Energizing Comparative Environmental Politics and Comparative Political Economy

Complying with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change requires leaving fossil fuels underground (LFFU), which raises justice issues regarding the Global South and its energy transition. The literature is scattered with no review papers on the challenges of LFFU in the Global South, hence we ask: What can be learnt from reviewing the scholarship on the Global South's energy transition, focusing on LFFU and the issue of stranded resources and assets? Our review reveals: (a) renewable investments in the Global South are relatively low for the scale of change needed, and such renewable deployment is more additive than substitutive. Nonetheless, there is potential for the Global South to leapfrog; (b) literature on LFFU in the Global South is limited, and much of it focuses on subsidies. However, developing countries might include stranded assets in their accounting, making LFFU appealing; (c) the Right to Development influences the energy transition's governance and justice issues: limited governance hampers LFFU, while understudied power dynamics shape transition's political economies. However, a global and multilevel just transition may have the potential to achieve LFFU. Thus, the literature overlooks (i) the dilemmas of stranded resources and assets from a developing country perspective and the implications in terms of equity, development, and climate change impacts; and (ii) the underlying power dynamics. Future research should investigate energy leapfrogging viability, critically assess renewables' additive rather than substitutive character in the Global South, and better identify the constraints to an inclusive energy transition, posed by North–South power dynamics and FF incumbents.This article is categorized under:Climate and Development > Social Justice and the Politics of Development

Ben Clift Comparative Political Economy: States, Markets and Global Capitalism, Palgrave Macmillan, Basingstoke, 2014; 392 pp: 9780230555174, 28.99 [pounds sterling] (pbk) Ben Clift provides an innovative textbook that integrates numerous accounts and perspectives within the study of political economy. The book focuses especially on highlighting and explaining the linkages between political economy, international political economy (IPE) and comparative political economy (CPE). In doing so, the book successfully fills a gap between IPE and CPE, interpreting the historical evolution and transformation of state-market relations, and providing theoretically and empirically rich explanations for those transformations. Chapters 1 and 2 justify the importance of historical change in state/market relations and contemporary capitalist restructuring, locating the discussion within the context of theoretical debates in political economy. Clift situates CPE as a field of study within classical political economy, tracing especially the influence of key thinkers, including Adam Smith, Karl Marx and Friedrich List. In doing so, he grounds the history of political economy in the emergence of modern capitalism and market societies, before subsequently integrating IPE and CPE by emphasising the importance of the analysis of both international and domestic forces, and discussing how international influences are mediated and channeled in domestic contexts. Chapters 3 to 7 introduce the theories and approaches that comprise CPE, again highlighting their emergence from classical political economy. Chapter 3 introduces Adam Smith and classical liberal political economy, which emphasises the importance of free market principles. The chapter also examines economic nationalism by introducing Listian political economy, in which List highlights the importance of nations as intermediaries between individuals and humanity, and the way in which this was earlier ignored by classical political economists. Clift goes on to contrast Smithian and Listian approaches with Marxian political economy on one hand, on the other, to highlight the different understanding of wealth, value, and the concepts of capital, capitalist market and exploitation contained within Marx's work, contrasted with both liberal and nationalist understandings. Not only does Clift describe Marxian political economy concisely and clearly, but he also develops the argument that Marx's formation of the problem of historical specificity is something that can and should be adopted within theories of CPE. Clift's analysis of Marx therefore brings to the fore the potentiality for Marx's insights, especially when integrated with other theories, to understand state-market relations, social relations and structure, and how and why human beings act in the way they do. Chapter 4 describes disciplinary politics and genealogy by introducing debates on methods between protagonists and schools that include the German Historical School, Marx and historical materialism, marginalist political economy, Hayek and Keynes. Clift introduces these debates with a specific focus on the way in which CPE has emerged, and the focus and research questions that have developed at its core. In Chapter 5, the book turns to consider the influence of institutional analysis upon CPE, focusing in particular upon the varieties of capitalism (VoC) literature. This highlights the significance of institutions and approaches that examine the role of political, societal, and economic institutions in studying political economy. The strength of Clift's analysis of CPE is here particularly evident; that is, his ability to discuss, contextualise and integrate both contemporary and classical debates in a way that shows considerable attention to state-of-the-art developments within the literature. Chapter 6 moves to a focus on 'interest-based approaches' to CPE, which are considered in terms of their exploration of the question 'Who benefits? …

