In the world I work in, we are very good at modelling change.

We simulate carbon prices, energy transitions, trade flows and sectoral impacts. We estimate how emissions evolve, how economies respond and which sectors expand or contract under different policy scenarios. These tools are increasingly sophisticated and play an important role in shaping climate policy.

And yet, I often return to a more uncomfortable question: are we actually transforming systems, or mostly optimising within them?

This distinction matters.

Much of what we describe as transformation is, in practice, transition. We shift from fossil fuels to renewables, improve efficiency or adjust policy instruments. These are necessary changes, but they often leave the underlying system largely intact. The same incentives, structures and expectations about growth and consumption continue to shape outcomes.

What models capture, and what they miss

From a modelling perspective, this is not surprising.

Our tools are well-suited to analysing how systems respond to policy changes under given assumptions. They allow us to identify cost increases, trace sectoral adjustments and estimate distributional impacts. Resistance to policy is therefore not difficult to explain. It often reflects real economic pressures, including higher costs, competitiveness concerns or uneven burdens across regions and groups.

But identifying these impacts is only part of the story.

What is harder to capture is how these impacts translate into political responses and institutional realities. Similar policies can lead to very different outcomes, both across and within countries, depending on governance, trust and the capacity to manage distributional effects.

In the European Union, such challenges are explicitly recognised. Cohesion policy, the Just Transition Mechanism, and broader solidarity-oriented instruments aim to address territorial and social imbalances that arise during the transition. These efforts reflect an understanding that transformation is not only a technical exercise, but also a question of fairness and political feasibility.

In many parts of the world, where fiscal capacity and institutional support are more limited, managing these tensions can be even more difficult. This suggests that transformation pathways differ significantly across contexts, and that the ability to navigate them is unevenly distributed. This means that people experience these transitions differently, with some regions and groups better positioned to adapt than others.

Translating these differences into analytical frameworks remains challenging, particularly when they depend on political and institutional dynamics.

Integrated scenarios, such as widely used socioeconomic pathways, attempt to reflect these broader dynamics. However, they rely on predefined narratives rather than processes that emerge within the model itself. As a result, many of the forces that shape transformation, including institutional change and behavioural shifts, remain outside the analytical core.

Models therefore do more than analyse transitions. They also shape the space within which transitions are explored. By focusing on what can be represented within existing assumptions, they inevitably give more attention to some pathways than others.

Moments of disruption

This becomes particularly visible in moments of disruption.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, it briefly felt as though a deeper shift might be possible. Mobility patterns changed, emissions dropped and there was widespread reflection on what constituted essential activity and consumption. For a moment, disruption opened space for imagining different trajectories.

And yet, many of these shifts proved temporary. Consumption rebounded, supply chains returned to familiar structures and policy attention shifted back to restoring growth and stability. Rather than accelerating structural transformation, the system largely absorbed the shock and returned to its previous trajectory.

A similar pattern can be seen in periods of geopolitical instability. These moments often expose the vulnerabilities of fossil fuel dependence and, in principle, create opportunities to accelerate more resilient and sustainable systems. In practice, however, they tend to trigger short-term responses that reinforce existing dependencies, including renewed investments in fossil-based supply chains.

Where does transformation begin?

This is where the conversation on systems transformation needs to become more precise.

The challenge is not a lack of tools or awareness. It is that much of our analysis and many of our policies operate within the same system they seek to change. They adjust incentives and redirect behaviour, but rarely alter the deeper structures that shape how economies function.

This is evident in ongoing policy efforts. In the European Union, initiatives such as the EU Emissions Trading System, the Green Deal and recent industrial strategies represent some of the most ambitious attempts to steer economies towards climate neutrality. They reshape incentives, mobilise investment and set long-term directions. At the same time, they largely adapt the current system, redirecting investment rather than fundamentally altering how it functions.

This is how change often unfolds. It is gradual, negotiated and constrained by existing institutions.

But it raises a difficult question:

To what extent can transformation emerge from within existing systems, and when does it require a deeper shift in how those systems are organised?

This matters because the difference between adapting a system and transforming it shapes not only environmental outcomes, but also people’s livelihoods, regional inequalities and the durability of change over time.

If systems transformation is about rethinking how societies organise, decide and prioritise, then the challenge is not only to model change or design better policies.

It is to recognise the limits of change within the system itself.