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W e know that COVID-19 is the worst global public health
crisis in living memory. It is changing everyday life in an
immediate and stark fashion across the world, arguably not
seen since the Second World War. We are in self-isolation, need
to stay at home, keep our distance from others, airplanes are
grounded, public transportation is empty and home school-
ing is becoming the norm. But will this virus change how we
live forever? Many are longing for a return to normal as soon
as possible, while others are calling for the recovery period
to be used to change our economies and societies to address
the climate crisis. All of this begs the question: what does the
COVID-19 crisis signify?
To answer this question and interpret the crisis we need a
frame. In this article I am using the Deep Transitions frame-
work to answer the question of the meaning of COVID-19
(Schot 2016; Schot/Kanger 2018; Kanger/Schot 2018; Swilling
2020), bringing to the fore deeper issues about whether we are
living at a tipping point in history, a divide between what I will
call a First and Second Deep Transition, and are experiencing
a period in which the world is making a significant move to-
wards a more sustainable future?
A shock for the socio-technical
landscape
In the Deep Transitions framework COVID-19 is a shock
produced at the landscape level. The landscape is our social,
technical and ecological environment which surrounds and
sustains us. The landscape is our context which we cannot eas-
ily influence, at least not in the short-term. We can take meas-
ures to combat COVID-19 and reduce the probability of new
pandemics emerging, yet our modern societies will continue to
cause them to occur; they are a normal accident (Perrow 1984),
one that is expected and caused by how we organize our soci-
eties and economies. The landscape consists of many trends:
urbanization, climate change, rising inequality, individualiza-
tion, digital transformation, hyper-modernity and globalization
are all developments within it. Landscape trends put pressures
on the way we live and we have to adapt to them. They can also
produce shocks. Such shocks appear as if they have been pro-
duced suddenly, but have been building up as a result of the
synergies between all trends, as volcanos and earthquakes sud-
denly erupt and generate havoc.
Our modern landscape is not a natural one, it is a socio-tech-
nical landscape in which nature has been transformed by hu-
man beings in an unprecedented way. This is the idea behind
the proclamation we live in the Anthropocene (Crutzen 2002).
Humans have used science and technology to build a complete
new world, a new life-style based on abundance. Now we have
to live with the ecological consequences, such as the climate
and biodiversity crises, and the social consequences, the un-
even distribution of abundance. These consequences are em-
bedded in the deep choices we have made when designing this
world, which suggests that we cannot fix the consequences
by small adjustments. This world was created during the first
Deep Transition that started at some point in the 18
th
th century.
Historians refer to it as the Industrial Revolution. I prefer to
use the notion of Deep Transition because it expresses bet-
ter the underlying dynamics. Industry becoming a driver for
change is certainly pivotal, but the genesis of the modern world
should be located in implementing a number of new socio-
technical systems for the provision of basic needs: energy, mo-
bility, healthcare, water, communication, food, housing, that
were optimized in specific directions. The use of fossil fuels,
linear production using nature as a free sink, labour productiv-
ity instead of land or resource productivity, globalized and in-
dustrial production, mass production and mass consumption.
In this way industrialization is one of the directions, among
others.
In the Deep Transitions framework these directions are a re-
sult of the adoption of meta-rules by a wide range of actors from
business, to governments, to citizens and consumers and social
movements, who use these rules to create, maintain and im-
prove the energy, water, mobility, housing, food and other sys-
tems. The meta-rules for the governance of these systems have
been framed by the struggle between communism, fascism
and democracy often tied to capitalism, and the acceptance of
technocracy across all three ideologies. Capitalism has become
dominant and promotes the idea that the market should put the
systems in place, run them, and in this process generate eco-
nomic growth, while the state is responsible for fixing market
failures, and managing the consequences through regulation,
putting limits on how the market operates.
as turning point in history
Interpreting COVID- through the
lens of the second Deep Transition
Is COVID- a stepping stone towards a more
sustainable future, or it is just a stone in the pond
of which the effects will wither away as soon as
we are back to normal? A look at the opportuni-
ties arising from the crisis.
By Johan Schot
ÖkologischesWirtschaften . ()
SCHWERPUNKT: ZEITENWENDE
DOI ./OEW
ÖkologischesWirtschaften .
()
| DOI ./OEW
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Opportunities for Deep Transitions?