The global green energy transition towards a low-carbon economy via decarbonisation is in-creasing the demand for and exploitation of so-called critical resources, including lithium. The growing demand for lithium, which, as a raw material, is primarily found in countries of the global South, has sparked a new debate on the global interdependencies, unequal ecological and economic exchange and unevenness of the energy transition between the global North and South. In this context, concepts such as green extractivism, green colonialism and green sacri-fice zones have emerged. In this article, we build on this strand of literature, assuming that decarbonisation – as the overarching goal of the energy transition – influences the decisions taken over lithium mining and the narratives used for its legitimisation. It remains an open question, however, how the legitimisation of lithium mining is being shaped by decarbonisa-tion and energy transition goals. What narratives are being used, by whom, how and with what socio-political and socio-economic effects? In Argentina, there are numerous lithium mining projects, and conflicts only arise in a fraction of them. We focus on two lithium mining projects at the Salar de Olaroz-Cauchari, Jujuy, where protests against the mines have been largely absent. We analyse the narratives applied by governmental and corporate actors. The theoretical underpinning of the analysis is based on a dialectical understanding of narratives, whereby narratives are seen as contingent products of social and global-local (multiscalar) interactions. We argue that, in order to become powerful and to legitimise lithium mining, two core narratives are applied by its proponents: a green development and industrialisation narra-tive and a climate protection narrative. Both narratives are increasingly linked to global dis-courses of green energy transition and are part of an emerging green developmentalist disposi-tive that manifests in new institutions, laws and administrative measures to enforce lithium mining. Resumen: Legitimando la extracción de litio: Transición energética global y desarrollismo verde en Jujuy, Argentina La transición energética ecológica mundial hacia una economía baja en carbono a través de la descarbonización está aumentando la demanda y la explotación de los denominados recursos críticos, entre ellos el litio. La creciente demanda de litio, que, como materia prima, se encuen-tra principalmente en países del Sur global, ha suscitado un nuevo debate sobre las interdepen-dencias globales, el intercambio ecológico y económico desigual y las desigualdades de la transición energética entre el Norte y el Sur globales. En este contexto han surgido conceptos como extractivismo verde, colonialismo verde y zonas de sacrificio verde. En este artículo nos basamos en esta corriente de la literatura, asumiendo que la descarbonización como objetivo global de la transición energética influye en las decisiones que se toman sobre la extracción de litio y en las narrativas que se utilizan para legitimarla en las regiones ricas en litio. Sin embar-go, sigue siendo una incógnita cómo los objetivos de la descarbonización y la transición ener-gética influyen en la legitimación de la minería del litio. ¿Qué narrativas se utilizan, quién las utiliza, cómo y con qué efectos sociopolíticos y socioeconómicos? En Argentina existen nume-rosos proyectos de extracción de litio pero los conflictos sólo surgen en una parte de ellos. Nos centramos en dos proyectos mineros de litio en el Salar de Olaroz-Cauchari, Jujuy, donde las protestas contra las minas han sido prácticamente inexistentes. Analizamos las narrativas aplicadas por los actores gubernamentales y empresariales. El sustento teórico del análisis se basa en una comprensión dialéctica de las narrativas, según la cual las narrativas son vistas como productos continuos de interacciones sociales y globales-locales (multiescalares). Soste-nemos que, para hacerse poderosos y legitimar la minería del litio, sus defensores aplican dos relatos básicos: el del desarrollo y la industrialización ecológicos y el de la protección del cli-ma. Ambas narrativas se vinculan a los discursos globales sobre la transición energética y forman parte de un dispositivo verde desarrollista emergente que se manifiesta en nuevas insti-tuciones, leyes y medidas administrativas para imponer la minería del litio.

