The epistemologies of local climate change policies in Germany

Abstract

Measures for climate adaptation and mitigation at the local level result in profound changes for the daily routines of municipal administrative staff. New agencies are created, new organisational relationships are established and the development of new competencies is needed. In particular, urban planning and environmental planning departments claim leading roles in cities’ socio-technical transitions. This article seeks to describe how knowledge is generated and used in this transition process in three German cities. The results show the combination of climate adaptation and mitigation is the dominant ‘narrative’ in large parts of the municipal administrations (as is the case in most other German and European cities). All three cities developed sophisticated strategies for ambitious goals to reduce CO2 emissions. Furthermore, the governance of local knowledge shares distinct characteristics and organisational aspects in the cities. However, internally competing epistemologies – in the sense of the infrastructure for the interpretation of reality and determination of what is known and how – can be identified and discussed.