A Deep Transition can thus be defined as a series of con-
nected fundamental transformations of a wide range of socio-
technical systems in a similar set of directions. We use the word
deep because it is about a broad set of systems providing our so-
ciety with a socio-technical landscape as we know it today, but
also because it has been created through interactions of many
actors who have put in place a new set of meta-rules that gov-
ern their behaviour, beliefs and values. When a set of rules are
aligned it is called a regime. The notion of rules occupies a cen-
tral place in institutional theory (Giddens 1984) as well as in in-
stitutional economics (North 1990). Rules are institutions set-
ting constraints on specific action while making other actions
possible. Rules are difficult to change, not only because they are
collective, but also because they are embedded or expressed in
systems. Individuals or organizations may want to have a sus-
tainable lifestyle or operation, but they are often constrained by
other actors, the systems put in place, and ultimately the land-
scape in which they act.
Taking the Deep Transition framing into account, how does
change come about? It starts in specific environments which
protect actors against the behaviour of dominant system ac-
tors, and against many trends at the landscape level that are
aligned with rules used for running the systems. Building on
sustainability transitions thinking, these environments are
called niches (Grin etal. 2010). This is how solar and wind en-
ergy came into being. They were nurtured in niches. They be-
gan as a new practice of decentralized energy production, estab-
lishing new user preferences, new regulatory measures and in-
frastructural changes. The niches were protected by subsidies
and/or strong collectives accepting the constraints. The land-
scapes are not only supporting the dominant systems, some
trends may also help to induce niche development. A landscape
trend and shocks such as climate change contributed to the de-
velopment of renewable energy niches. Within the niche ac-
tors engaged in learning, networking, and visioning leading
to the buildup of a new socio-technical energy system, which
then began to compete head on with the centralized electricity
production system based on fossil fuels. Change does not only
come about through niche development, it also needs a desta-
bilization of the dominant systems; this can happen because of
the threat of a new competitor, but more often systems them-
selves are hollowed out because actors supporting them start
to question the ability of systems to resolve the problems as
they appear within the landscape, and are voiced by a range of
actors, often by social movements in the first instance (Kivi-
maa
&
Kern 2016).
This dynamic of niche and system (or regime) competition
influenced by landscape development operates within areas
such as energy, mobility, food single systems, but also across
systems because they are coupled through global value chains,
sharing of resources (for example research infrastructures) and
exchanging of experiences, so actors in each system learn from
one other. It is this process in which niches and systems be-
come aligned that a transition is deepened because niches and
systems begin to operate according to a similar set of rules.
These rules act as the genotype of further evolution. Mass pro-
duction was not a dominant practice for many systems, as a set
of principles it was only used in a number of niches (mainly
the car industry), and it was highly contested before the Sec-
ond World War. After the War the principles of mass pro-
duction and the factory became a dominant practice for food
production, agriculture, construction, and healthcare for exam-
ple.
For new systems to emerge and become established domi-
nant practice it may take 40 to 60 years. Perez (2002) calls this
a Surge of Development. Each surge has a turning point some-
where in the middle, whereby actors are forced by a huge crisis
to decide on the directionality of the surge, or in other words,
the competition between various niches and systems. For the
Fourth Surge the Second World War gave the final push to mass
production and mass consumption becoming the dominant
meta-rule sets for many systems (see figure 1).
A pandemic of change?
What does this all imply for our interpretation of COVID-19?
This pandemic comes at a time of a turning point of the Fifth
Surge fueled by the meta-rules of digitalization influencing
many systems, but not in a decisive way. This is also a Surge
in which many systems are questioned because of the ecologi-
cal and social consequences they have generated. A wide range
of actors have called for a wider transformation. This is indeed
why the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals are im-
portant. These are goals accepted by almost all nations of the
world for transforming our world and our systems. To there-
fore take digitalization forward, it needs to be married to other
social and ecological meta-rules. The world is not only ques-
tioning the dominant practices and systems, at this point in
time meta-rules are nurtured in niches. They exist and thrive
there. Examples are organic and localized food production, the
retrofitting of houses, renewable energy, new forms of water
provision that reduce the need for fresh water, a focus on pre-
„COVID-19 will help
to promote specific niches
and help to de-stabilize
some existing systems.“
ÖkologischesWirtschaften . ()
SCHWERPUNKT: ZEITENWENDE
vention and lifestyle changes in medical
care. The big question is thus whether
the actors will decide to build a Fifth
Surge towards a digital future in which
these niches are incorporated without
changing a major directionality, so green
and social issues are secondary drivers
(meta-rules). This may result in green
growth with a very uneven global distri-
bution of the benefits and impacts how-
ever. The alternative is actors investing
in building up the Second Deep Transi-
tion, niches becoming the lever for cre-
ating a new development pathway divert-
ing from the Industrial Modern Society
as we know it today (see figure 1). Such
a pathway is putting the double ecolog-
ical and social challenges at the heart of
the development paradigm. Growth and progress will be meas-
ured in completely new ways. This is not a binary choice, both
may happen simultaneously, and blends are conceivable, how-
ever at some point one will become the dominant development
pathway. When this will happen is the fundamental question.
