The questions that keep returning when studying work, livelihoods, and socio-ecological transformations beyond growth

This week I gave two presentations to my colleagues. First, I presented myself and my work to my new research group, Transformative Value Creation in Renewing Economy (TRaCE) in Tampere University of Applied Sciences. It is exciting to join a group with expertise in innovation and strategic management research, sustainability transition studies, and arts-based methods.

Second, I introduced myself as a member of Puistokatu 4 to my wonderful colleagues inhabiting this house for science and hope. Alongside discussing my work, I found myself reflecting on my current relationship with creativity. In short, it is in transition, much like many other things in life and in the world right now.

Both presentations offered an opportunity to pause and look back. Academic careers are often described through projects, publications, and job titles. When I look at my own trajectory, a number of recurring questions stand out: What other ways of organising work, livelihoods, economies, and societies already exist, even if dominant institutions and narratives overlook them? What can they teach us about living and working well within planetary limits? How can we make them more visible, learn from them, and understand their potential to contribute to wider socio-ecological transformations?

To give a more concrete overview of my work and outputs, I developed four themes to capture my work. While no categorisation can fully capture a career, since research paths are rarely linear, I tried to give a comprehensible overview. These themes connect what I have studied, how I understand socio-ecological transformations, and what I hope to explore in the years ahead.

1. Socio-ecological transformations, work, and livelihoods

My most recent work has increasingly focused on the role of work and livelihoods in socio-ecological transformations. While debates often centre on technologies, policies, and markets, I am interested in an overlooked question: how do people make a living in ways that are socially and ecologically sustainable?

This question has led me to study post-fossil work, sustainability work, and small-scale farming, as well as the everyday realities of people trying to align their work with ecological concerns. At the heart of this research lies a tension that many people recognise from their own lives. Many know that profound societal transformations are needed, but still much of the world of work remains embedded in systems that depend on economic growth, resource extraction, including human and non-human animals. Understanding how people navigate these tensions, and how work itself might become a force for transformation, has become one of the central questions of my research.

Selected publications

• Siivonen, K., Tuittila, S., Räikkönen, T., & Houtbeckers, E. (2026). Jälkifossiilisen työn ajurit ja hidasteet yrityksissä. Futura.
• Ylöstalo, H., Salmenniemi, S., & Houtbeckers, E. (2026). Ekologisesti kestävämpi työ: Miten kvantifiointi muokkaa yritysten kestävyystyötä? Sosiologia.
• Houtbeckers, E., Salmenniemi, S., & Räikkönen, T. (2025). Transformations and tensions in sustainability work. Environmental Sociology. https://doi.org/10.1080/23251042.2025.2487962
• Kallio, G., & Houtbeckers, E. (2025). Exploring Small-scale Farming as Ecological Livelihoods: Agricultural Sustainability Transformation in Minority Worlds. In S. Ramcilovik-Suominen (Ed.), Just Transformations. Routledge.
• Houtbeckers, E. (2023). Miten tulla toimeen planeetan rajoissa? Kestävyysmurros transformatiivisen työn tekijöiden näkökulmasta. Työväentutkimus Vuosikirja. https://journal.fi/tyovaentutkimus/article/view/131269

2. Social Innovation and Social Entrepreneurship

My academic journey began with social entrepreneurship. For my doctoral dissertation, I studied the everyday work of social entrepreneurs. Rather than focusing on heroic entrepreneurs or exceptional innovations, I became interested in the mundane practices through which people create change in their communities and organisations.

This interest eventually expanded into broader questions of soci(et)al innovation. How do new ideas and practices emerge? How are they sustained? Why do some spread while others remain local? And what happens when grassroots initiatives encounter institutions, markets, and established power structures?

What continues to inspire me about this field is that it directs attention to human agency. In addition to governments, corporations, or technological breakthroughs, societal change is created through the everyday efforts of citizens, communities, cooperatives, associations, and social enterprises that experiment with different ways of organising.

Selected publications

• Houtbeckers, E. (2016). Mundane Social Entrepreneurship: A Practice Perspective on the Work of Microentrepreneurs. Doctoral dissertation, Aalto University.
• Houtbeckers, E. (2016). The Everyday Experiences of a Sustainable Entrepreneur: Brokering for Social Innovation at the Intersection of Networks of Practice. In Sustainable Entrepreneurship and Social Innovation.
• Houtbeckers, E. (2016). The Tactics of Ecopreneurs Aiming to Introduce New Practices. Small Enterprise Research, 23(1), 22-38.
• Houtbeckers, E. (2017). Researcher Subjectivity in Social Entrepreneurship Ethnographies: The Entanglement of Stories in a Co-working Cooperative for Social Innovation. Social Enterprise Journal, 13(2), 128-143.
• Kostilainen, H., Houtbeckers, E., & Pättiniemi, P. (2021). A New Typology of Social Enterprise in Finland: Capturing the Diversity. In Social Enterprise in Western Europe.

