Larry Geri attended the 14th annual International Sustainability Transitions conference in Utrecht, The Netherlands from August 30th to September 1st, 2023, and chaired a panel on the political and social implications of sustainability transitions.  During the panel he gave a presentation on his paper titled, “Does Populist-Authoritarianism Pose a Threat to Sustainability Transitions?” The main takeaway from the paper is that while the weak authoritarian leaders in the two cases examined, Mexico and the U.S.,  tend to associate fossil fuels with national greatness, and emphasize what they claim are the high costs and complexity of renewable energy, we need more data on how authoritarian leaders engage these transitions.  (India, for example, has invested massively in renewable energy).  This conference is organized annually by the Sustainability Transitions Research Network (STRN), a research organization with over 1500 member researchers who consider questions of how the transition to sustainability can succeed through co-evolutionary changes and innovations in socio-technical systems. Learn more about STRN and future conferences here.