How do cities challenge patterns of demand? Characterising the local governance of climate change in Nordic cities

Abstract

Meeting international climate targets will require deep and rapid shifts in urban demand patterns. While the literature has emphasized the role played by cities in the response to climate change, it remains unclear whether or how urban-level interventions actually affect possibilities for low-carbon living, and contribute to the re-configuration of everyday practices. In this paper, we use a social practice lens to understand how, and to what extent a range of Nordic cities target everyday demand patterns in the development of low-carbon policies. Contemporary demand-side approaches have been critiqued for their focus on the provision of low-carbon technologies and individual-level interventions. Instead, we argue that understanding how measures target and intervene in everyday practices provide a relevant lens for approaching the success of low-carbon interventions. Using an intervention-in practice-framework to understand urban interventions, we find that current measures rely heavily on non-committal measures in the domains of mobility and housing and forms of household self-governance. This paper concludes by discussing the policy implications of taking a practice view in developing climate interventions in urban setting, arguing that such perspective broadens the range of governance approaches adopted by cities to govern a reduction of urban emissions.