Table 5 Roles and functions of intermediaries in strengthening urban transformative capacities in Battambang and Sihanoukville, referencing the functions of intermediaries and their activities listed in Table 2 (above)

C1 Inclusive and multiform urban governance

As a facilitator between urban residents and key stakeholders (waste company and municipality), Comped addressed power disparities and helped to resolve sustainability problems through creating a coordination platform (F5 and F6 demonstrated)

International development agencies and businesses had found it difficult to establish intermediary partnerships with authorities at local levels. Emerging partnerships facilitated by international (United Nations) agencies had initiated participation and inclusiveness (F6 initiated), although overall the city lacked a diversity in governance modes and networks

C2 Transformative leadership (in the public, private and civil society sectors)

Through knowledge transfer and policy influencing on organic waste recycling, Comped strengthened the municipality’s leadership (F2 and F7 demonstrated)

Top-down leadership on urban transformation in the public sector had limited the conditions for emerging leadership in local authorities, private sector, and NGOs

C3 Empowered and autonomous communities of practice (place-based and/or issue-driven)

Comped’s community facilitation with the urban residents of Battambang enabled the city to identify and act on their social needs and empower community members through increasing their access to waste services and employment opportunities (F5 and F6 demonstrated)

Place-based solutions to key waste sector challenges had started to emerge, with local authorities facilitating access to waste resources for recycling to a local network of informal recycling businesses (F4 and F5 initiated), although community empowerment was limited, given the overall top-down governance structures

C4 System(s) awareness and memory

Comped’s long-term institutional knowledge of and engagement in the sanitation sector provided knowledge continuity for urban sanitation reforms, sustaining local policy reforms and supporting matchmaking between agencies (F2 and F7 demonstrated)

Public sector intermediaries lacked strategic planning and knowledge partnerships to support systems awareness and memory. International development agencies had initiated baseline studies to support systems awareness and identify opportunities for sustainability transformation (F2 initiated)

C5 Urban sustainability foresight

Comped supported the Municipality-led multi-stakeholder partnership for sanitation planning that created a collective vision and roadmap for sustainability transformation in the city’s Waste Management Masterplan (2022) (F1, F3 and F5 demonstrated)

Existing public-sector planning structures had not supported the development of collective visions for sustainability or the envisioning of future pathways in sanitation; however, private sector entrepreneurs and international development agencies were generating knowledge to support alternative scenarios (F2 initiated)

C6 Diverse community-based experimentation with disruptive solutions

Comped supported the municipality and other partners in experimenting with waste separation and recycling systems for schools, markets, and households, disrupting existing waste management practices (F3 and F4 demonstrated)

Through knowledge transfer, matchmaking and coordination, international development agencies supported initial small scale pilots for waste separation and recycling using smart technologies creating initial disruptions (F2 and F4 initiated). Also, a waste recycling business had piloted a new financial model for plastics recycling (F4 and F7 demonstrated)

C7 Innovation embedding and coupling

Lessons learned through recycling experiments supported the city authorities to facilitate behaviour changes, supporting waste separation at source and increasing organic waste recycling (F3 and F4 demonstrated)

Small scale pilots were yet to be taken to scale and embedded within local practices and institutions and were limited by a lack of intermediation support to scale pilots from a niche to the regime level within the city

C8 Reflexivity and social learning

Multi-stakeholder partnerships provided an opportunity for open dialogue between stakeholders with diverse interests, and knowledge transfer that facilitated social learning and problem solving (F2 and F5 demonstrated)

Top-down leadership directing the urban transformation processes limited the opportunity for local-scale reflexivity and social learning

C9 Working across human agency levels

Multi-stakeholder partnerships enabled coordination of behaviour change in waste management practices from individuals, households, businesses, organisations, and institutions; this was facilitated through knowledge transfer and capacity strengthening of local officials and households (F2 and F3 demonstrated)

Provincial authorities coordinated the engagement of international development agencies, businesses and NGOs in the city, and supported knowledge transfer between organisations (F2 demonstrated). The Municipality had a limited role in coordination across agency levels

C10 Working across political-administrative levels and geographical scales

The Municipality intermediated across political-administrative levels, facilitating waste reforms within the directives of, and resources provided by, national and provincial authorities, while guiding village-scale reforms (F6 and F7 demonstrated)

Provincial authorities were an intermediary between national and municipal authorities, facilitating knowledge transfer through top-down policy directives and guidance