ABSTRACT
Sustainable development is a policy objective of the European Union. However, the concept of sustainable development is contested, both scientifically and socially, so by definition it is subjective and ambiguous. This makes it difficult to operationalize the concept. Universal implementation is impossible. Sustainability is context-bound and needs to be interpreted and implemented by a range of stakeholders within that specific context. Developing long-term strategies to achieve sustainability goals requires processes that can deal with the context-dependence, ambiguities and uncertainties of these problems. This has been discussed widely in the growing literature on sustainability science (see, for example, Jäger 2011) and transition management (see, for example, Grin et al. 2010).
