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This study aims to show a case study of ecosystem-based adaptation (EbA) measures to increase coastal system’s resilience to extreme weather events and sea-level rise (SLR) implemented at Kiyú (Uruguayan coast of the Rio de la Plata river estuary).

A participatory process involving the community and institutional stakeholders was carried out to select and prioritise adaptation measures to reduce the erosion of sandy beaches, dunes and bluffs due to extreme wind storm surge and rainfall, SLR and mismanagement practices. The recovery of coastal ecosystems was implemented through soft measures (green infrastructure) such as revegetation with native species, dune regeneration, sustainable drainage systems and the reduction of use pressures.

Main achievements of this case study include capacity building of municipal staff and stakeholders, knowledge exchanges with national-level decision makers and scientists and the incorporation of EbA approaches by subnational-level coastal governments. To consolidate EbA, the local government introduced innovations in the coastal management institutional structure.

The outcomes of the article include, besides the increase in the resilience of social-ecological systems, the strengthening of socio-institutional behaviour, structure and sustainability. This experience provides insights for developing a strategy for both Integrated Coastal Management and climate adaptation at the national scale.

Despite their economic significance, empirical evidence on the growth constraints facing micro-businesses as an important subset of small and medium enterprises remains scarce. At the same time, little consideration has hitherto been given to the context in which entrepreneurial activity occurs. The purpose of this paper is to develop an empirically informed contextual understanding of micro-business growth, beyond firm-level constraints.

The paper draws on 50 in-depth interviews with stakeholders and micro-business owner–manager entrepreneurs (OMEs henceforth) in a peripheral post-industrial place (PPIP henceforth).

The paper shows that, beyond firm-level constraints generated by their OME-centric nature, there are “additional costs” for micro-businesses operating in PPIPs, specifically limited access to higher-skilled labour, a more challenging, “closed” business environment and negative outward perceptions stemming from place stigmatisation. All of these “additional costs” can serve to stymie OMEs' growth ambition.

The paper is based on a limited number of interviews conducted in one region in England. However, the contextualisation of the findings through a focus on PPIPs provides valuable insights and enables analytical generalisation.

The article develops a context-sensitive model of micro-business growth constraints, one that goes beyond the constraints inherent in the nature of micro-businesses and is sensitive to their local (socio-institutional) operating context. The implications serve to advance both how enterprise in the periphery is theorised and how it is addressed by policymakers and business intermediaries to support the growth of micro-businesses.

There is a need to proactively address strategic weaknesses in protecting the built environment from a range of hazards. This paper seeks to focus on the mitigation for flood hazards in the UK; particularly in understanding the extent of the problem, collating key guidance and legislation related to flood hazard mitigation, identifying who the key construction decision makers are and the most opportune stages of the Design‐Construction‐Operation Process when they need to make their key decisions.

A pluralistic research design was adopted for the study, which included a UK‐wide questionnaire survey and a set of semi‐structured interviews involving a range of professionals from construction, planning, insurance, emergency management and local/national government agencies was undertaken.

Despite the publication of a range of guidance on flood hazard mitigation in the UK there is still insufficient evidence that key construction stakeholders are playing an active role in mitigating flood risk. The pre‐construction phase of a building's life cycle is identified as is the most critical stage when key stakeholders need to adopt flood hazard mitigation strategies. The socio‐institutional constraints to the proactive attainment of built‐in resilience are highlighted as are recommendations as to how these constraints can be addressed.

The paper reports on the provisional findings of an ongoing project but these findings nonetheless provide essential foundations for the latter development of the PRE‐EMPT toolkit and also raise some important considerations about flood resilience in the UK.

The findings presented reveal how stakeholders should be better involved, and what issues they need to address, regarding the integration of built‐in resilience into construction decision making.

This chapter opens the second part of the Volume, focusing on the small farms' role and dynamics within the evolving food system. Assessing small farmers' actual and potential contribution to the change towards a sustainable food and nutrition security requires a deep understanding of their strategic decision-making processes. These processes take place in a context highly conditioned by internal and external conditions, including the complex relations between farm and household, which are mapped and described. Building on an adaptation of Porter's model (Porter, 1990), the chapter investigates how farmers, given those conditions, define their strategies (in particular their innovation strategies) aimed at economic and financial sustainability through a multidisciplinary analysis of scientific literature. Internal conditions are identified in the light of the Agricultural Household Model (Singh & Subramanian, 1986) which emphasizes how family farming strategies aim at combining business-related objectives, and family welfare. Then, a comprehensive set of external conditions is identified and then grouped within eight categories: ‘Factors’, ‘Demand’, ‘Finance and Risk’, ‘Regulation and Policy’, ‘Technological’, ‘Ecological’, ‘Socio-institutional’ and ‘Socio-demographic’. Similarly, six types of strategies are identified: ‘Agro-industrial competitiveness’, ‘Blurring farm borders’, ‘Rural development’, ‘Risk management’, ‘Political support’ and ‘Coping with farming decline’.

The discourse of construction practitioners and decision-makers worldwide has begun to appreciate and acknowledge the advantages of sustainable building. Toward this goal, one of the main steps is creating a control mechanism, which provides the context for moving to sustainable buildings by monitoring the environmental, economic and social dimensions of sustainability. The previous research studies indicate the social dimension has received far less attention than the economic and environmental aspects. Therefore, this study aims at developing a social sustainability framework to evaluate building systems.

This research has chosen the Parsons sociological theory as its theoretical framework basis and acquires the research theoretical framework with its modification and completion by grounded theory (GT). In the next step, to realize the GT structure validity and model fitting, the confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used and the research hypotheses were tested.