The global energy transition is pivotal in mitigating climate change. In Chile, the energy system that includes hydropower faces challenges from prolonged megadroughts, necessitating diversification toward renewable energy sources like solar and wind energy. However, research gaps persist in understanding how these sources can optimally address climate-induced vulnerabilities. This study conducts a bibliometric analysis to identify global research trends on renewable energy strategies under extreme drought conditions, distinguishing it from systematic or narrative reviews. A bibliometric analysis was conducted using Scopus, incorporating 82 selected documents analyzed via Bibliometrix and VOSviewer to map co-authorship networks, keywords, and publications. Results revealed a significant increase in research on solar energy (26.83%) and renewable energy (25.61%) within the study period (2005–2024), with the most notable growth occurring in the last six years. Key findings include the predominance of studies on energy optimization, with solar and wind technologies emerging as pivotal for enhancing resilience in water-scarce regions. These insights underscore the strategic role of renewable energies in addressing climate vulnerabilities while supporting sustainable energy transitions. The implications of this work lie in guiding future research and policy frameworks to enhance energy security and environmental sustainability.

The pursuit of climate action to meet net-zero targets has triggered the call for a global energy transition from fossil fuels to clean energy sources. However, this global energy transition does not entirely recognise all countries’ social, economic and technological capacities as well as emission contributions as envisaged under the Common but Differentiated Responsibilities (CBDR) principle, which underlies international climate policy. It is concerned more with the outcome of transitioning to clean energy than with justice in the transition process. Recognition justice, an element of energy justice, enables us to identify the inequalities that global energy paradigms (such as the energy transition) can create and how a justice framework can help us understand the implications of energy injustice and address the inequities across energy systems. Recognition justice acknowledges the divergent perspectives rooted in social, economic and racial differences and the varied strengths of developed and developing countries. The energy transition process ought to recognise these differences so that they are reasonably expected to benefit everyone. Implementing the energy transition in the Global South (GS) in the same way as it is being advanced in the Global North will have security, justice, economic, resource-stranding, and sustainable development implications. This issue (of injustice in the energy transition) is aggravated by two dichotomous realities: many countries in the South will be most impacted by climatic changes, yet there remains political and social opposition to climate action through the energy transition. As a solution, this paper relies on the notion of recognition justice with support from the Rawlsian justice concept to argue that a delayed transition represents justice and recognises the peculiar nature and different circumstances of the GS. It identifies that learnings from the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer and the notion of CBDR under international climate treaties can be mainstreamed into energy transition research and policies to achieve justice for countries of the GS. The paper further finds that a delayed transition for the GS will (i) enable the region to address sustainability-related issues of hunger and multidimensional poverty, essential to realising other Sustainable Development Goals, whilst gradually implementing energy transition policies; (ii) present an attractive case against political and social opposition to energy transition in the GS; (iii) advance the goal of CBDR already recognised under international climate treaties and the bifurcated approaches established in such treaties; and, finally, (iv) ensure that developed countries contributing the most to greenhouse gas emissions take the lead now and act while the GS effectuates national contributions sustainably.

Strategies, Struggles, and Sites of Transformation in Korean Political Economy

Energy and environmental issues are among the most important problems of public concern. Wind and solar energy may be one of the alternative solutions to overcome energy shortage and to reduce greenhouse gaseous emission. Using electric cars in cities can significantly improve the air quality there. Through our analyses and modeling on the basis of the National Centers for Environment Prediction data we confirm that the amount of usable solar and wind energy far exceeds the world's total energy demand, considering the feasibility of the technology being used. Storing the surplus solar and wind energy and then releasing this surplus on demand is an important approach to maintaining uninterrupted solar‐ and wind‐generated electricity. This approach requires us to be aware of the available solar and wind energy in advance in order to manage their storage. Solar and wind energy depends on weather conditions and we know weather forecasting. This implies that solar and wind energy is predictable. In this article, we demonstrate how solar and wind energy can be forecasted. We provide a web tool that can be used by all to arrive at solar and wind energy amount at any location in the world. The tool is available at www.renewableenergyst.org. The website also provides additional information on renewable energy, which is useful to a wide range of audiences, including students, educators, and the general public.

