Comparing contested sustainabilities: how diverse human–nature relationships give rise to different approaches to sustainability

Abstract Despite increasing acknowledgement of the diversity and different approaches at play in research on sustainability transitions, systematic comparisons of these approaches are scarce. This is a problem for sustainability research, as the coexistence of multiple approaches to sustainability in the absence of an overarching comparative vocabulary may result in disparate and potentially incommensurable assumptions affecting the analysis, implementation, and impact of sustainability transitions. By means of a review and conceptual investigation, we develop a conceptual model for comparing multiple and diverse sustainability approaches. Investigating both the descriptive (stationary) and actionable elements of sustainability, we create a comparative space based on distinguishable parameters shared among sampled sustainability approaches as empirical literature-based units: (1) from instrumentalist to intrinsic valuations of nature; and (2) from holistic to particularistic system considerations. Using a vector-based method to represent a sustainability approach, we systematically compare various perceptions of sustainability problems and solutions, thereby allowing us to characterize different movements towards imagined sustainable futures.