The local perspective on energy transition and innovation

Abstract

This contribution reviews three major perspectives on local transition processes from the economic, social, and political lens. We discuss the major dimensions, concepts, and complementarities of the three approaches—the regional innovation systems’ approach, the sustainable communities perspective, and the local governance concept. Based on the discussion, we suggest three guiding questions that should be addressed in future research on local transition and innovation processes. Using the case of the local energy transition, we demonstrate the applicability of our approach suggested. We find that local innovation is much more bond to social processes of the community and strongly depends on existing, multilevel governance patterns. The social perspective adds substantial insights to the regional innovation systems’ approach taking into consideration a larger variety of actors, institutions, infrastructures, and interactions.