Dr. Bipashyee Ghosh | University of Sussex (original) (raw)

Books by Dr. Bipashyee Ghosh

Asia’s rapidly growing cities are gearing up to meet increasing mobility needs while simultaneous... more Asia’s rapidly growing cities are gearing up to meet increasing mobility needs while simultaneously striving to achieve sustainability goals. A number of new innovations are being introduced in the form of experiments aiming to change the systems and rule-sets that currently dominate the provision of mobility services in Asian cities. This chapter analyses selected cases of mobility experiments in India and Thailand and explores the strategies that the niche actors deploy to navigate the challenges posed by incumbent socio-technical regimes. The chapter concludes that whilst niche actors tried to stretch-and-transform technological, infrastructural and cultural dimensions of regimes, they opted to fit-and-conform with public policy and political power dimensions.

Papers by Dr. Bipashyee Ghosh

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

Here we propose a framework for considering the justice issues of industrial cluster decarbonisat... more Here we propose a framework for considering the justice issues of industrial cluster decarbonisation, a pressing challenge confronting many industrialised economies. Industrial clusters are large, multi-point source emitters, users of energy and employers of regional and national significance. In the UK, establishing low carbon industrial clusters is one of several grand challenges of industrial strategy. Theorising the just transition of industrial clusters requires concepts from multiple literatures. We abstract relevant themes from the intersections of the literatures of just transitions, innovation studies and sociotechnical transitions, and public participation in spatial planning, and illustrate their empirical relevance. The broad themes of our framework are (i) politics, space and institutions, with sub-themes of justice, democracy, financialization; (ii) new processes and procedures, with subthemes of legal recognition of public concerns, community-based planning, community capacity enhancement and life cycle impact assessment; and (iii) correlates of acceptance and resistance, with sub-themes of environmental values, perceived loss of amenity, pre-existing politics, perceptions of just process and trust in the developer. The framework is intended to both guide the design of just transition processes ex-ante and evaluate these post-hoc.

The Nexus Network, Mar 24, 2017

Bipashyee Ghosh, a doctoral student at SPRU attended the Nexus Network workshop on ‘Transforming ... more Bipashyee Ghosh, a doctoral student at SPRU attended the Nexus Network workshop on ‘Transforming Innovation: addressing nexus challenges with radical change’ on 17th March 2017. Here she shares her thoughts from the day, arguing that transformation towards sustainability at the nexus requires attention be paid to transdisciplinary knowledge; appreciation of plurality and diversity; and experimentation with the knots and joints of interrelated systems

Throughout and 2019, academic scholars and policymakers involved in research and practice on scie... more Throughout and 2019, academic scholars and policymakers involved in research and practice on science, technology and innovation (STI) policy came together on several occasions to explore intersections of their perspectives around the emerging 'Transformative Innovation Policy (TIP)' theme, in the 'internetwork dialogue'. This working paper presents discussion on ten questions raised in multiple sessions and workshops, categorised under three main themes-1) conceptualisation, 2) actors and contexts and 3) operationalisation of TIP. The aim of this paper is to present the rich quality and diversity of knowledge shared by over 100 scholars with transdisciplinary expertise, as well as policy professionals willing to contribute practical experience to the scholarly debates. A further aim of this paper is to provide a springboard for accelerating the ongoing developments in TIP research. A virtual conference in 2021 could build on these different streams of knowledge presented in the paper. The paper seeks further contributions from the new network of TIP scholars (TIPRN) in building a vibrant community of practise on TIP.

The impending climate emergency, the Paris agreement and Sustainable Development Goals demand sig... more The impending climate emergency, the Paris agreement and Sustainable Development Goals demand significant transformations in economies and societies. Science funders, innovation agencies, and scholars have explored new rationales and processes for policymaking, such as transformative innovation policy (TIP). Here, we address the question of how to orient the efforts of science, technology, and innovation policy actors to enable transformations. We build on sustainability transitions research and a 4-year co-creation journey of the TIP Consortium to present twelve transformative outcomes that can guide public policy agencies in evaluating and reformulating their projects, programmes, and policies. We illustrate the transformative outcomes in two empirical cases: transitions towards mobility-as-a-service in the Finnish transport system and the emergence of speciality coffee in Colombia. We argue that the twelve transformative outcomes can guide public policy agents to fundamentally tr...

