ACCTING D2.2 - Report on inspiring practice cases

The aim of this report is to provide information on inspiring practice cases of bottom-up initiatives across the 34 countries that have been mapped within the ACCTING EU project. The report examines the types and characteristics of the initiatives mapped.

In Chapter 1, the main Concepts & Methods of ACCTING EU project are introduced. In Chapter 2 the research activity of ‘mapping Bottom-Up Initiative (BUIs)’ is described. Further in Chapter 3, the mapped BUIs are presented according to the eight research lines. In this central chapter for each research line an analysis of the bottom-up initiatives is presented highlighting common themes of implementation, justice profiles and specific barriers and drivers.

Chapter 4 and Chapter 5, Discussion and Final Remarks, discuss the results of the analysis of all the mapped BUIs across the different research lines. What emerges is that most BUIs focus on the themes of food and land; energy is also a central issue. Further, the BUIs surveyed appear to focus mostly on the vulnerabilities based on income, rural/urban gap, age, and ethnicity. They are led by various actors, principally citizens' and community organisations, voluntary organisations, NGOs, and micro and small enterprises, suggesting a vitality of the civil society in promoting the green transition. However, local authorities and the public sector influence barriers and drivers for many BUIs. Drivers that propel many of the BUIs include internally held resources such as finances, awareness,information, knowledge and education (AIKE) and pro-environmental and prosocial attitudes. Additionally, the analysis highlights that, contextual drivers and barriers, such as prosocial culture in the community, play a role in supporting collective actions, particularly at the neighbourhood level, where social bonds are active and strong. The research presented, albeit non-conclusive and part of a larger research process within the ACCTING project, suggests that societies still face a wide problem of distributive justice and recognition justice that civil society actors consider a priority in promoting the green transition. The analysis also shows a window of opportunity for learning, knowledge transfer and future research: while there is a relatively low number of BUIs explicitly addressing gender+ inequality issues, they do exist. The challenge for future research is to learn from those BUIs that do address gender+ inequalities and to transfer these insights to those who do not, as well as to translate this knowledge to operational recommendations.