Life-Labs in Europe and Latin America
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This case innovation has been analysed using the Transformative Intervention Mixes (TIMs) framework. The framework maps the regulatory, economic, social‑behavioural, technological and material interventions at play, clarifying how these elements interact and what this configuration suggests about the innovation’s capacity to support transformative change.
The case analysis draws primarily on evidence synthesised from:
Mercado (2024)
Overview
Nature Based Thinking
Nature-Based Thinking (NBT), developed and applied as an analytical mindset within the CONEXUS project via a transdisciplinary online symposium and Nature Futures Workshops (NFWs) across European and Latin American cities implementing urban NBS ‘Life-Labs’.
Urban Nature-Based Solutions (NBS) planning, governance, and cross-sectoral coordination.
The paper responds to critiques that NBS can remain solutionist and insufficiently transformative; it uses an iterative reflective process to develop NBT themes and apply them as an analytical lens for city workshops.
Multi-city, transcontinental (seven cities; Europe and Latin America) within an EU-funded Horizon 2020 project context.
Practical: workshops use futures methods (three horizons) and backcasting to reflect on current actions and pathways for NBS interventions.
Political: explicit emphasis on ‘new organisational structures / new NBS governance paradigms’ and cross-sectoral coordination beyond formal organisational structures.
Personal: NBT is framed as a mindset shift towards ‘nature with people’ and strengthening human–nature connectedness, supported through reflective learning processes.
The paper presents NBT as a transferable analytical and reflective approach that can be used to broaden and expand NBS frameworks across contexts.
TIMs Summary
This case is strongly evidenced in the source material in Voluntary-advisory-educational and Knowledge tools through a structured reflective process (symposium plus futures workshops) used to develop and apply NBT as an analytical lens. Political mechanisms are also central in the sense that outcomes explicitly foreground new organisational structures and governance paradigms for NBS, although these are articulated as themes rather than implemented institutional reforms. Technology is present mainly as an enabling context for online convening, not as a focal mechanism. Regulatory and Financial / Market-Based instruments are discussed as contextual constraints and broader agendas (e.g., differences in resources across regions), but are not implemented as tools within the reflective intervention.
The configuration implies a transformative pathway oriented to reframing and coordination: shifting how problems are understood (nature with people; long-term perspectives) and how cross-sectoral governance is imagined. The workshops explicitly use backcasting to identify gaps between current actions and preferred futures, making the method’s diagnostic function central to its intended value.
Implications for Intervention Mix Design
The documented intervention mix primarily produces shared frames and governance-oriented themes; to translate these into broader transformation, additional alignment would be needed with concrete institutional and resourcing instruments (e.g., explicit programme rules, funding mechanisms, and implementation capacities) that are not part of the reflective events themselves. Where behavioural change is sought, complementary mechanisms (e.g., choice-structuring tools or social norm interventions) would need to be added beyond the mindset and learning focus evidenced here.
TIMs Matrix
| Tool Category | Examples | How it ENABLES (mechanisms) | How it HINDERS (barriers) | Opportunities to strengthen | Risks / caveats | Additional suggestions and resources |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Regulatory | ||||||
| Financial / Market-Based | The paper discusses differences in financial resources for NBS between Global North and Global South contexts as an implementation challenge. | No explicit evidence in the sources of financial instruments implemented by the NBT intervention itself. | Limited funding capacity is described as a barrier to large-scale NBS in some contexts. | Conservation Basic Income. | ||
| Information / Education | Transdisciplinary NBT symposium with presentations and panel discussion across themes. Nature Futures Workshops using preparatory surveys, shared visions, and backcasting with diverse stakeholders. | Structured learning and reflection processes support mutual transformative learning and capacity to critique/expand NBS practice. | COVID-related restrictions affected delivery modality. | Guidance documents and post-workshop validation meetings are described as supporting consistency and refinement across cities. | Outputs are reflective and may not directly change implementation without follow-on instruments (consistent with method scope). | Participatory contract design (see Complimentary TIMs links above)as a complementary structured co-design method for specifying implementable measures. |
| Choice Architecture | Implementing choice-structuring tools to serve as complementary mechanisms that drive practical behavioural change alongside the project’s reflective Nature Futures Workshops. | It provides a practical pathway to translate the shared ‘nature with people’ mindset and newly developed governance themes into the everyday decisions of urban planners and communities. | The effectiveness of these choice-structuring tools can be severely limited if they are not backed by concrete institutional capacities, explicit programme rules, or adequate funding. | These mechanisms could be integrated directly into new organisational structures and cross-sectoral governance paradigms to actively bridge the gap between current actions and preferred futures. | Relying on choice architecture without addressing broader contextual constraints - such as siloed government structures, rigid bureaucracies, or socio-economic inequalities - risks leaving the intervention superficial. | Pair choice-structuring tools with social norm interventions and institutional reforms to ensure the desired shift away from ‘business as usual’ practices is fully supported. |
