Assessing the Dutch Energy Transition Policy: How Does it Deal with Dilemmas of Managing Transitions?

Sustainable development is about the redirection of development (WCED, 1987). It is not about an identifiable end state (Kemp et al., 2005; Meadowcroft, 1999; Meadowcroft et al., 2005; Voß et al., 2006). Sustainable development is a contested concept. The requirements of sustainable development are multiple and interconnected. As an inherently dynamic, indeterminate and contested concept (Mog, 2004), sustainability cannot be translated into a blueprint from which criteria can be derived and unambiguous decisions can be taken to get there. From a governance perspective such disagreement is an essential part of sustainable development, one that makes operationalization difficult (Farrell et al., 2005).