3. Diverse Economies, Post-growth Societies, and Ecofeminism

A third thread running throughout my work concerns how we imagine and understand the economy itself. Much of mainstream economic thinking focuses on markets, firms, growth, and paid employment. Yet this provides only a partial picture of how societies function. My research has explored diverse economies, post-growth organising, degrowth, and ecofeminist perspectives that foreground care, interdependence, and ecological limits.

What attracts me to these perspectives is their ability to make visible forms of economic activity that are often hiding in plain sight: care work, voluntary work, subsistence practices, community economies, mutual aid, and the many forms of labour that sustain both people and ecosystems.

Rather than asking how economies can continue to grow indefinitely, these conversations invite us to ask what is enough. What enables collective flourishing? What kinds of livelihoods support both human and non-human wellbeing and ecological regeneration?

Selected publications

• Houtbeckers, E. (2025). The Spectrum of Degrowth Work. In Routledge Handbook on Degrowth.
• Houtbeckers, E. (2024) The political economy of ecofeminist degrowth. Kvinder, Køn & Forskning, (1), 114–125. https://doi.org/10.7146/kkf.v37i1.143582
• Houtbeckers, E. & Korica, M. (2023). Organisational decline and the failure in alternative organising: The case of a coworking cooperative. In J. Merkel, D. Pettas & V. Avdikos (Eds.), Coworking Spaces – Alternative Topologies and Transformative Potentials (pp. 51–65). Springer.
• Gaziulusoy, I., Veselova, E., Hodson, E., Berglund, E., Öztekin, E. E., Houtbeckers, E., Hernberg, H., Jalas, M., Fodor, K., & Litowtschenko, M. F. (2021). Design for Sustainability Transformations: A Deep Leverage Points Research Agenda for the (Post-)Pandemic Context. Strategic Design Research Journal, 14(1), 19-31. 10.4013/sdrj.2021.141.02
• Houtbeckers, E. (2018). Framing Social Enterprise as Post-Growth Organising in the Diverse Economy. Management Revue, 29(3), 257-280.

4. Transformative Research Methods

I have always been interested in how research is conducted and what kinds of knowledge it generates. My work has drawn on ethnography, action research, practice theory, participatory approaches, and creative methods. One of the main questions has been how researchers can engage with socio-ecological transformations without positioning themselves outside them.

Many of the phenomena that interest me, including socio-ecological transitions, emerging livelihoods, and social innovations, are unfinished, contested, and constantly evolving. Studying them requires methods that can attend to uncertainty, and multiple forms of knowledge.

Research for me is not only about analysing social change. It is also about creating spaces for reflection, dialogue, experimentation, and collective learning. Thus, methods are never merely technical tools. They are part of how we imagine and enact possible futures.

Selected publications

• Houtbeckers, E. (2025). Working the Insider-Outsider Hyphen in Action Research for Sustainability: Tensions in Citizen-led Multi-stakeholder Forest Dialogues. International Journal of Action Research.
• Houtbeckers, E. (2025). Etnografin positiot työn kestävyysmurroksen kentällä. In (Eds.) T. Koivunen, E. Saari & M. Hasu, Työelämän etnografiaa. Tampere University Press. https://doi.org/10.61201/tup.953.c1924
• Houtbeckers, E. (2023). Should I Stay or Should I Go? Academic Tempered Radicalism in the Era of Ecological Crisis. In At the Frontiers of Everyday Life.
• Teoskollektiivi. (2022). MetabolsimiZine – Tutkijat tieteen tiloissa. Omakustanne (ISBN 978-952-94-6267-4). https://untame.fi/metabolismizine
• Kallio, G., & Houtbeckers, E. (2020). Academic Knowledge Production: Framework of Practical Activity in the Context of Transformative Food Studies. Frontiers in Sustainable Food Systems, 4.
• Houtbeckers, E. (2017). Researcher subjectivity in social entrepreneurship ethnographies: The entanglement of stories in a co-working cooperative for social innovation. Social Enterprise Journal, 13(2), 128–143. https://doi.org/10.1108/SEJ-07-2016-0025

Emerging directions

Looking back, what surprises me is not how much my research has changed, but how often it returns to the same questions. How can work, livelihoods, and economies be organised in ways that support both people and planet?

I do not have a final answer. But I look forward to continuing the search in my new position at Tampere University of Applied Sciences. If any of these themes resonate with you, I would be delighted to continue the conversation.