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Short abstract:

We present the concept of “transition imaginary” defined as an effect of the relational work of the state to strategically select and reconfigure landscape pressures and national sociotechnical imaginaries for the sake of carrying out particular transition projects.

Long abstract:

Two elements of sustainable transitions have been considered undertheorized in multi-level-perspective: landscape and state. We present the concept of “transition imaginary” defined as an effect of the relational work of the state to strategically select and reconfigure landscape pressures and national sociotechnical imaginaries for the sake of carrying out particular transition projects. This way, we aim to theorize the relation between the landscape and the state. With the case study of the Polish project of an EV IZERA, we illustrate a model which helps understand how landscape pressures are re-interpreted in relation to national sociotechnical imaginaries with the active role of state actors in this process. State actors with political or economic stakes in the project, use various forms of representation to publicly express expectations about its benefits and its national meaning to consolidate the social base for it and propose concrete forms of intervention. At the same time, other actors from state and economic institutions become interested in verifying and challenging both the expectations and particular intervention instruments. By applying the strategic-relational approach to state power developed by Bob Jessop, we unpack sustainable transitions as state projects of political power and a geographically specific modality of state capitalism.