Doing more with less: Provisioning systems and the transformation of the stock-flow-service nexus

Physical components of societies like infrastructures need biophysical resources for their construction, maintenance and use. These components, analyzed as societies' material stocks, predefine energy and raw materials and provide societal services, necessary for their functioning and for social welfare. The nexus between stocks, the resource flows and the services, is crucial for the analysis of social-ecological transformations. In this paper, we build on recent work in socio-metabolic research on the stock-flow-service nexus and develop a conceptual approach how to examine this nexus while addressing the challenges of social-ecological transformations. We refer to the concept of provisioning systems to analyze the institutions, technologies, knowledge and practices mediating between actors and resources but also the power relations involved in the creation and transformation of this nexus. It enables us to understand how specific stock-flow-service nexuses are constructed, which lock-in effects result from specific stock-flow-service configurations and which options can be envisaged for its transformation towards lower resource use. We argue that provisioning systems need to be analyzed as structuring space and time as well as embedded within the contested terrain of the state. By providing this conceptualization, we aim to offer an understanding which can help to define options for the transformation of the stock-flow-service nexus in a transdisciplinary process. •The paper deals with the services material stocks (e.g. infrastructures) provide.•It develops an innovative conceptual approach to provisioning systems.•This approach aims at the transformation of the stock-flow-service nexus.•The objective is to provide the same or even better services with less resources.•Provisioning systems are embedded in the state and sensitive to time and space.