| Social Norms | Workshops aim to build shared visions of desired futures and stimulate collective reflection on ‘business as usual’ trajectories. | Shared visions can shape collective expectations about acceptable trajectories and what constitutes mainstream NBS practice. | Dominant urban narratives, mistrust, and business-as-usual practices can constrain this normative shift. | Sustained community processes that normalise participation, care and inclusive local stewardship. | Normative change may remain uneven across contexts, especially where survival pressures and socio-economic inequalities limit participation. | Community-led ICCA governance (see Complimentary TIMs links above)as an example of collective norms embedded in local governance practice. |
| Emotional Appeal | NBT explicitly emphasises reconnecting urban populations with nature physically, spiritually and emotionally as part of human–nature relations. | Emotional and identity-linked reconnection is framed as part of the mindset shift supporting transformation of city–nature relations. | Pessimism, skepticism, and tensions where basic needs are unmet, limiting the reach of affective mobilisation. | Connecting emotional engagement to everyday practices and locally meaningful experiences of nature. | There is a risk that emotionally resonant visions remain aspirational if not matched by material conditions and governance support. | Wildeverse (see Complimentary TIMs links above) as another intervention aiming to influence emotions/attitudes via media. Nature connectedness; community care practices; place-keeping. |
| Technology | The NBT symposium was held online. | Digital convening enables cross-context participation and sharing within an international project. | Macroscope (see Complimentary TIMs links above)as a technology-enabled system for ecological data integration (distinct function). | |||
| Infrastructure (Hard/Soft) | New organisational structures and governance paradigms; cross-sectoral coordination; links between formal government and local communities through cyclical planning, design, construction and management processes. | The soft infrastructures help connect institutions, communities and nature, and are presented as necessary for integrated and adaptive NBS implementation. | Siloed government structures, fragmentation, privatisation, and weak local government capacity are persistent barriers. | Governance spaces for plurality, better coordination across scales, and more time for long-term management and discussion. | Without institutional adaptation, NBS may remain technocratic, fragmented, and remote from citizens’ lives. | Structure new governance paradigms to ensure psychological safety during cross-sectoral meetings, allowing for the critique of ‘business-as-usual’ without fear of professional repercussion. |
| Biophysical Resources | Expanded room for nature, ecological connectivity, habitat restoration, agroforestry spaces, restored streams and wetlands, and protected urban green areas. | The biophysical resource improvements alter the ecological condition and spatial availability of urban nature, supporting biodiversity, hydrological function, and more reciprocal human–nature relations. | Trade-offs around urban land use, tensions over wilder urban nature, and inequities where basic social needs remain unmet. | Integrating biophysical restoration with locally specific social priorities and long-term maintenance. | There is a risk of conflict, green gentrification, or exclusion if ecological expansion is pursued without attention to justice and local needs. | Urban restoration; ecological connectivity; sustainable urban drainage systems. |
| Knowledge | NBT articulated as a mindset with three inter-related dimensions and nexus. Thematic analysis of symposium and workshop outputs identifies themes. | NBT provides an analytical framework to interrogate NBS beyond ‘solutions’, linking ecological processes, institutions, and communities across governance levels. | Dominant epistemologies, technocratic narratives, and weak incorporation of local knowledge can constrain implementation. | Iterative feedback from symposium into workshop analysis is described as deepening understanding and supporting coherence. | As an analytical lens, NBT may be adopted rhetorically without organisational change (risk consistent with critique of mainstreaming; not explicitly documented). | Strengthen the ‘incorporation of local knowledge’ by creating digital platforms where residents can upload real-time ecological observations, turning local expertise into a formal and valued data stream for the NFWs. |
| Other | NBT itself as a mindset oriented to relational, reciprocal and long-sighted urban transformation. | NBT functions as a hybrid framing device that links nature, governance and community, and opens debate on the assumptions underlying NBS interventions. | NBT remains challenging to operationalise in contexts marked by inequality, institutional inertia and urgency. | A reasonable strengthening opportunity is to translate the mindset into locally specific stewardship, governance and evaluation practices without reducing it to a technical checklist | There is a risk that NBT remains conceptual if institutions do not create time, capacity and authority for implementation and learning. | Combat the ‘urgency’ barrier by framing long-term NBT goals in a way that emphasises ‘legacy’. Humans are naturally biased toward immediate rewards; using ‘legacy framing’ helps decision-makers value long-sighted transformation over short-term ‘business-as-usual’ gains. |
Note: Blank cells reflect that the documentary evidence available for this case did not contain sufficiently explicit information to address these dimensions. This absence should not be interpreted as implying that such mechanisms were irrelevant or ineffective, but simply that they were not documented within the scope of the source materials.