COVID-19 as a landscape shock can play a role in both sce-
narios. It will not single-handily trigger a big change itself, how-
ever it will be a factor in the battle between prolonging the First
Deep Transition and building up the Second Deep Transition.
Most likely it will help to promote specific niches, and help to
de-stabilize some existing systems (healthcare, food, mobility
systems) because actors have been convinced that COVID-19
should not be treated as a normal accident, but as a signifier of
a bigger set of crises that require addressing. Whether this hap-
pens in reality and with what impacts can only be documented
in retrospect, however COVID-19 has clarified once again that
the need for a Second Deep Transition should be embraced in
order to avoid further regional and global lock-downs as a re-
sult of future social and ecological crisis in the coming decades,
let alone the prospects of New Wars that may be caused (John-
stone
&
MacLeish 2020 a and 2020 b).
References
Crutzen, P.
J. (): Geology of mankind. In: Nature : .
Giddens, A. (): The Constitution of Society. Berkeley, University of
California Press.
Grin, J./Rotmans, J./Schot, J.
W. (): Transitions to Sustainable Develop-
ment: New Directions in the Study of Long Term Transformative Change.
New York, Routledge.
Johnstone, P./McLeish, C. ( a): The Role of War in Deep Transitions:
Exploring Mechanisms, Imprints and Rules in Sociotechnical Systems.
https://deeptransitions.net/publication/the-role-of-war-in-deep-
transitions-exploring-mechanisms-imprints-and-rules-in-sociotechnical-
systems/
Johnstone, P./McLeish, C. ( b): The ‘COVID war’? Reflections on
mechanisms and the imprints of the COVID- pandemic.
https://deeptransitions.net/publication/the-covid-war-reflections-on-
mechanisms-and-imprints-of-the-covid--pandemic/
Kanger, L./Schot, J.
W. (): Deep transitions: Theorizing the long-term
patterns of socio-technical change. In: Environmental Innovation
and Societal Transitions : –.
Kivimaa, P./Kern, F. (): Creative destruction or mere niche support?
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/: –.
North, D. (): Institutions, Institutional Change and Economic Perfor-
mance. Cambridge, Cambridge University Press.
Perez, C. (): Technological Revolutions and Financial Capital. Chelten-
ham, Edward Elgar Publishing.
Perrow, C. (): Normal accidents: Living with high-risk technologies.
New York, Basic Books.
Schot, J.
W. (): Confronting the second deep transition through the
historical imagination. In: Technology and Culture /: –.
Schot, J.
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AUTHOR + CONTACT
Johan Schot is Professor at Utrecht University Centre
for Global Challenges, The Netherlands
&
Visiting
Professor at University of Johannesburg, South Africa.
He is also Academic Director of the Transformative
Innovation Policy Consortium.
Utrecht University, Centre for Global Challenges,
Janskerkhof – a, BK Utrecht. Tel.: +,
E-Mail: j.w.schot@uu.nl
Years
Diffusion of successive surges
First Deep Transition
(s–?)
Second
Deep
Transition?
st surge
Industrial
(–)
nd surge
Steam & Railways
(–)
rd surge
Steel, Electricity &
Heavy Engineering
(–)
th surge
Oil & Mass
Production
(–)
th surge
Information &
Telecom
(–?)
Accumulation of meta-rules
Turning
point
Figure : First and Second Deep Transition (drawn by Laur Kanger). An adapted version can be found
in Schot and Kanger , p.
.
ÖkologischesWirtschaften . ()
SCHWERPUNKT: ZEITENWENDE
