Table 5 This table defines four transformative capacities (Hölscher et al., 2019) and gives examples from the CUP cases that show how partnership and project functioning can impact transformative capacity in positive or negative ways

Stewarding

Ability to anticipate, protect and recover from uncertainty and risk while exploiting opportunities beneficial for sustainability

UNAM/Mexico City:

Partnership enhanced stewarding capacity by providing space to plan and navigate government transition and possible dissolving of resilience office

KIT/Karlsruhe:

Not including city partner in testing of research methods/workshops indicated less stewardship of previous collaborative work and thwarted identification of new opportunities

Unlocking

Ability to recognize and dismantle structural drivers of unsustainable path-dependencies and mal-adaptation

PSU/Portland:

Project activities highlighted local governance structure and system was barrier to collaborative infrastructure planning, unlocking pathways for future work and change

Leuphana/Luneberg:

Personnel changes on multiple sides of the partnership increased structural barriers to sustainability action implantation and reinforced path-dependencies

Transforming

Ability to create and diffuse novelties that contribute to sustainability and resilience and to embed these novelties in structures, practices and discourses

ASU/Tempe:

Partnership created opportunity for City’s first ever Climate Action Plan with implementable projects. Grew partnership participants and imbedded collaboration into city workflow

UNAM/Mexico City:

Lack of formal recognition of collaboration reduced CUP’s power and therefore ability to implement structural changes

Orchestrating

Ability to coordinate multi-actor governance processes and foster synergies and minimize trade-offs and conflicts across scales, sectors and time

PSU/Portland:

Outcome from CUP is new collaborative team (Disaster Resilience and Recovery Action Group) that will facilitate multi-sector resilience planning in Portland

Leuphana/Luneberg:

When one project phase ended, a new project was not immediately identified and the partnership began to falter, signifying significant challenge in moving from ideation phase to coordination and implementation phase