druk creëren...

In deze Syscope-special staat 'leren' centraal als een essentieel ingrediënt van een op innovatie gerichte stimulerende omgeving. In het openingsartikel wordt ingegaan op de noodzakelijke randvoorwaarden voor zo'n omgeving en de consequenties die dat heeft voor de wijze waarop stakeholders en kenniswerkers samenwerken. In de daarop volgende artikel...

Het doel van dit werkdocument is om projectleiders van (systeem)innovatieprojecten te ondersteunen in het denken over monitoring en evaluatie. Het document formuleert antwoorden op vragen als: Wat is monitoring en evaluatie nu precies? Wat kan ik als projectleider met monitoring en evaluatie en wat niet? Welke vragen moet ik mezelf stellen als ik a...

Verslag van een onderzoek naar de vraag of het Nationaal Initiatief voor Duurzame Ontwikkeling (NIDO) kan worden beschouwd als een systeeminstrument en in hoeverre zij daarin succesvol is. Het is een verkennend onderzoek naar een manier om theorieën over leren samen te brengen met de innovatiesysteem-benadering. In twee programma¿s waarmee NIDO spr...

Aan de in Nederland beschikbare methoden om bewoners van dorpen zelf de leefbaarheid ter plaatse vast te laten stellen is een methode toegevoegd uit het Verenigd Koninkrijk. Kern van de methode is een softwareprogramma dat bewoners in staat stelt zelfstandig een vragenlijst te ontwikkelen door vragen uit een database te kiezen en daar zelfgemaakte...

This chapter describes the institutional barriers for building integrated photovoltaic (PV). Being an alternative for fossil fuels, PVs have to overcome traditional structures, procedures, cultures, and values. As a new building material PVs also have to deal with the structure and culture of the building sector. In this chapter the institutional b...

Two wind speed time series were analyzed and correlated in order to replace missing values in one of the time series. By taking directional and seasonal effect into account good correlations were found based on non-linear comparison of both time series. To avoid computer-time consuming calculations attempts were made to estimate these correlations...