Hydrogen farm concept: A Perspective for Turkey

Comparative environmental politics is the systematic study and comparison of environmental politics in different countries around the globe. The importance of a comparative approach to global environmental politics stems from the fact that the political processes that promote or impede trends like deforestation (see Chapter 38 ), water scarcity ( Chapter 34 ), and climate change ( Chapter 28 ) play out every day in places as diverse as the American state of Maine, the Indonesian island of Java, rapidly developing countries such as Chile and China, poor and unstable political systems like those of Haiti and Guinea, highly industrialized countries like Germany, and post-communist countries such as Belarus. To understand global environmental governance thus requires an appreciation for complexity – for the unique ways that actors and institutions interact in particular places and at specifi c historical junctures – and the use of theoretical tools to help us make sense of this complexity. With this overarching goal in mind, in this chapter we make two claims. First, comparative inquiry brings a great deal to the study and practice of global environmental politics and should occupy a more prominent position in the fi eld (see Chapter 2 ). Second, to realize this potential, and to cohere into a cumulative literature, comparative environmental research should give substantially greater attention to theories of comparative politics.

BackgroundThe need to balance renewable energy supply with biodiversity conservation has become increasingly urgent in light of current climate, energy, and biodiversity crises. However, the development of wind and solar energy often presents trade-offs such as competing for land use and potentially impacting species and habitats. To address these concerns, ‘priority zones’ for bird and bat species have been proposed as spatial designations for early species protection in the regional planning process. However, there are concerns that the areas suitable for wind and solar energy may be limited further, making it difficult to meet state- and regional-specific spatial targets for renewable energy sites.ResultsTo help decision-makers deal with this challenge, a Multi-Criteria Scenario Framework has been developed and analyzed. It involves a habitat model of priority zones for species conservation and techniques from the intuitive logic scenario planning method. Through a regional case study, various planning criteria were analyzed according to scenarios, such as priority zones for species protection, settlement buffers, and forests. The framework indicates how criteria could be balanced to achieve wind energy spatial targets as well as targets for ground-mounted solar energy with the least possible impact. Results show that compared to other planning criteria, species priority zones had limited competition with spatial wind energy targets. Achieving these targets may require minimal adjustments, such as allowing wind energy in 1–3% of completely protected recreational landscapes. To reconcile land use demands in the energy transition, a balance between ‘green’ protected areas is necessary. Additionally, ground-mounted solar energy could replace some of the wind energy spatial targets while also meeting the overall solar development goals.ConclusionsThe framework provides transparency in assessing trade-offs between multiple objectives and helps quantify the ‘costs’ and ‘benefits’ in renewable energy planning. Adapting more flexible planning methods could help resolve the conflict between wind energy and species protection. Joint analysis of the areas needed for wind and solar energy and determining the optimal energy mix are gaining in importance. However, how the benefits of multi-criteria scenarios can be achieved within the confines of preoccupied and siloed organizations remains an ongoing research topic.

