Research

Research interests

How do societies change, and how can they transform to sustain human ecological wellbeing within biophysical and social limits? These are the questions that guide my interdisciplinary research. Intersecting environmental, rural, agrarian and social movement studies, I am interested in the conditions, mechanisms, and consequences of present and past sustainability transformations.   

My research draws upon theories and methods from Human Geography, Sociology, Ecological Economics, and Political Ecology, and has a geographical focus on Europe and Latin America (primarily Colombia). Thematically, I am interested in agrifood systems and the climate crisis.

I am presently conducting research on the following themes: degrowth strategy; degrowth, rurality and agrifood systems; agrifood systems transitions; prefigurative grassroots initiatives; political conflict in sustainability transformations.

Generally speaking, my research falls under one of five themes:

• Sustainability transition and post-growth transformation theories (e.g., Feola, 2015; Feola 2020; Feola et al., 2021; Smessaert and Feola, 2023). How can theories of sustainability transitions and transformation, particularly those involving post-capitalist and post-growth transformations, be further developed? In this, how can critical social theory enrich mainstream theorisations? How can empirical work in specific systems (i.e., food systems), geographies (i.e., the Global South), and neglected socio-political contexts (i.e., non-ideal situations of weak and criminal power) challenge and enrich current theorisations of sustainability transformation?

• The prefiguration of post-growth societies (e.g., Feola and Nunes, 2014; Feola and Butt, 2017; Feola, 2019; Poças et al., 2021; van Oers et al., 2023). What are the conditions and mechanisms enabling prefiguration, and how transformative is this form of political action, also in combination with other strategies? What social logics are experimented with and how are they institutionalised in prefigurative grassroots initiatives? How do such prefigurative grassroots initiatives diffuse in space, thereby adapting to different contexts?

• The impacts of grassroots initiatives and social movements (e.g., Nicolosi et al., 2025; Henfrey et al., 2023; Spanier-Guerrero Lara and Feola, 2024). What are the cultural and political impacts of different grassroots political strategies across contexts? How should ‘impact’ be (re-)conceptualised to capture the transformative consequences of non-conventional political strategies, also in areas characterised by limited statehood and/or criminal governance? What are the conditions for social movement coalitions, as well as multi-stakeholder platforms, to be formed, sustained and for them to result in increased impact?

• The politics and governance of sustainability transitions and post-growth transformation (e.g., Oliver et al., 2018; Feola et al., 2019; van Oers et al., 2021; Frank et al., 2024; Patterson et al., 2024). What are the political dynamics characterising transitions and transformations and especially the deliberate destabilisation of unsustainable socio-technical and socio-ecological arrangements? How can inevitable social conflicts be addressed in the context of sustainability transformation? How can the contradictory, uneven and contested relations between the environment and development be governed, especially in rural areas and food systems, and in contexts characterised by limited statehood and/or criminal governance? 

• Imaginaries and discourses of post-growth societies (e.g., Feola and Jaworska, 2019; Büscher et al., 2021; Feola et al., 2023; Guerrero Lara et al., 2023). Which novel imaginaries and discourses inform ongoing attempts to realise alternatives to unsustainable and unjust capitalist, growth-oriented development? To what extent do these imaginaries and discourses resonate with memories of the past? What social and political possibilities do these imaginaries and discourses open, and what do they obscure?