Pathways to transformation: institutionalizing urban agriculture in a Montréal borough
Around the world, cities and their residents are experimenting with innovations for social and ecological sustainability, sowing the seeds of good Anthropocenes. Although such seed initiatives tend to operate at society’s margins, some successfully embed their innovations into new or existing regime...
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| Language: | English |
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Resilience Alliance
2025-06-01
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| Series: | Ecology and Society |
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| Online Access: | https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol30/iss2/art28 |
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| author | Olivia St-Laurent Karina Benessaiah Elena M. Bennett |
| author_facet | Olivia St-Laurent Karina Benessaiah Elena M. Bennett |
| author_sort | Olivia St-Laurent |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | Around the world, cities and their residents are experimenting with innovations for social and ecological sustainability, sowing the seeds of good Anthropocenes. Although such seed initiatives tend to operate at society’s margins, some successfully embed their innovations into new or existing regimes. This process, which is called institutionalization, is deemed crucial for accelerating transformations and ensuring the persistence of change, yet little is known about how institutionalization unfolds. Our study aimed to deepen empirical understanding of the dynamics of institutionalization by exploring how seed initiatives interact with other actors and interventions to institutionalize innovations in the pursuit of transformative visions and goals. We conducted a qualitative case study in Rivière-des-Prairies–Pointe-aux-Trembles, a borough in the city of Montréal, Canada where urban agriculture became more strongly institutionalized following the local government’s enactment of an urban agriculture policy in 2019. Through semi-structured interviews with 46 governmental and non-governmental actors, we discovered that government-supported interventions, including policies, can significantly bolster transformation. When these interventions are effectively designed in collaboration with a diverse community of change-makers, they make space for synergies between actors and resources, thereby supporting the flourishing of seed initiatives. Our findings revealed that institutionalization is not a linear process, but rather an iterative and dynamic process that can span every phase of transformation. In Rivière-des-Prairies–Pointe-aux-Trembles, institutionalization and experimentation were mutually reinforcing processes. Our results challenge prevailing notions of actors’ roles, for example by demonstrating that governments, too, can be seed actors, conducting their own innovative experiments. This study offers an alternative, more nuanced, explanation of how institutionalization relates to sustainability transformations through an empirical case-study in an urban local context. |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj-art-51d4e69e93df494bb08bb5baa7094dc8 |
| institution | Kabale University |
| issn | 1708-3087 |
| language | English |
| publishDate | 2025-06-01 |
| publisher | Resilience Alliance |
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| series | Ecology and Society |
| spelling | doaj-art-51d4e69e93df494bb08bb5baa7094dc82025-08-20T03:28:00ZengResilience AllianceEcology and Society1708-30872025-06-013022810.5751/ES-15897-30022815897Pathways to transformation: institutionalizing urban agriculture in a Montréal boroughOlivia St-Laurent0Karina Benessaiah1Elena M. Bennett2Department of Natural Resource Sciences, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, CanadaDepartment of Geography, Environment and Geomatics, University of Guelph, Guelph, Ontario, CanadaDepartment of Natural Resource Sciences, McGill University, Montreal, Quebec, CanadaAround the world, cities and their residents are experimenting with innovations for social and ecological sustainability, sowing the seeds of good Anthropocenes. Although such seed initiatives tend to operate at society’s margins, some successfully embed their innovations into new or existing regimes. This process, which is called institutionalization, is deemed crucial for accelerating transformations and ensuring the persistence of change, yet little is known about how institutionalization unfolds. Our study aimed to deepen empirical understanding of the dynamics of institutionalization by exploring how seed initiatives interact with other actors and interventions to institutionalize innovations in the pursuit of transformative visions and goals. We conducted a qualitative case study in Rivière-des-Prairies–Pointe-aux-Trembles, a borough in the city of Montréal, Canada where urban agriculture became more strongly institutionalized following the local government’s enactment of an urban agriculture policy in 2019. Through semi-structured interviews with 46 governmental and non-governmental actors, we discovered that government-supported interventions, including policies, can significantly bolster transformation. When these interventions are effectively designed in collaboration with a diverse community of change-makers, they make space for synergies between actors and resources, thereby supporting the flourishing of seed initiatives. Our findings revealed that institutionalization is not a linear process, but rather an iterative and dynamic process that can span every phase of transformation. In Rivière-des-Prairies–Pointe-aux-Trembles, institutionalization and experimentation were mutually reinforcing processes. Our results challenge prevailing notions of actors’ roles, for example by demonstrating that governments, too, can be seed actors, conducting their own innovative experiments. This study offers an alternative, more nuanced, explanation of how institutionalization relates to sustainability transformations through an empirical case-study in an urban local context.https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol30/iss2/art28amplificationecological transitioninstitutionalizationmainstreamingseeds of good anthropocenessocial innovationtransformationsustainability transitionurban agriculture |
| spellingShingle | Olivia St-Laurent Karina Benessaiah Elena M. Bennett Pathways to transformation: institutionalizing urban agriculture in a Montréal borough Ecology and Society amplification ecological transition institutionalization mainstreaming seeds of good anthropocenes social innovation transformation sustainability transition urban agriculture |
| title | Pathways to transformation: institutionalizing urban agriculture in a Montréal borough |
| title_full | Pathways to transformation: institutionalizing urban agriculture in a Montréal borough |
| title_fullStr | Pathways to transformation: institutionalizing urban agriculture in a Montréal borough |
| title_full_unstemmed | Pathways to transformation: institutionalizing urban agriculture in a Montréal borough |
| title_short | Pathways to transformation: institutionalizing urban agriculture in a Montréal borough |
| title_sort | pathways to transformation institutionalizing urban agriculture in a montreal borough |
| topic | amplification ecological transition institutionalization mainstreaming seeds of good anthropocenes social innovation transformation sustainability transition urban agriculture |
| url | https://www.ecologyandsociety.org/vol30/iss2/art28 |
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