UNMAKING: a research programme on the disruption of capitalism in societal transformation to sustainability

Welcome to the website of the research programme UNMAKING. Grassroots initiatives may hold the potential to transform society toward sustainability. This project will use a novel interdisciplinary theory and an innovative combination of methods to explain whether, when and how agri-food grassroots initiatives unmake environmentally disruptive institutions and practices that are deeply ingrained in capitalist societies.

An overview of the research programme can be accessed here while more detailed information on the research programme and its subprojects can be found here.

Leadership

This programme is led by Dr. Giuseppe Feola and hosted by the Section of Environmental Governance at the Copernicus Institute of Sustainable Development.

Funding

This research programme consists of two separate, but parallel projects funded by the Netherlands Organization for Scientific Research (NWO) through a Vidi Research Grant, and by the European Research Council (ERC) through a Starting Grant, respectively.

News

20 October 2023

Julia Spanier presents at University of Amsterdam

On 18 October Julia Spanier gave a talk titled ‘Rural-urban degrowth transformations: lessons from community-supported agriculture’ at the ...

05 October 2023

Leonie Guerrero Lara presents at Critical Political Economy Research Network

Leonie Guerrero Lara presented the paper ‘Degrowth and agri-food systems: a research agenda for the critical social sciences‘ at the Critical ...

01 October 2023

UNMAKING team organizes and presents at 3rd Utrecht Degrowth Symposium

Members of the UNMAKING team organized and/or presented at the ‘3rd Utrecht Degrowth Symposium: Sowing sustainability in food and agriculture‘ ...

01 September 2023

Laura van Oers and Giuseppe Feola present at the 14th International Sustainability Transitions Conference in Utrecht

Laura van Oers and Giuseppe Feola present at the 14th International Sustainability Transitions Conference in Utrecht. Laura van Oers: Community-supported ...

01 September 2023

UNMAKING team presents at 9th International Degrowth Conference in Zagreb

Julia Spanier, Leonie Guerrero Lara and Jacob Smessaert presented three papers and co-led a workshop session at the 9th International Degrowth Conference ...

18 August 2023

Guilherme Raj presents at SASE 2023 in Rio de Janeiro

Guilherme Raj presented the paper ‘Selective, quiet and representational: lessons from rural queer empowerment in a community-supported ...

14 August 2023

New publication on power in transformation to postcapitalist work relations in community–supported agriculture

Raj, G., Feola, G. & Runhaar, H. Work in progress: power in transformation to postcapitalist work relations in community–supported ...

03 July 2023

Laura van Oers, Julia Spanier and Giuseppe Feola presented at Rural Geography conference

Laura van Oers, Julia Spanier and Giuseppe Feola presented papers at the third Rural Geography Conference hosted by the University of Groningen. Laura van ...

30 June 2023

Giuseppe Feola presents at Institute of Geography, University of Münster

On 29 June Giuseppe Feola presented the talk ‘Sustainability transformation beyond capitalism: theorizing negation and affirmation in prefigurative ...

23 June 2023

Giuseppe Feola presented at Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lisbon (online)

On 22 June Giuseppe Feola presented the talk ‘Sustainability transformation from the bottom up: grassroots initiatives in and beyond ...

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