Understanding transformational changes in construction from a critical realism perspective

The construction industry is undergoing fundamental transformations triggered by environmental and social challenges. Notably, moving towards circular practices in construction represents a paradigm shift that requires, at the very least, a complete rethinking of the economic, technological, and organisational principles of doing business in the industry. These change processes have been extensively investigated to understand their mechanisms. However, research appears to provide only fragmented snapshots of these long-term systemic transformations, often with unclear ontological foundations. This leads to inconsistent and less insightful results. We propose critical realism as a potential ontological perspective and the morphogenetic approach as one of its programmatic elaborations that appears particularly useful for understanding transformational changes. We introduce both and illustrate their suitability as ontological foundations for understanding sustainable and circularity transitions in construction.