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2021

Asia’s rapidly growing cities are gearing up to meet increasing mobility needs while simultaneous... more Asia’s rapidly growing cities are gearing up to meet increasing mobility needs while simultaneously striving to achieve sustainability goals. A number of new innovations are being introduced in the form of experiments aiming to change the systems and rule-sets that currently dominate the provision of mobility services in Asian cities. This chapter analyses selected cases of mobility experiments in India and Thailand and explores the strategies that the niche actors deploy to navigate the challenges posed by incumbent socio-technical regimes. The chapter concludes that whilst niche actors tried to stretch-and-transform technological, infrastructural and cultural dimensions of regimes, they opted to fit-and-conform with public policy and political power dimensions.

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2020

The impending climate emergency, the Paris agreement and Sustainable Development Goals demand sig... more The impending climate emergency, the Paris agreement and Sustainable Development Goals demand significant transformations in economies and societies. Science funders, innovation agencies, and scholars have explored new rationales and processes for policymaking, such as transformative innovation policy (TIP). Here, we address the question of how to orient the efforts of science, technology, and innovation policy actors to enable transformations. We build on sustainability transitions research and a 4-year co-creation journey of the TIP Consortium to present twelve transformative outcomes that can guide public policy agencies in evaluating and reformulating their projects, programmes, and policies. We illustrate the transformative outcomes in two empirical cases: transitions towards mobility-as-a-service in the Finnish transport system and the emergence of speciality coffee in Colombia. We argue that the twelve transformative outcomes can guide public policy agents to fundamentally transform their ways of thinking and operation in advancing transformative change.

Journal of Transport Geography, 2021

This paper examines two bikeshare programs implemented in two Global South cities, examining the ... more This paper examines two bikeshare programs implemented in two Global South cities, examining the role of users in promoting sustainable transport. To explore the sustainability of smart cycling, we argue that it is important to understand the prevailing administrative and socio-institutional practices within a given context. For the effective stabilisation of smart regimes, harmony between the administrative and socio-institutional practices must be established. In this context, we introduce a complementary approach to understanding transitions. Maintenance of political commitments and institutional support are crucial for cycling success, not incidental footloose initiatives. We explore two case studies in the context of the Global South, in the first one top-down policies and planning initiatives dictate the directions of transitions by enabling or constraining user routines. In the second one, citizens take control to resolve a transport deficit by initiating and driving a very bottom-up user-led transition narrative. We propose a framework to cater to the unique political, cultural and smart discourses of the Global South and the role of users in conjunction with the administrative and socio-institutional practices around them. Investigating both the bikeshare cases through the lens of this framework provides unique insights extending our knowledge beyond the built environment features of sustainable planning initiatives. Our findings reveal the complex narratives that are in play in developing nations and conclude that understanding and realising cycling transitions in southern megacities require a different approach compared to the Global North.

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2018

The SPRU Working Paper Series aims to accelerate the public availability of the research undertak... more The SPRU Working Paper Series aims to accelerate the public availability of the research undertaken by SPRU-associated people, and other research that is of considerable interest within SPRU, providing access to early copies of SPRU research.

Sustainability Science, 2017

It is generally accepted that the concept of sustainability is not straightforward, but is subjec... more It is generally accepted that the concept of sustainability is not straightforward, but is subject to ongoing ambiguities, uncertainties and contestations. Yet literature on sustainability transitions has so far only engaged in limited ways with the resulting tough questions around what sustainability means, to whom and in which contexts. This paper makes a contribution to this debate by unpacking sustainability in India and Thailand in the context of solar photovoltaic and urban mobility experimentation. Building on a database of sustainability experiments and multicriteria mapping techniques applied in two workshops, the paper concludes that sustainability transition scholarship and associated governance strategies must engage with such questions in at least three important ways. First, there is a need for extreme caution in assuming any objective status for the sustainability of innovations, and for greater reflection on the normative implications of case study choices. Second, sustainability transition scholarship and governance must engage more with the unpacking of uncertainties and diverse possible sociotechnical configurations even within (apparently) singular technological fields. Third, sustainability transition scholarship must be more explicit and reflective about the specific geographical contexts within which the sustainability of experimentation is addressed.

