Urban Governance and Decision-making under Climate Change: a Critical Review of Frameworks, Methods and Tools from the Perspectives of Ecological Economics and Sustainability Science

Ion Dubovich,Vitaliy Soloviy

doi:10.15421/412017

Abstract

Over the past 10-15 years, cities have emerged as clear leaders in global climate action. The wealth of frameworks, methods and tools aimed to support urban climate governance and decision-making have created a picture of progress on the topic, however, practical examples of success are limited to a limited group of forerunners. This research aims to address the gap between needs, theory and practice, by providing a critical review of the current developments from the lenses of sustainability science and ecological economics. Based on their integration, we developed ten minimum criteria for development and selection of actionable means: (1) legitimacy, salience and credibility; (2) consideration of social-ecological-economic dynamics; (3) critical pluralism; (4) inclusivity; (5) equality; (6) nexus; (7) transparency; (8) usability; (9) VUCA-fit; 10) transformative potential. The minimum criteria were used to assess 10 selected frameworks, 13 methods and 9 tools, providing decision-makers initial guidelines for making better choices. The analysis revealed that while comprehensive urban climate governance frameworks already exist, sophistication and usability of decision-support methods and tools require further work, while common reliance on simple means limits available opportunities. Thus, it is important to make multi-criteria, multi-objective, adaptive and robust approaches better accessible to urban decision-makers beyond the expert circles to support more effective climate action, while the suggested minimum criteria can be used to provide initial guidelines for such developments.

Highlights

The unprecedented scale human impacts on the planet over the past few centuries has triggered unseen social and ecological dynamics of high volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, which some call the Anthropocene (Steffen et al, 2018)
This study focuses on the analysis of the available frameworks, methods and tools for urban climate governance and decision making from the perspectives of ecological economics and sustainability science
This paper intersects the perspectives of two fields — ecological economics and sustainability science, which were chosen considering their mutually enriching agendas and different lenses they provide for analysis of relevant methods and tools

Summary

Introduction

The unprecedented scale human impacts on the planet over the past few centuries has triggered unseen social and ecological dynamics of high volatility, uncertainty, complexity and ambiguity, which some call the Anthropocene (Steffen et al, 2018). Over the past two decades and most significantly, since the adoption of the Paris Agreement, cities have become leading actors in ambitious attempts to curb emissions and adapt to climate change. Their role is unique, considering their responsibility for 75% of global emissions (Couture et al, 2019) and the fact that they are home to over half of the global population (UN DESA, 2019). Large cities are hotspots of climate impacts and vulnerability, which requires responsible and well-calibrated action (Hunt & Watkiss, 2011). Despite significant progress in urban climate governance over the past decade, it

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