Place-based climate commissions: embracing messy governmentality

Research on norm domestication in multi‐level governance structures is overlooked in urban climate governance and policy literature. This paper conceptualizes multi‐scalar interactions of norm domestication for local climate actions. The city of Phoenix, which operates under the “purple” (blue cities and red legislatures) state of Arizona, is analyzed to illustrate how a local government can take up the climate actions left in the void at the state and federal levels. The empirical findings reveal important temporal politics at the state level that influenced the local government's climate norm domestication. The period of Democratic party leadership diffused climate norms at the state‐level and positioned the local government more as a climate policy‐taker, adopting decisions from the state legislature. Swings in the state‐level executive orders under the subsequent period of Republican leadership, however, forced the local government to seek some common ground for norm domestication, usually related to the nonpartisan goals of economic development. Consequently, local climate actions are subject to depoliticization of climate change from the higher‐level governance structures. Overall, decarbonization targets are not being directed in ways that lead to a broader shift in the socio‐technical system but would support short‐term emission reductions if multiple institutions, both at the state and sub‐state levels, created spaces for collaboration rather than competition.

Impact of a climate network: The role of intermediaries in local level climate action

A SHIFT towards interest-driven, opportunity-based and more voluntary actions by combining bottom-up with top-down elements (Falkner, 2016).Interactive learning and experimentation at different levels of global governance have become highly important, and these complex global interactions are increasingly regarded not as obstacles but as opportunities for innovation and interactive learning (Sovacool, 2011).Global climate governance relates not only to the legal system of the climate regime but also to various public and private initiatives at different scales and across sectors.Scholars studying the complex multi-actor and multi-sector characteristics of the system have therefore begun to conceptualize global multi-level climate governance as an opportunity structure for the generation and diffusion of climate-related innovation.The topic of this special issues is climate governance within a multi-level and multi-sectoral global system.The work argues that global climate governance today aims essentially to activate the dynamic potential of each level of the global governance system, the level of world regions as well as the level of provinces and local communities.Horizontal peer-to-peer learning between countries, cities and regions, as well as vertical up-scaling of best practice, has created a dynamic of change.The cross-sectoral approach has become important as far as the mobilizing of economic interests (e.g. in the construction sector) and the use of co-benefits is concerned.This special issue intends to offer a better understanding of the nature and variety of, and linkages between, initiatives taken and governance functions delivered within the broader 'climate governance landscape ' (Betsill et al., 2015).It analyses various climate governance activities in the European Union (EU), India and China through a systemic perspective.The EU may be regarded as the strongest regional sub-system of the global system, although the BRICS countries of China and India play a comparable role, as countries both with a similar scope and with explicit multi-level climate policy activities.The systematic dimension of global climate governance is described in the introductory article 'Multi-level climate governance as a global system' by Martin Jnicke.The author analyses the potential of the global climate governance system, which is characterized by a multiplicity of access points and incentives for innovation and interactive learning.It is regarded as a 'multi-impulse-system', where the sum of even weak impulses from different parts of the system can play the role of a strong instrument.The global multi-level climate governance structure is also characterized by a specific global knowledge base and a global policy arena, allowing for climate-related agenda-setting and the mobilization of interests at each level.It is taken as an opportunity structure for ambitious innovation-based climate strategies based on interactive lesson-drawing from best practice.The lesson to be learned at all levels of the system is the potential for economic co-benefits related to the socio-technical system of clean-energy innovation and the global clean-energy market.The following article, 'The EU system of multi-level climate governance', by Martin Jnicke and Rainer Quitzow provides an overview of the regional structure of the global climate governance system.The authors understand the EU as a system where 'multi-level reinforcement' has been observed several times and which can be considered as a leader by example in global climate governance.They point to the fact that the EU has the world's highest share of green electricity and since 1990 has made the largest reduction to its greenhouse gas emissions.They attribute the EU's relatively successful performance in climate and energy governance to two main factors: (1) multi-level reinforcement and (2) the mobilization of economic interests at different levels of governance through low-carbon industrial policy.While the multi-impulse system has fostered

States have been negotiating climate mitigation actions centred around greenhouse gas emissions for several decades. In the wake of the Paris Agreement, a significant body of research has emerged reflecting on the unintended negative consequences of climate mitigation action. More recently, this research includes a focus on climate adaptation actions. The negative impacts have, together, been labelled ‘maladaptation’. Maladaptation as articulated in the literature takes many forms: e.g. displacement of communities from traditional lands such as forests and pasture, violent conflict at different scales, resource capture by elites. In this article, we argue in support of a careful delineation between local-level side effects of climate action and negative effects reaching back to the state (through different pathways and at different levels). The latter we label ‘boomerang effects’. We illustrate, through several examples, the pathways leading from climate action to local impact to boomerang effect, arguing that careful articulation of policy and program decisions, actions and effects upon the state provide support for improved policy making. Climate action is necessary, and necessarily must be better informed in order to achieve the broadest socio-ecological benefits possible.