Reviewed by: After Adam Smith: A Century of Transformation in Politics and Political Economy Peter Mandler (bio) After Adam Smith: A Century of Transformation in Politics and Political Economy, by Murray Milgate and Shannon C. Stimson; pp. x + 306. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2009, $35.00, £24.95. Thirty years ago the history of political economy played a central role in Victorian studies. The social concerns that had driven the rise of Victorian studies since the Second World War led to vigorous scholarly debates about population growth, industrialization, class, poor laws, factories, laissez faire, and state intervention. An understanding of Adam Smith, Thomas Malthus, David Ricardo, and J. S. Mill was crucial to an understanding of the terms in which the Victorians dealt with these questions. Looking forward, even the history of Victorian social criticism from Thomas Carlyle and John Ruskin to the origins of the Labour party couldn't be understood except in the context of continuities with as well as reactions against classical political economy. Looking backward, a rediscovery of Smith's civic-republican and civic-moralist roots helped to explain his curious relevance to the left as much as to the right up to the present day. As late as the 1980s, the work of Donald Winch, Istvan Hont and Michael Ignatieff, Boyd Hilton, and others added vigorously to our understanding of the complexities of the Scottish Enlightenment and the ways in which its thinking was embedded in Victorian social and political thought as well as social and political reform. It is fair to say that all of these questions—and their answers—appear rather shopworn today. The social concerns of the postwar decades, revolving around class, have been substantially displaced by new concerns for nation, race, and gender. The hegemony of neoclassical economics since the 1980s has, oddly, put its critics off from examining its classical roots—it was more comfortable, perhaps, to look away. Postmodernism's interest in political economy stretched only so far as was necessary to explode its naive epistemology; exploring its inner workings seemed irrelevant at best, a trap that might draw you back into the system at worst. After Adam Smith, by Murray Milgate and Shannon C. Stimson, seeks to rectify this omission. Aimed explicitly at neoclassical economists' misunderstanding and misappropriation of Smith's legacy, it seeks both to restore Smith's concepts to the late-eighteenth-century context in which they developed and to show how subsequent generations revised those concepts for their own uses and their own contexts—particularly in the immediate, early-nineteenth-century aftermath of Smith's own time. Despite the title, more than a third of the book is devoted to Smith himself, to his ideas about economic growth, liberty, and civil society, and to the wide variety of possible relations between economics and politics. By the authors' own admission, the analysis here rests heavily on Winch's pioneering work. They then move on, in their most interesting chapter, to Dugald Stewart's representation of Smith, narrowing a loose and suggestive body of thought into a science of legislation—"and economic legislation at that" (109). Subsequent chapters remind us that Stewart did not have the last word. Malthus's introduction of the population question—a specific polemical animus against 1790s [End Page 319] utopianism—was claimed both as an elaboration of and as a repudiation of Smith's legacy. James Mill's and Ricardo's applications of utilitarianism to political economy is shown to have ambiguous implications for the idea of democracy. At this point, Milgate and Stimson temporarily abandon the legacy of Smith as a focal point for the book—reasonably enough given the radical transformations in the political environment between the 1770s and the 1820s. They resume the Smithian theme in a discussion of how far the dynamic elements of Smith's thinking were affected by early-nineteenth-century utopianism and ideas about the stationary state. In an unusual deviation from the canonical figures, Milgate and Stimson then consider Ricardian socialism—or, rather, one particular Ricardian socialist, Thomas Hodgskin—and the relationship of radical political economy to Smith and Ricardo. Returning to the earlier discussion of utilitarianism, they consider J. S. Mill...

The global energy transition is increasingly driven by competition among major powers instead of multilateral cooperation, raising questions about its impact on resource-rich countries in the Global South. While International Relations (IR) and International Political Economy (IPE) have focused on the geopolitics/geoeconomics of the transition, a growing discussion within Development Studies highlights ‘green windows of opportunity’ for economic catch-up and structural change. These two approaches often operate separately, overlooking how geopolitical competition and development prospects are interconnected and mutually shape one another. This article addresses this gap by focusing on the agency of extractivist countries, those heavily dependent on extracting and exporting raw materials, as they navigate the geopoliticization of the energy transition. Geopoliticization is a framing process in which the energy transition becomes part of strategic rivalry, affecting the international environment where resource policies, partnerships, and development strategies are negotiated. The article proceeds in three parts. First, it identifies four main sources of uncertainty driving this process: technological path dependencies, geoeconomic competition, reorganisation of energy systems, and socio-political conflicts related to extraction. Second, it explains how these uncertainties create policy ambiguities at the national level, complicating decisions about resource governance, technology transfer, domestic policy dependence, and energy security. Third, it highlights the role of extractivist political settlements in assessing whether these windows of opportunity exist and, if so, how deeply rooted political and economic structures can either reinforce extractivism or adapt to new incentives. By connecting geopoliticization with the political economy of extractivist countries, this article provides a detailed framework for understanding why the global energy transition does not automatically lead to green industrialisation or structural change in many parts of the Global South. It demonstrates that opportunities are ambiguous, contingent on circumstances, and shaped by both international pressures and domestic political arrangements, emphasising the need for deeper exploration of domestic agency in the Global South.

