Local Initiatives: Factors in and Lessons for Sustainable Development

This paper reviews scholarly literature on local initiatives for sustainable development, exploring how such initiatives succeed and become part of a wider societal transformation towards sustainability. Five factors are highlighted: capacity and learning; flexibility and profitability; solidarity and autonomy, support and access, and networks. Drawing on these factors the paper emphasizes the importance of understanding the linkages between local initiatives and the outside world; that knowledge and different types of knowledge matter; and, that a holistic approach to sustainable development is of importance.