ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses questions pertaining to what types of governance might be pursued to advance an efficacious transition away from the current growth-based consumption society. It contends that more radical, system innovation-oriented governance can challenge incumbent paradigms, powers, and institutions. The chapter introduces the concept of "governance panarchy" which is grounded in the notion that contemporary technologies and conditions enable large-scale processes of self-organization in which numerous forms of organization and governance are used to address sustainability problems and their impacts in particular contexts. It introduces the transition perspective by applying it to the emergence of the welfare state in which the separation of production and consumption has been a core feature. This discussion will illustrate both the necessity and potential of transitions and their challenges for governance. The rise of the nation state as central authority was accompanied by emergence of centralized systems of provisioning.
