The STEPS Centre (Social, Technological and Environmental Pathways to Sustainability) is an interdisciplinary global research and policy engagement hub, funded by the Economic and Social Research Council. The Centre brings together development studies with science and technology studies and was launched at Portcullis House in London on 25 June 2007
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By acknowledging the interactions between social, technological and environmental factors in diverse local settings the STEPS Centre seeks to help create more sustainable and socially just conditions for poorer people. Based at the Institute of Development Studies (IDS) and the Science Policy Research Unit (SPRU) at the University of Sussex in the UK, the Centre works with partners in Africa, Asia and Latin America.
Professor Ian Scoones is the director of the STEPS Centre and Professor Andy Stirling is co-director. Professor Melissa Leach stepped down as STEPS Director in 2014 to become Director of the Institute of Development Studies.
Advisory board
The STEPS Centre Advisory Board is chaired by Mike Hulme (King's College London) with members including Brian Wynne (CESAGEN, University of Lancaster), Carl Folke (Stockholm Resilience Centre), Dipak Gyawali (Nepal Academy of Science and Technology), Fred Pearce (science writer), Sue Hartley (Director, York Environmental Sustainability Institute), Suman Sahai (Convenor, Gene Campaign), and Thomas Lingard (Global External Affairs Director, Unilever).
Areas of work
The STEPS Centre brings together social scientists and natural scientists to work together to try and achieve a breakthrough in thinking and action for development. The Centre's unique ‘pathways’ approach interweaves social, technological and environmental conditions with dynamic change across three domains - food and agriculture; health and disease; water and sanitation - and three themes - dynamics; governance; designs.
Through linking across domains and themes in its projects, the STEPS Centre connects new theory with practical approaches in a bid to help provide sustainable opportunities for poor and marginalised people.
Pathways approach
The STEPS Centre's pathways approach aims to understand the complex, non-linear interactions between social, technological and environmental systems. Some pathways may threaten poor peoples’ livelihoods and health while others create opportunities for sustainability.
The Centre aims to link social scientists, natural scientists and users to develop new tools and methods linking theory with practical solutions. It also offers teaching, in conjunction with IDS and SPRU, to help train a new generation of researchers on MA and PhD courses.
A paper published in 2007 entitled Pathways to Sustainability: an Overview of the STEPS Centre Approach outlined the STEPS Centre approach to understanding dynamic systems and their governance. The paper laid out the ingredients of the STEPS Centre's work, including linking diverse social and natural science perspectives, connecting theory, policy and practice and an engaged, interactive approach to communications. Promoting pathways to Sustainability that meet the perspectives and priorities of poor and marginalised groups is at the heart of the pathways approach.
Projects
Among the STEPS Centre's projects are:
•Innovation, Sustainability, Development: A New Manifesto (40 years on from the Sussex Manifesto)
• Crop, disease and innovation in Kenya - Maize and farming system dynamics in areas affected by climate change
• Urbanisation in Asia - urbanisation and sustainability on the expanding peri-urban fringe of Delhi, India
• Rethinking regulation - assumptions and realities of drug and seed regulation in China and Argentina
• Risk, uncertainty and technology - framing and responses to risks and uncertainties in areas of rapid scientific and technological advance
• Epidemics, livelihoods and politics - HIV-AIDS, SARS, ‘avian flu, BSE - procedures for addressing epidemics that support rather than compromise poor people