Networks of actors for sustainability – the case of McGill University

How do interactions of different seed initiatives impact just and sustainable transformations? We studied this question at McGill University, which has worked on sustainability in research, teaching, and on campus for several decades. Combining interview data with a social network analysis, we identify barriers and leverage points for mainstreaming and accelerating sustainability in this ~50,000 person organization. We show that the individual seeds (and subsystems, e.g., research, teaching, administration) have their own logics that must find synergies to accelerate the impact of individual seeds and move toward a good Anthropocene.