Will Eadson explores how policymakers in South Yorkshire interpret and implement the concept of a just transition—the idea that the shift to a low-carbon economy must be fair and inclusive. Drawing on research using Q-methodology, the study reveals how different stakeholders conceptualise justice, change, and transformation.
Cities around the world are declaring climate emergencies and pledging to reach “net zero” carbon emissions. Climate action is urgent, but we must recognise that it affects different people and different places in different ways. Old industrial regions, for example, face unique challenges. They’re under pressure to decarbonise, but they also have to deal with the long-term legacies of economic restructuring and social inequality.
The idea of a just transition is about making sure that the move to a greener economy is fair and inclusive. It’s not just about cutting carbon, it’s about supporting people and communities through the changes, making sure everyone has a say, and recognising different needs and histories.
How do the decision makers—senior policymakers, business leaders, and community representatives—make sense of the idea of a just transition?
Our research, published in European Urban and Regional Studies, sought to answer this question through research in South Yorkshire, England. Using a method called Q-methodology (a way of sorting and ranking ideas), we investigated how these leaders think about justice, change, and the depth of transformation needed.
Three Facets of a Just Transition
First, what do we mean by just transition? We developed a ‘3D’ framework to help make sense of the different ways people interpret just transition:
- Domains of Justice: This includes distributive justice (fair sharing of resources), procedural justice (who gets a say), and recognition justice (acknowledging different cultures and identities).
- Dimensions of Change: Change affects different places, groups, and sectors in different ways and unfolds over time.
- Depth of Transition: Some see just transition as tweaking existing systems (like helping workers retrain), while others see it as requiring deep, systemic change—reimagining democracy, institutions, and societal norms.
There’s no single way to define or deliver a just transition. It’s a complex, unstructured policy problem with lots of uncertainty and disagreement about what matters most.
How Policymakers Make Sense of Change
Policy isn’t made in a vacuum. It’s shaped by the lived experiences, beliefs, and habits of the people making decisions. We drew on the idea of “sensemaking”—how people interpret new ideas and decide what to do about them.
We developed a framework for understanding the sensemaking process through three phases:
- Conceptualisation: Understanding what the idea of ‘just transition’ means
- Contextualisation: Relating the idea to local realities—who is affected, what places matter, what histories are important.
- Operationalisation: Deciding what actions to take, turning ideas into real policies.
But this isn’t easy. New policy concepts like just transition interact with people’s own experiences, preferences, and understandings, which are also influenced by different power dynamics. Existing ways of thinking can reinforce the status quo or open up new possibilities.
Why Is This So Hard?
Urban governments are often seen as the best place for transformative change because they’re close to the people and have a critical mass of social networks and infrastructure. But they also face big challenges:
- Limited resources and powers, especially after years of budget cuts.
- Complex governance structures, with responsibilities spread across different levels and sectors.
- The need to balance local realities with national and global climate goals.
In the UK, city and regional governments are especially tied to national government priorities and funding regimes, and often have to negotiate with government for funding to support programmes for decarbonisation or economic development. All of this makes it harder to implement transformational change.
The study found several points of challenge for moving beyond existing policy approaches towards more transformative approach to just transition. At the conceptualisation and contextualisation stage, these include:
- Conflicting Interpretations: While the idea of just transition is widely embraced, stakeholders often have varying ideas of what it actually means. Some prioritise economic growth and technological innovation, while others emphasise social solidarity and citizen empowerment.
- Repurposing existing concepts: stakeholders used existing policy concepts to help them make sense of just transition, most commonly reformulating just transition as “inclusive growth plus net zero”.
- Historical legacies: In our study, the South Yorkshire region’s industrial past, characterised by economic decline and social scarring, shaped how policymakers approach the transition. This can lead to a focus on revitalising traditional industries rather than exploring more transformative possibilities.
- Regional Imaginaries: participants largely characterised the region as an economic territory threatened by external forces, with less attention given to different aspects of justice beyond distributive domains or lived experiences of citizens.
These disconnects reflect the difficulties that we all have when faced with new ideas or concepts, and the tendency to either reject them or incorporate them within our existing world view.
Operationalising Just Transition
The research revealed a tendency among stakeholders to rely on familiar strategies when operationalising just transition. Participants advocated investment and coordination to stimulate infrastructure, jobs, and skills—the existing repertoire for regional policymaking.
While these investments are important, they might not be sufficient to address the underlying and growing challenges of inequality and environmental degradation. The study also found limited support for increased citizen participation in decision-making, raising concerns about procedural justice.
To be clear, this is not a criticism of individuals but instead reflects the difficulties of implementing new ideas or frameworks within embedded political frameworks, especially the perceived constraints placed by national government priorities and funding regimes.
Moving beyond incremental change
Since the completion of our research, the focus on ‘growth first’ strategy by the current UK government has further embedded entrenched ways of viewing regional development. English city regions have recently been mandated to develop Local Growth Plans, emphasising opportunities for economic growth and identifying ‘growth-driving sectors’. In many regions, there will be a desire to align this with goals for net zero and inclusivity, but the risk is that ambitions for transformative just transition become further narrowed towards incremental change in service of the abstract notion of ‘growth’, especially given short timeframes to respond that work against more inclusive conversations.
However, our research also found points of promise for achieving a transformative just transition. Our research involved just one discussion with policy stakeholders; further reflection and deliberative conversations, utilising our layered framework for sensemaking, could help to address three points of challenge:
- Opening up space for new framings and ideas for transformative regional development
- Supporting the development of new regional narratives about histories and futures, through engagement with diverse groups across regions and understanding of their lived experiences of change
- Developing new institutional imaginaries through active deliberation of what the ‘real’ as well as ‘assumed’ limits of action are, and taking advantage of windows of opportunity for greater regional devolution to push forward transformative agendas.
As academic researchers, we think there is value in making the most of regional academics as assets who can help translate different ways of thinking into policy solutions. Strides are being made through a range of investments in strengthening the nexus between policy and academia, such as the recent £6m UPEN investment from ESRC and, of course, the Policy Innovation Partnership network. In South Yorkshire, the South Yorkshire Sustainability Centre also strives to open up conversations on how we can achieve transformative change together.
More broadly, our research highlighted that challenges like just transition are not only – or perhaps even primarily – a question of resources or infrastructure. They are fundamentally a question of expanding our imaginations of what a green and just future might look like, about what and who is important for such a shift to become reality.
This blog was written by Will Eadson, Professor of Urban and Regional Studies, Sheffield Hallam University.
Find out more about the Local Policy Innovation Partnership Hub.
Disclaimer:
The views expressed in this post are those of the author and not necessarily those of City-REDI or the University of Birmingham.