Household-level mitigation and adaptation actions are important because households make a significant contribution to greenhouse gas emissions and are severely affected by climate change. However, there is still very little understanding of the factors that influence household-level mitigation and adaptation action. From a review of literature, we identified the factors that potentially influence climate mitigation and adaptation actions of households, which we then tested using survey data from 622 households in Nuevo Leon, Mexico. Nuevo Leon is a major emitter of greenhouse gasses and is a state where climate-related disasters are recurrent and expected to increase in frequency and severity. Results from ordinal regression analyses showed that perceived knowledge and financial self-efficacy greatly influenced the extent of household-level action taken. To a lesser extent, the age and educational level of the respondent also affected action. Respondents pointed out the need to know about different aspects of climate change. An implication of our study is the value of recognizing the importance of perceptions, as mitigation and adaptation actions are shaped by perceptions of climate change alongside socio-demographic characteristics. This may have significant implications for policies and campaigns promoting household-level action to increase resilience to climate change.

Multiple sectors—health and non-health—can determine the health and well-being of people and the condition of the socio-ecological environment on which it depends. At the climate and human health nexus, a systems-based understanding of climate change and health should inform all stages of the policy process from problem conceptualization to design, implementation, and evaluation. Such an understanding should guide countries, their partners, and donors to incorporate health in strategic climate actions based on how health is affected by, and plays a role in, the dynamic interactions across economic, environmental, and societal domains. A systems-based approach to sustainable development has been widely promoted but operationalizing it for project level and policy development and implementation has not been well articulated. Such an approach is especially valuable for informing how to address climate change and health together through policy actions which can achieve multiple, mutually reinforcing goals. This commentary article describes strategic steps including the complementary use of health impact assessment, quantification of health impacts, and linking climate and health actions to national and global policy processes to apply a systems-based approach for developing climate mitigation and adaptation actions with human health benefits.

The greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions in the European Union (EU) are mainly caused by human activity from five sectors—power, industry, transport, buildings, and agriculture. To tackle all these challenges, the EU actions and policies have been encouraging initiatives focusing on a holistic approach but these initiatives are not enough coordinated and connected to reach the much needed impact. To strengthen the important role of regions in climate actions, and stimulate wide stakeholders' engagement including citizens, a conceptual framework for enabling rapid and far-reaching climate actions through multi-sectoral regional adaptation pathways is hereby developed. The target audience for this framework is composed by regional policy makers, developers and fellow scientists. The scale of the framework emphasizes the regional function as an important meeting point and delivery arena for European and national climate strategies and objectives both at urban and rural level. The framework is based on transformative and no-regret measures, prioritizing the Key Community Systems (KCS) that most urgently need to be protected from climate impacts and risks.

Multilateral efforts are essential to an effective response to climate change, but individual nations define climate action policy by translating local and global objectives into adaptation and mitigation actions. We propose a conceptual framework to explore opportunities for polycentric climate governance, understanding polycentricity as a property that encompasses the potential for coordinating multiple centers of semiautonomous decision-making. We assert that polycentrism engages a diverse array of public and private actors for a more effective approach to reducing the threat of climate change. In this way, polycentrism may provide an appropriate strategy for addressing the many challenges of climate governance in the Anthropocene. We review two Chilean case studies: Chile’s Nationally Determined Contribution on Climate Change and the Chilean National Climate Change Action Plan. Our examination demonstrates that Chile has included a diversity of actors and directed significant financial resources to both processes. The central government coordinated both of these processes, showing the key role of interventions at higher jurisdictional levels in orienting institutional change to improve strategic planning and better address climate change. Both processes also provide some evidence of knowledge co-production, while at the same time remaining primarily driven by state agencies and directed by technical experts. Efforts to overcome governance weaknesses should focus on further strengthening existing practices for climate change responses, establishing new institutions, and promoting decision-making that incorporates diverse social actors and multiple levels of governance. In particular, stronger inclusion of local level actors provides an opportunity to enhance polycentric modes of governance and improve climate change responses. Fully capitalizing on this opportunity requires establishing durable communication channels between different levels of governance.

. . Over recent years, Ethiopia has massively engaged in climate change mitigation and adaptation activities so as to reduce the adverse risks of climate change. However, considering the country’s vulnerability, the effort is not diversified and nature-based solutions such as wetland conservation are overlooked. Therefore, the purpose of this review is to assess and evaluate the potential of Ethiopian wetlands as another huge on hand natural solutions in intensifying climate actions, conservation strategies, and other challenges. Recent studies on Ethiopian wetlands have shown a tremendous capacity in capturing and securing atmospheric carbon, however, their conservation is not attracting sufficient attention yet. These ecosystems’ carbon reserve potential and the ultimate role they are playing in regional as well as a global contribution is not well perceived, thereon, overlooked in the nationwide conservation activities to foster climate change adaptation. Hence, we would like to suggest that considering the coverage and potential of our wetlands it should be the go-getting time now to include them in the country’s climate adaptation actions and diversify the efforts through approaches like community-based wetland management.

