The role of regime-level processes in closing the gap between sustainable city visions and action

There is an implementation gap between cities’ long-term sustainable visions and the short-term actions realised to achieve them. To accelerate sustainable urban transitions a greater understanding of the regime-level processes that enable or constrain translation between long-term visions and short-term action is required. Transition research to date has neglected regime processes, especially cultural-cognitive habits and heuristics, and the role of power and agency. To address this a novel analytical framework is proposed, with transition theory as the basis, additionally drawing on institutional and quasi-evolutionary theory. This framework is tested using Copenhagen as a case study, generating important insights; in particular that normative institutional processes are an effective means for regime actors to coordinate power, affect resource allocation, and impact selection pressures and adaptive capacity. The findings suggests that unless the institutional and quasi-evolutionary processes that drive action are re-configured in line with sustainable city visions then progress will be limited.