Research on how countries are positioning and ‘greening’ their heavy industries in response to the ‘global energy transition’ has focused on higher-income countries with established heavy industries, rather than lower-income countries with fledgling industries and aspirations to continue expanding them. Our paper responds to this lacuna by examining Ghana's current plans for, and challenges with, developing an integrated bauxite-to-aluminium industry. Adopting a multiscalar political economy approach, and drawing on research methods including documentary analysis and key informant interviews, we argue that Ghana's challenges stem significantly from the mode of its insertion – or subordination – within the global economy. Like other late-developing countries in the global economic periphery, Ghana is struggling to access the latest ‘green’ technologies or devise a strategy for powering its bauxite-to-aluminium industry because of uncertainties in the ‘green’ taxonomies of core economies in the Global North. Nationally, meanwhile, tentative plans to feed Ghana's aluminium industry with relatively ‘green’ hydropower (also Ghana's cheapest electricity source) are provoking pushback because of the trade-offs involved, while other contestations are emerging around expanding bauxite mining into forest reserves. Collectively, these multiscalar challenges may frustrate Ghana's ambitions once more, even though a bauxite-to-aluminium industry could generate significant economic benefits. Ghana's government can overcome some of these issues by consulting meaningfully with domestic stakeholders around the design of an integrated bauxite-to-aluminium industry. However, at an international level, peripheral economies like Ghana need clarity about how particular energy technologies will be classified by core economies moving forwards, and for climate financing and (green) technology transfer pledges to be honoured.

The deployment of solar and other renewable energy technologies (RETs) plays a central role in the global energy transition and the pursuit of sustainable development. Beyond reducing greenhouse gas emissions, these technologies generate far-reaching societal co-benefits that shape environmental quality, social equity, and economic growth. This study systematically reviews peer-reviewed literature published between 2009 and 2025 to identify, integrate, and assess empirical evidence on how RET deployment contributes to societal welfare. Following the SALSA framework and PRISMA guidelines, 147 studies were selected from Scopus and Web of Science. The evidence reveals a consistent welfare triad: environmental gains (emission and pollution reduction, climate mitigation), social gains (improved health, affordability, energy security, and inclusion), and economic gains (employment and income growth, local development). These benefits are, however, heterogeneous and depend on enabling conditions such as policy stability, financial development, grid integration, innovation capacity, and social acceptance. The review highlights that solar energy, in particular, acts as both an environmental and social catalyst in advancing sustainable welfare outcomes. The findings provide a comprehensive basis for policymakers and researchers seeking to design equitable and welfare-enhancing renewable energy transitions.

This study develops a theoretical framework to assess the key drivers of carbon markets, that is, carbon markets approach in the global energy transition. The developed Global Low Carbon Energy Transition (GLCET) framework is then applied to the six metareviews of the literature, with the exception of the literature reviews of Groups 1 and 2 (Section 2). Based on this metareview, the study also considers the key drivers of the GLCET, namely, DE carbonisation of the power sector, fossil fuel phase-out, geopolitical security. Based on the MOSCOW technique, the author concludes that DE carbonisation of electricity is very important and critical (MO), phasing out fossil resources is challenging but requires some solutions (S) and in third place (W) the impact of geopolitical security on GLCET is not very important. The author’s main recommendation is to develop a more qualitative framework to understand the main challenges of the global energy transition.