Assessing the Transformative Potential of a Sociocracy-Informed Climate Change Adaptation Lab in Lund, Sweden

Abstract: Effective climate change adaptation necessitates enhanced public participation as there is a need for the voice of people to be meaningfully incorporated to facilitate transformational adaptation, contend with complexity, and avoid maladaptation. Despite this, widespread participation in climate change adaptation governance in Global North countries like Sweden is currently restricted by rigid power dynamics, even in spaces that purport to be transformationally participatory. In essence, there is an apparent gap between the needs identified in the literature and how practitioners actually carry out participation. This thesis aims to address this gap by developing a methodology for facilitating a climate change adaptation lab that can open these closed and invited spaces to challenge all forms of power from the bottom-up and thereby contribute to transformational change in the context of climate change adaptation. The transformational potential of the proposed lab is evaluated through the establishment and facilitation of two labs in the municipality of Lund in Sweden, utilizing the methodology of sociocracy. Interviews with experts in participatory climate change adaptation, sociocracy, and the Swedish context also supplement these findings. The conclusions of this thesis point towards the significant transformational potential of a sociocracy-informed climate change adaptation lab, while underscoring the need for further research into novel methodological approaches to participatory climate change adaptation.