Energy Research & Social Science, 2019

Article (Accepted Version) http://sro.sussex.ac.uk Ghosh, Bipashyee and Schot, Johan (2019) Towar... more Article (Accepted Version) http://sro.sussex.ac.uk Ghosh, Bipashyee and Schot, Johan (2019) Towards a novel regime change framework: studying mobility transitions in public transport regimes in an Indian megacity. Energy Research & Social Science, 51. pp. 82-95.

Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space, 2021

'Smart' imaginaries have been enthusiastically embraced by urban planners and policymakers around... more 'Smart' imaginaries have been enthusiastically embraced by urban planners and policymakers around the world. Indians are no exception. Between 2015-2018, following national government guidelines to use participatory and inclusive processes, many cities developed proposals for a smart city challenge. Successful proposals received financial and technical support from the national government. We examine the making of the smart city proposal submitted by New Town Kolkata (NTK). We ask how (un)democratic was the making of the proposal, along three aspects: distributive, participatory, and responsive. Based on an analysis of documents and interviews with policymakers and citizens, we find that NTK's smart city imaginary largely failed to be distributive. It rarely accounted for the specific needs of poorer and vulnerable citizens. City officials invested considerable effort in using participatory techniques, but citizen participation was tightly controlled through top-down design and practice of the techniques. The latter often facilitated one-way flow of information from the city administration to the citizens. The proposal was responsive to some citizens' voices, but only those belonging to the more affluent classes. A messy diversity of citizens' voices was thus closed down, as the city officials filtered and cherry-picked citizens' voices that were well-aligned with the official technocratic vision of 'global' smart urbanism. The paper shows how democracy can be put in the service of technocracy, within a rhetoric of citizen participation and social inclusion that embodies smart urbanism.

The ESRC STEPS (Social, Technological and Environmental Pathways to Sustainability) Centre carrie... more The ESRC STEPS (Social, Technological and Environmental Pathways to Sustainability) Centre carries out interdisciplinary global research uniting development studies with science and technology studies. Our pathways approach links theory, research methods and practice to highlight and open up the politics of sustainability. We focus on complex challenges like climate change, food systems, urbanisation and technology in which society and ecologies are entangled. Our work explores how to better understand these challenges and appreciate the range of potential responses to them.

Disclaimer This document contains a student thesis (bachelor's or master's), as authored ... more Disclaimer This document contains a student thesis (bachelor's or master's), as authored by a student at Eindhoven University of Technology. Student theses are made available in the TU/e repository upon obtaining the required degree. The grade received is not published on the document as presented in the repository. The required complexity or quality of research of student theses may vary by program, and the required minimum study period may vary in duration.

Asia’s rapidly growing cities are gearing up to meet increasing mobility needs while simultaneous... more Asia’s rapidly growing cities are gearing up to meet increasing mobility needs while simultaneously striving to achieve sustainability goals. A number of new innovations are being introduced in the form of experiments aiming to change the systems and rule-sets that currently dominate the provision of mobility services in Asian cities. This chapter analyses selected cases of mobility experiments in India and Thailand and explores the strategies that the niche actors deploy to navigate the challenges posed by incumbent socio-technical regimes. The chapter concludes that whilst niche actors tried to stretch-and-transform technological, infrastructural and cultural dimensions of regimes, they opted to fit-and-conform with public policy and political power dimensions.

Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews

Here we propose a framework for considering the justice issues of industrial cluster decarbonisat... more Here we propose a framework for considering the justice issues of industrial cluster decarbonisation, a pressing challenge confronting many industrialised economies. Industrial clusters are large, multi-point source emitters, users of energy and employers of regional and national significance. In the UK, establishing low carbon industrial clusters is one of several grand challenges of industrial strategy. Theorising the just transition of industrial clusters requires concepts from multiple literatures. We abstract relevant themes from the intersections of the literatures of just transitions, innovation studies and sociotechnical transitions, and public participation in spatial planning, and illustrate their empirical relevance. The broad themes of our framework are (i) politics, space and institutions, with sub-themes of justice, democracy, financialization; (ii) new processes and procedures, with subthemes of legal recognition of public concerns, community-based planning, community capacity enhancement and life cycle impact assessment; and (iii) correlates of acceptance and resistance, with sub-themes of environmental values, perceived loss of amenity, pre-existing politics, perceptions of just process and trust in the developer. The framework is intended to both guide the design of just transition processes ex-ante and evaluate these post-hoc.

The Nexus Network, Mar 24, 2017

Bipashyee Ghosh, a doctoral student at SPRU attended the Nexus Network workshop on ‘Transforming ... more Bipashyee Ghosh, a doctoral student at SPRU attended the Nexus Network workshop on ‘Transforming Innovation: addressing nexus challenges with radical change’ on 17th March 2017. Here she shares her thoughts from the day, arguing that transformation towards sustainability at the nexus requires attention be paid to transdisciplinary knowledge; appreciation of plurality and diversity; and experimentation with the knots and joints of interrelated systems

Throughout and 2019, academic scholars and policymakers involved in research and practice on scie... more Throughout and 2019, academic scholars and policymakers involved in research and practice on science, technology and innovation (STI) policy came together on several occasions to explore intersections of their perspectives around the emerging 'Transformative Innovation Policy (TIP)' theme, in the 'internetwork dialogue'. This working paper presents discussion on ten questions raised in multiple sessions and workshops, categorised under three main themes-1) conceptualisation, 2) actors and contexts and 3) operationalisation of TIP. The aim of this paper is to present the rich quality and diversity of knowledge shared by over 100 scholars with transdisciplinary expertise, as well as policy professionals willing to contribute practical experience to the scholarly debates. A further aim of this paper is to provide a springboard for accelerating the ongoing developments in TIP research. A virtual conference in 2021 could build on these different streams of knowledge presented in the paper. The paper seeks further contributions from the new network of TIP scholars (TIPRN) in building a vibrant community of practise on TIP.

The impending climate emergency, the Paris agreement and Sustainable Development Goals demand sig... more The impending climate emergency, the Paris agreement and Sustainable Development Goals demand significant transformations in economies and societies. Science funders, innovation agencies, and scholars have explored new rationales and processes for policymaking, such as transformative innovation policy (TIP). Here, we address the question of how to orient the efforts of science, technology, and innovation policy actors to enable transformations. We build on sustainability transitions research and a 4-year co-creation journey of the TIP Consortium to present twelve transformative outcomes that can guide public policy agencies in evaluating and reformulating their projects, programmes, and policies. We illustrate the transformative outcomes in two empirical cases: transitions towards mobility-as-a-service in the Finnish transport system and the emergence of speciality coffee in Colombia. We argue that the twelve transformative outcomes can guide public policy agents to fundamentally tr...

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2021

Asia’s rapidly growing cities are gearing up to meet increasing mobility needs while simultaneous... more Asia’s rapidly growing cities are gearing up to meet increasing mobility needs while simultaneously striving to achieve sustainability goals. A number of new innovations are being introduced in the form of experiments aiming to change the systems and rule-sets that currently dominate the provision of mobility services in Asian cities. This chapter analyses selected cases of mobility experiments in India and Thailand and explores the strategies that the niche actors deploy to navigate the challenges posed by incumbent socio-technical regimes. The chapter concludes that whilst niche actors tried to stretch-and-transform technological, infrastructural and cultural dimensions of regimes, they opted to fit-and-conform with public policy and political power dimensions.

