Decision makers need better insights about solutions to accelerate adaptation efforts. Defining the concept of solution space and revealing the forces and strategies that influence this space will enable decision makers to define pathways for adaptation action.

The science-society contract is broken. The climate is changing. Science demonstrates why this is occurring, that it is getting worse, the implications for human well-being and social-ecological systems, and substantiates action. Governments agree that the science is settled. The tragedy of climate change science is that at the same time as compelling evidence is gathered, fresh warnings issued, and novel methodologies developed, indicators of adverse global change rise year upon year. Meanwhile, global responses to Covid-19 have shown that even emergent scientific knowledge can bolster radical government action. We explore three options for the climate change science community. We find that two options are untenable and one is unpalatable. Given the urgency and criticality of climate change, we argue the time has come for scientists to agree to a moratorium on climate change research as a means to first expose, then renegotiate, the broken science-society contract.

COVID-19 has triggered major upheavals to life as we know it in every corner of the planet. The governance response has been deep and far-reaching, albeit variable and contradictory. Disruptions like the pandemic inspire new perspectives on climate resilient development, especially with respect to the role of governance in navigating transformations. We reflect on what reactions and responses to COVID-19 around the world suggest about society’s ability to transform – and what types of global development we need to transform away from – in order to support more climate resilient and equitable futures. We identify three key pivot points to stimulate further thinking on governance for climate resilient development: the tension between engendering transformation and returning back to normal; the role of disruption and uncertainty for triggering transformation; and the role of systemic inequality in how people are affected by crises. In particular, we spotlight the turbulent nature of transformation, and challenge the dominant belief that predicted, controlled and desired outcomes can be engineered through rational policy decisions. Climate resilient development navigates the turbulence of transformation through solidarity and socially equitable governance by opening up space for inclusive and even contestatory politics.

Festering ocean conflict thwarts efforts to realize the Agenda 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. This paper explores transformations of ocean conflict into situated sustainability pathways that privilege human needs, justice and equity. We first outline the promise and limits of prevailing ocean/coastal governance practices, with a focus on marine spatial planning (MSP), which by framing conflict in shallow terms as use incompatibility, supports resolution strategies that privilege neoliberal technocratic-managerial and post-political models of consensual negotiation, thereby obscuring the structural inequalities, maldistributions and misrecognitions that drive deep-seated conflicts. Next, the distinctive features of the marine realm and ocean conflict are explained. Third, we outline the root causes, drivers and scale of conflict, with reference to history, climate, culture, governance, institutions and prevailing international socio-political conditions. Fourth, we reflect on the nature of conflict, exploring implications for shallow and deeper approaches of handling conflicts. Fifth, we highlight the implications of knowledge co-production for understanding and transforming conflict in pursuit of justice. Then, in response to the orthodoxies of MSP and prevailing conflict resolution strategies, we elaborate an alternative approach – Pragmatic Agonistic co-produced Conflict Transformation (PACT) for sustainability – sketching out key elements of a praxis that seeks to transform destructive interaction patterns of conflict into co-produced, constructive, scalable and ‘institutionalizable’ yet contestable and provisional sustainability knowledge-action.