An integrated social sustainable framework is presented with five subsystems: socio-political, socio-cultural, socio-institutional, socio-economic and socio-environmental. This research addresses the void of a comprehensive social sustainability framework in the construction industry, and the findings can contribute to construction industry practitioners and decision-makers to evaluate building systems socially.

The application of this framework is not limited to the construction industry and building systems. It can deliver a general use for integrating social perspectives into decision-making on various subjects. Localization and specialization of current research's social sustainability components and factors can be a high potential research topic for future studies, in all fields and scopes. This framework can be a significant contribution to the sustainable development goals (SDGs) as a basis for creating comparable models to assess social aspects of buildings, campuses and urban sustainability.

Globalization has become such an all-encompassing concept that it is almost meaningless. However, most scholars recognize that the term conveys in some manner or form a shrinkage of time and space such that events happening in one part of the world have the potential to impact other locales (Giddens, 1999; Held, 1991). Beyond this most basic meaning, it is hard to find any agreement on what the term actually conveys or when in fact the world actually entered a global age (Morrow & Torres, 2000). Given the vagueness of globalization as a concept, the challenge then is to be as clear as possible in discussing various forces related to globalization that may impact a particular phenomenon under study. In the case of this chapter, the phenomenon of interest is university transformation in the developing world.

Purpose – Starting from the premise that human behavior is the result of a complex interaction between physiological processes, psychological values systems, and socio-institutional contexts, this chapter examines how political behavior can be better understood through a multilevel approach.

Design/methodology/approach – Employing social functionalism and Jonathan Haidt's Moral Foundations Theory, the conceptual model presented is predicated on the premise that human phenotypes are the product of evolutionary processes which have resulted in an intensely social animal. This chapter examines how physiological processes operating at the individual level, as demonstrated by recent neuroscience scholarship, are intricately involved in attitude formation as well as the presence of and variation in moral values. These individual-level traits are both responsible for socio-institutional processes as well as shaped by this larger social context.

Findings – The chapter cites that there are specific neural substrates that correlate with moral values responsible for the formation of preferences for particular policies.

Originality/value – In order to better understand political behavior and policy formation, it is incumbent upon political scientists to include individual-level analyses in theoretical models.

The chapter analyzed the conditions and challenges of the innovation in Latin America, and the historical trend in its study in the framework of this handbook. The transformative and inclusive approach of the innovation was evidenced as the most significant ascendent trend in the region. Furthermore, this was identified as a breaking point of the linear individualism of the entrepreneurship and the innovation in Latin America due to this type of innovation that requires high levels of collaboration and strong institutional leaderships. It was highlighted that the major challenge of recovery in the region should be accompanied by a deep transformation in the quality of education because the systematic generation of innovation implies capabilities rather than wills. The chapter closes with a critical reflexion of the phenomenon, the new lines of research in the region, and its implications.

Purpose: This chapter aims to address the problem and explore the process of creating the new ‘markets of tomorrow’ from the perspective of the technological inequalities arising in this context and leading to conflicts in international trade, thus prompting the creation of promising areas of conflict management.

Design/methodology/approach: The study is carried out using the comparative analysis methods through the review of analytical data, as well as using the qualitative structural and logical analysis method.

Findings: This chapter reviews the factors that determine the benefits and limits of participating in the creation of the new ‘markets of tomorrow’ in some of the world’s countries. Prospects and recommendations are identified to prevent or partially mitigate the technological inequalities constituting a barrier to the creation of new ‘markets of tomorrow’, provoking conflict in international trade and promoting the development of promising areas of conflict management.

Originality/value: The results of the study generally supported the assumption that recovery from the economic downturn associated with the COVID-19 pandemic requires a comprehensive and sustained economic transformation capable of delivering economic growth that would contribute to the broader social and environmental goals to be achieved over the coming decade. Implementing such a transformation will require the active creation of ‘markets of tomorrow’ through a creative combination of disruptive technological and socio-institutional innovations. The aim is not only to produce more or in a better way but also to transform economies by creating new technological and institutional systems that can address some of today’s most pressing social problems, in particular to mitigate technological inequalities and prevent conflicts from developing.

This study aims to investigate how Living Labs of Van Hall Larenstein UAS perform as sustainability-oriented, transdisciplinary learning environments. It shows how the sustainable development goals (SDGs) can be used as a compass and debates the sustainability impact of applied research.

A case study approach was adopted, including a literature review, scoping visits, online workshops and peer-to-peer inter-vision/learning, using the SDGs as a compass and framework for analysis.

Most Living Labs use a “silo-approach” on the SDGs and are designed from a technological-expert perspective. This results in blind spots, particularly on SDGs related to reducing socio-economic inequality and just institutions. Debating unsustainable systems, cultures and practices is avoided. To contribute to sustainability transitions, universities need to invest in developing transformative capacity. This refers to SDG-transition competences such as collaborative communication, constructively engaging with diversity and conflicts, discussing values, norms and ethics and encouraging reflexivity.

Mainly lecturer-researchers were involved in the study. COVID-19 travel restrictions hindered the research at the grassroots level in India and Indonesia.

The study revealed the importance of creating Living Labs as safe and brave inter- and transdisciplinary learning environments to practice reflexivity: encouraging students, researchers and stakeholders to look at sustainability issues from plural perspectives and questioning unsustainable practices, which combined lead to changing perceptions, practices and relations and a deeper understanding of how change happens. The SDGs as a compass method supports reflexivity among stakeholders and in redirecting strategies towards a sustainable future.