When Systems Stand Still: Why Climate Action Moves So Slowly and How to Change It (Part 2)
Climate action is slow because our cities, governments, and industries resist change by design. Because that is the way systems work.
In Part 2 of this series, we explore where systems can still be shifted from feedback loops and institutional design to the mental models that guide decisions and how small, well-placed interventions can start meaningful transformation without waiting for collapse, perfect consensus, or radical sacrifice.
Leverage points: where small shifts change big systems
Systems thinker Donella Meadows famously described leverage points as places “where a small shift in one thing can produce big changes in everything” (Meadows 1999). Building on her work, later research (Abson et al. 2017) grouped leverage points for sustainability transformation into four broad categories, ranging from shallow to deep.
Parameters: For climate action, we often focus on parameters such as carbon prices, subsidies and efficiency rules. These matter but typically deliver only incremental change.
Feedbacks: Greater leverage comes from shifting feedbacks, making climate impacts and co-benefits visible locally, rewarding long-term performance and penalising externalised costs.
Design: It also requires redesigning institutions so planning, transport and housing work together, and ensuring cities have the authority and resources to act.
Mental models: The deepest leverage arises when mental models and goals shift, for example from “maximising short-term GDP” to “maximising well-being within planetary boundaries” (Raworth, 2017), from “cheap energy” to “secure, fair and clean energy,” and from individual blame to shared responsibility. When values and goals change, other parts of the system begin to realign naturally.
Why things still move slowly even when we see the leverage points
Even with strong theories at hand, real-world change faces several headwinds. Short political and economic time horizons collide with long-term climate risks, leading to chronic underinvestment in resilience. Fragmented responsibilities across ministries, agencies and city administrations further encourage delay, as decision-makers face a flood of information but lack tools that clarify trade-offs and consequences. At the same time, human psychology adds friction: when climate values clash with carbon-intensive behaviour, cognitive dissonance and group dynamics favour narrative adjustment over behavioural change. Finally, concerns about trust and stability in core systems—from energy and health care to social security and public order, mean that rapid or poorly communicated change is often perceived as risky or unfair, triggering resistance and polarisation.
Combined, these forces explain why systems often default to “more of the same, but slightly greener.” Climate measures therefore need to be framed not as sacrifices, but as concrete improvements, healthier homes, lower bills, cleaner air, better mobility so that system change feels less threatening and more like a genuine upgrade to everyday life.
How KNOWING can help accelerate transformation
This is where projects like KNOWING come in: as an effort to work with systems rather than against them. Using scientific data, modelling and participatory processes, KNOWING helps regions understand their own leverage points and pathways for change.
Making complexity navigable: A shared Knowledge Base consolidates climate data, socio-economic indicators and evidence on impacts and solutions. A modular Modeling Framework lets regions explore futures, from reducing flood risks and mitigating urban heat islands to managing land-use conflicts around forest wind energy and determining how much renewable capacity, grid infrastructure and storage are needed for a climate-neutral energy supply. This makes abstract debates concrete and comparable. Pathways for Mitigation and Adaptation offer region-specific transformation routes, supporting awareness, capacity building, sensitivity analysis and evidence-based decisions. A Decision Support System (DSS) then translates these insights into clear scenarios and trade-offs for real-world choices.
Working with human psychology
A Climate Coping Typology clarifies how different groups respond to climate information, enabling tailored communication. Empowerment tools and Playful Trainings make systems knowledge accessible through visualisations, exercises and serious games. The Shape Your Future App allows citizens to explore futures and understand how collective choices shape outcomes.
Connecting COP ambitions to local practice: Local Hubs bring together municipalities, authorities, businesses, civil society and researchers to co-create strategies that are both technically feasible and socially acceptable, serving as translation spaces between global climate goals and local implementation.
Haven’t read Part 1?
“When Systems Stand Still: Why Climate Action Moves So Slowly and How to Change It” explains why climate action moves so slowly despite clear evidence: systems are path-dependent, shaped by past investments, habits, and power structures, and designed for stability rather than rapid change. Read the full article here.
About the author
Stefan E. Slembrouck is a doctoral researcher at TU Berlin working on the ethics of the smart city and leads the work package on communication, dissemination, and exploitation in the KNOWING project.
References
Abson, David J. et al. (2017): “Leverage points for sustainability transformation.” Ambio, 46(1), 30–39. https://doi.org/10.1007/s13280-016-0800-y
Bourdieu, Pierre (1998): Practical Reason: On the Theory of Action. Stanford University Press.
Festinger, Leon (1957): A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance. Stanford University Press.
Janis, Irving L. (1982): Groupthink: Psychological Studies of Policy Decisions and Fiascoes (2nd ed.). Houghton Mifflin.
Kahneman, Daniel (2011): Thinking, Fast and Slow. Farrar, Straus and Giroux.
Meadows, Donella H. (1999): “Leverage Points: Places to Intervene in a System.” Sustainability Institute.
Meadows, Donella H. (2008): Thinking in Systems: A Primer. Chelsea Green Publishing.
Raworth, Kate (2017): Doughnut Economics. Chelsea Green Publishing
Streeck, Wolfgang (2014): Buying Time: The Delayed Crisis of Democratic Capitalism. Verso.
About KNOWING
KNOWING is a Horizon Europe project that develops tools, models and participatory formats to support climate-transformation. By combining scientific analysis with local knowledge and stakeholder input, the project supports regions and sectors to understand climate risks, assess options, and design effective, inclusive pathways for change.