There is increasing public debate about the governance of climate change and its repercussions for nature and human livelihoods. In today's digitalized communication landscape, both public and private actors involved in climate change governance use social media to provide information and to interact with stakeholders and the broader public. This Focus Article discusses two main aspects of debates about climate change and climate governance on Twitter, which previous theories suggest to shape climate governance across domestic and global levels: non‐state climate action and public opinion formation on the social media. We see significant advancement in the environmental social sciences studying these two areas. Yet, we also see the need for a better understanding of how public and private actors in the climate governance complex interact on Twitter, and how these actors shape, and are shaped by, experiences, values, and positions. This understanding will help to advance climate governance theories. This article proceeds in three steps. We first discuss previous social media research on non‐state climate action and public opinion formation related to climate change and its governance. Then we sketch avenues for future research, elaborating how Twitter data might be used to investigate how non‐state climate action and public opinion formation on social media are linked to and influence climate governance. We conclude by making the case for drawing together Twitter data and climate governance research into a more coherent research agenda.This article is categorized under: Policy and Governance > Private Governance of Climate Change Perceptions, Behavior, and Communication of Climate Change > Communication Policy and Governance > National Climate Change Policy Policy and Governance > Multilevel and Transnational Climate Change Governance

Urban climate governance on the subnational and local government levels requires multilevel governance and local autonomy. Within centralised governments, climate action becomes challenging. Moreover, in developing countries, development needs are usually prioritised, while climate action is viewed as an unaffordable luxury. In a centralised, middle-income country like Egypt, climate action is a challenge for all government levels. This research investigates the current state and the prospect of urban climate change governance on the subnational level in Egypt. A twofold methodology is used. First, through desk research, a comprehensive list of urban climate governance enabling factors was extracted. The list was used to assess the practices of 3 international case studies (Delhi, Durban, and Amman) and then refined and used to assess the first subnational level climate change strategy in Egypt. Second, semi-structured interviews were conducted with a few selected experts working on climate change and urban policies in Egypt. Two sets of recommendations were formulated to expedite urban climate change governance in Egypt, especially on the subnational and local levels. While the research focuses on Egypt, the methodology and recommendations could be adopted and adapted by local governments functioning within centralised systems.

Transformative climate resilience and sport mega-events – The case of the Australian Open

Local governments have led the way on climate action in the United States. While the federal government has largely stood to the side, local governments have made great efforts to adopt policies aimed at reducing greenhouse gas emissions. A large and robust literature in urban politics has explored the variables that influence local government action on climate change in the United States. Issue severity and resident ideological preferences have been identified as two of the most important factors in local climate action. Governments that are more likely to face major impacts from climate, such as coastal communities, and governments serving more liberal residents have both been found to pursue climate policy at higher rates. In this paper we suggest that these relationships are better understood as conditional. We argue that the effect of issue severity will be moderated by ideology. When residents are liberal, issue severity will matter. When residents are conservative, the impact will be muted. We find strong evidence for this hypothesis. Coastal governments and governments that have experienced drought adopt more climate policies, but this is conditional on the ideology of residents.

Local governments play an increasingly important role in international climate policy. Climate action follows existing trajectories of sustainable development action at the local level. The history of climate action in cities suggests a lot of potential for learning from previous sustainability experiences. Three aspects of climate change governance are important at the local level: the motivations for responding to climate change, the different responses deployed, and the city structures and networks representing cities in the global spheres. Current interest in climate change action at the local level follows three decades of local sustainability action. Because of engagement with environmental conflicts at the local level, environmental justice activists also influenced local climate action. Cities and settlements are exciting policy arenas with great potential to enable just transitions. However, the impacts of local government’s action at both the local level and internationally are not always evident. Cities have sought to address climate change through planning, harnessing co-benefits of climate action, and finding appropriate evaluation means. Solutions have also been developed through the insertion of cities in global circuits of knowledge production via transnational municipal networks (TMNs). Local government action can only be explained with reference to the international climate change regime. International policy events influence local government action, and local government action influences international discourses of climate action. A range of actors, from local governments to businesses, communities, and civil society, also play a role in addressing climate change. Still, they require autonomy and the resources to deliver mitigation and adaptation actions that local governments can mediate.

This editorial examines the intricate landscape of local climate action in Latin America. It explores the interplay between local initiatives, global agendas, and the potential for innovative and anti-systemic approaches. The paper recognizes the constraints faced by local actors, including limited capacity and the complexities of action, highlighting their differences and complementarity. Furthermore, this editorial underscore the role of local climate actions in challenging the dominant neoliberal global order, particularly through grassroots efforts prioritizing sustainability and equity. These initiatives offer alternative socioeconomic models and reframe issues beyond climate change, addressing broader challenges like inequality and resource depletion. In navigating these complexities, the editorial emphasizes the need to combine both localization and local climate actions, demanding inventive methods for progress measurement and support. It sets the stage for a topical collection that dissects local climate action in Latin America and its critical role within the global climate change agenda, and national policies.