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2020

The impending climate emergency, the Paris agreement and Sustainable Development Goals demand sig... more The impending climate emergency, the Paris agreement and Sustainable Development Goals demand significant transformations in economies and societies. Science funders, innovation agencies, and scholars have explored new rationales and processes for policymaking, such as transformative innovation policy (TIP). Here, we address the question of how to orient the efforts of science, technology, and innovation policy actors to enable transformations. We build on sustainability transitions research and a 4-year co-creation journey of the TIP Consortium to present twelve transformative outcomes that can guide public policy agencies in evaluating and reformulating their projects, programmes, and policies. We illustrate the transformative outcomes in two empirical cases: transitions towards mobility-as-a-service in the Finnish transport system and the emergence of speciality coffee in Colombia. We argue that the twelve transformative outcomes can guide public policy agents to fundamentally transform their ways of thinking and operation in advancing transformative change.

Journal of Transport Geography, 2021

This paper examines two bikeshare programs implemented in two Global South cities, examining the ... more This paper examines two bikeshare programs implemented in two Global South cities, examining the role of users in promoting sustainable transport. To explore the sustainability of smart cycling, we argue that it is important to understand the prevailing administrative and socio-institutional practices within a given context. For the effective stabilisation of smart regimes, harmony between the administrative and socio-institutional practices must be established. In this context, we introduce a complementary approach to understanding transitions. Maintenance of political commitments and institutional support are crucial for cycling success, not incidental footloose initiatives. We explore two case studies in the context of the Global South, in the first one top-down policies and planning initiatives dictate the directions of transitions by enabling or constraining user routines. In the second one, citizens take control to resolve a transport deficit by initiating and driving a very bottom-up user-led transition narrative. We propose a framework to cater to the unique political, cultural and smart discourses of the Global South and the role of users in conjunction with the administrative and socio-institutional practices around them. Investigating both the bikeshare cases through the lens of this framework provides unique insights extending our knowledge beyond the built environment features of sustainable planning initiatives. Our findings reveal the complex narratives that are in play in developing nations and conclude that understanding and realising cycling transitions in southern megacities require a different approach compared to the Global North.

SSRN Electronic Journal, 2018

The SPRU Working Paper Series aims to accelerate the public availability of the research undertak... more The SPRU Working Paper Series aims to accelerate the public availability of the research undertaken by SPRU-associated people, and other research that is of considerable interest within SPRU, providing access to early copies of SPRU research.

Sustainability Science, 2017

It is generally accepted that the concept of sustainability is not straightforward, but is subjec... more It is generally accepted that the concept of sustainability is not straightforward, but is subject to ongoing ambiguities, uncertainties and contestations. Yet literature on sustainability transitions has so far only engaged in limited ways with the resulting tough questions around what sustainability means, to whom and in which contexts. This paper makes a contribution to this debate by unpacking sustainability in India and Thailand in the context of solar photovoltaic and urban mobility experimentation. Building on a database of sustainability experiments and multicriteria mapping techniques applied in two workshops, the paper concludes that sustainability transition scholarship and associated governance strategies must engage with such questions in at least three important ways. First, there is a need for extreme caution in assuming any objective status for the sustainability of innovations, and for greater reflection on the normative implications of case study choices. Second, sustainability transition scholarship and governance must engage more with the unpacking of uncertainties and diverse possible sociotechnical configurations even within (apparently) singular technological fields. Third, sustainability transition scholarship must be more explicit and reflective about the specific geographical contexts within which the sustainability of experimentation is addressed.

Energy Research & Social Science, 2019

Article (Accepted Version) http://sro.sussex.ac.uk Ghosh, Bipashyee and Schot, Johan (2019) Towar... more Article (Accepted Version) http://sro.sussex.ac.uk Ghosh, Bipashyee and Schot, Johan (2019) Towards a novel regime change framework: studying mobility transitions in public transport regimes in an Indian megacity. Energy Research & Social Science, 51. pp. 82-95.

Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space, 2021

'Smart' imaginaries have been enthusiastically embraced by urban planners and policymakers around... more 'Smart' imaginaries have been enthusiastically embraced by urban planners and policymakers around the world. Indians are no exception. Between 2015-2018, following national government guidelines to use participatory and inclusive processes, many cities developed proposals for a smart city challenge. Successful proposals received financial and technical support from the national government. We examine the making of the smart city proposal submitted by New Town Kolkata (NTK). We ask how (un)democratic was the making of the proposal, along three aspects: distributive, participatory, and responsive. Based on an analysis of documents and interviews with policymakers and citizens, we find that NTK's smart city imaginary largely failed to be distributive. It rarely accounted for the specific needs of poorer and vulnerable citizens. City officials invested considerable effort in using participatory techniques, but citizen participation was tightly controlled through top-down design and practice of the techniques. The latter often facilitated one-way flow of information from the city administration to the citizens. The proposal was responsive to some citizens' voices, but only those belonging to the more affluent classes. A messy diversity of citizens' voices was thus closed down, as the city officials filtered and cherry-picked citizens' voices that were well-aligned with the official technocratic vision of 'global' smart urbanism. The paper shows how democracy can be put in the service of technocracy, within a rhetoric of citizen participation and social inclusion that embodies smart urbanism.

The ESRC STEPS (Social, Technological and Environmental Pathways to Sustainability) Centre carrie... more The ESRC STEPS (Social, Technological and Environmental Pathways to Sustainability) Centre carries out interdisciplinary global research uniting development studies with science and technology studies. Our pathways approach links theory, research methods and practice to highlight and open up the politics of sustainability. We focus on complex challenges like climate change, food systems, urbanisation and technology in which society and ecologies are entangled. Our work explores how to better understand these challenges and appreciate the range of potential responses to them.

Disclaimer This document contains a student thesis (bachelor's or master's), as authored ... more Disclaimer This document contains a student thesis (bachelor's or master's), as authored by a student at Eindhoven University of Technology. Student theses are made available in the TU/e repository upon obtaining the required degree. The grade received is not published on the document as presented in the repository. The required complexity or quality of research of student theses may vary by program, and the required minimum study period may vary in duration.

World’s megacities are facing acute sustainability challenges. Persistent problems such as urban ... more World’s megacities are facing acute sustainability challenges. Persistent problems such as urban pollution, resource depletion, climate change, poverty and social inequalities are shaping unsustainable futures for some of the world’s most populated regions. How can these challenges be tackled? Focusing on the urban mobility regimes that contribute to the acute challenges, this thesis investigates if they can transition toward sustainability. According to sustainability transitions studies, experimentation is vital for making such a transition, through replacing existing unsustainable socio-technical regimes such as fossil fuel-based automobility. Besides niche experimentation, existing regimes can also undergo transformation towards sustainability, being enabled by regime actors. Both experimentation and regime transformation are explored in five studies covering cities like Kolkata, New Delhi and Ahmedabad in India and Bangkok and Chiang Mai in Thailand. However, the majority of th...

Mobility systems in megacities are facing persistent sustainability problems. A focus on regime s... more Mobility systems in megacities are facing persistent sustainability problems. A focus on regime shift in transitions literature in addressing these problems reflects a western bias as it relies on niches as sources of change. In megacities like in Kolkata, India, public transportation is dominant, and actors are more concerned to improve and upgrade a variety of public transport regimes. In this paper, we develop a framework for such regime analysis and explore regime transformation as a pathway in between regime optimisation and regime transition pathways. Drawing from evolutionary and institutional theories of socio-technical change, we characterised these three pathways of regime change through changes in
trajectories, rules and selection pressures. Applying this novel framework, we study sociotechnical changes in the past 15 years in multiple urban public transportation regimes in Kolkata through a mapping tool which may be useful in policy contexts. We find that regime actors can act as front-runners in these change processes and that meta-rules guide
directionality of change. We conclude on how sustainability transitions can happen right away within existing regimes, without recourse to niche development.