Sustainability transitions pose some of the most urgent challenges to societies today, as well as in the (distant) past. Transitions in energy systems, food production, the use of natural resources, or the shift from agrarian to urban and industrial societies always play out over longer spans of time. Current debates on sustainability challenges and proposed transitions benefit greatly from professionals who understand history deeply and can compare developments across long periods of time.

This package equips students with skills to analyze various types of sustainability transitions in a temporal (intergenerational) framework. By examining transitions in depth and comparing different methodological and theoretical approaches, students will learn to untangle complexity and synthesize diverse perspectives.

Students will:

• Gain knowledge of dynamic models linking environmental, demographic, economic, political, and technological forces.
• Explore key concepts such as path dependence, resource curse, carrying capacity, and tipping points.
• Apply their learning to real cases through written reports, scenario modeling, and case-based games.
• Actively engage with them through hands-on cases, written reports scenario-modelling and case-based games.

Students can choose how many courses they want to take from the package.

Overview electives