Urban Climate Governance Research Articles

Copenhagen CO2 neutrality in 2025? A polycentric analysis of urban climate governance in Copenhagen 2006–2020

AbstractIn 2009, the City of Copenhagen declared its objective to become the first CO2‐neutral city in the world by 2025 by practicing a collaborative climate governance approach. However, a 2020 status reported a further need for decarbonisation of at least 33% to reach this target. By applying a synthesised polycentric concept—supplemented by participatory climate governance studies—we analyse the deficient results of collaborative climate governance in Copenhagen 2006–2020. The empirical analysis reveals an altered political prioritisation of climate issues in 2010 and, as a crucial aspect of that, an inadequate mobilisation of civic society actors and waning departmental collaboration. We conclude that, since 2010, Copenhagen has mainly applied a rather monocentric governance approach and relied on technological innovation instead of behavioural change via civic society mobilisation, which does not promote sufficient carbon mitigation processes to reach carbon neutrality in 2025. Finally, we discuss what the synthesised polycentric concept adds to the debate about bold urban climate governance and how it could be further developed. Empirically, we draw on document analysis and interviews with 32 key actors in Copenhagen.

Urban climate governance in Southeast Asian small and mid-sized cities: undermining resilience and distributing risks unevenly

ABSTRACT Secondary cities are home to most of the world’s urban populations vulnerable to climate change, yet researchers and policymakers have devoted less attention to them than large and megacities. To help address this gap, this paper explores the relationship between incomplete decentralized governance, climate change, and urban resilience. It does through the case studies of secondary cities of Cambodia, Myanmar, Thailand, and Vietnam. Secondary cities are of importance because they are the fastest growing cities in the Global South but also because they have weaker capacity to address climate risks. Through these case studies, the paper draws comparisons between the different cases to look at the linkages between decentralization and urban resilience in secondary cities. Overall, it argues that climate governance, due to the retention of power and resources by central bureaucrats along with fragmented governance structures, and misaligned incentive structures which prioritize economic growth over climate protection have undermined resilience building and contributed to the uneven distribution of climate risks in these cities.

The Co-creation Paradox: Small Towns and the Promise and Limits of Collaborative Governance for Low-Carbon, Sustainable Futures

Co-creation is considered a ‘near perfect strategy’ for resolving complex and unruly public problems, such as climate change. Based on data collected among small Scandinavian towns, this article investigates the role of co-creation in the urban governance of climate- and sustainability responses by looking at their vertical and horizontal integration in the wider polycentric governance framework. The article has a two-fold aim. First, it develops an analytical framework for investigating how small towns and municipalities navigate in a range of governance contexts based on two strains of theories on collaborative governance and urban climate governance. Second, it applies this framework to a comparative study of small towns to analyse how co-creation plays a strategic role across types and scales of governance in relation to an evolving climate agenda. The article finds that new forms of public leadership in each of the three municipalities and towns is a main factor in the ‘remaking’ of collaborative planning arenas, triple helix partnerships, business alliances, city networks and collaborative pilot projects, much in a similar manner as observed in global cities. Co-creation is extensively employed as a proactive policy- and leadership instrument. However, the nature of response is uneven across the cases compared. A co-creation paradox is suggested: limited municipal politico-administrative leadership and capacity correspond to a low level of ability to engage in co-creation of solutions. This implies that those organisations with the most need for co-creation may have the least capacity to do so.

Socio-ecological contagion in Veganville

In order to meet the 2015 Paris Agreement for 1.5 °C global warming, per capita emissions need to come down to 2.9 tonnes by 2030. Food systems are known to be a significant source of an individual's carbon footprint and demand attention in sustainability management. The objective of this research is to conceptualise and define an intersection between contagion theory and socio-ecological systems models. This is achieved using a population dynamics model between two groups characterised by a distinct food regime: omnivores and vegans. The greenhouse gas emissions of each food regime is used to estimate the city's changing carbon foodprint as the food regimes shift by social contagion. Social contagion is identified as a catalyst for social tipping points, and emission pathways are explored with a variety of different contagion variables to test sensitivity towards a tipping point. The main finding is that the urban carbon foodprint can be reduced significantly with widespread adoption of veganism, but that the foodprint reaches a minimum at 1.97 tonnes CO2-equivalent per capita. This demonstrates the need to embed food demand in urban climate governance such as nudging towards plant-based food alternatives. Nudging is discussed as a lever of ecological importance to social contagion. Lastly, socio-ecological contagion is defined as the interactions between social contagion and damage done to ecological systems to measure peer-to-peer spread of environmental stewardship agendas, such as the journey to Veganville.

Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) Role in Driving Urban Climate Governance: The Case of CIKOD and GAYO in Ghana

While cities are considered pivotal sources of global greenhouse gas emissions, they are also essential in urban climate governance. The role of NGOs in different contexts is increasing in terms of the mode of governance, but the empirical evidence of how they contribute to urban climate action in small and medium-sized cities, especially in developing countries is limited. Drawing evidence from Ghana, a case study research design was adopted and this facilitated an in-depth understanding of how NGOs contribute to urban climate governance in small and medium-sized cities in Ghana. The primary data collection methods included key informant interviews with two purposively selected NGOs: the Center for Indigenous Knowledge and Organisational Development (CIKOD) and the Green Africa Youth Organisation (GAYO), which is located in the Wa Municipality and the Cape Coast Metropolis respectively. Randomly selected residents made up of chiefs and assembly members, who are the representatives of the people in the municipality, were interviewed. All interviews were transcribed and analysed in generated themes. The study revealed that climate change adaptation actions included local empowerment through capacity building, climate advocacy, and waste management. As a result of the adaptation focus, the paper concludes that collaborations and partnerships among state and non-state actors will help generate greater resilience benefits for local communities. Climate change adaptation programmes, which are often initiated by NGOs, are also steered by local residents outside of administrative systems.

Book review of: Gordon, David J. (2020): Cities on the World Stage. The Politics of Global Urban Climate Governance

Book review

The Third Sector’s Role in Driving Urban Climate Governance: Evidence from Two Major Small and Medium Sized Cities in Ghana

Small, and medium-sized cities house most of the world’s population and are essential to delivering climate action. Drawing evidence from Ghana, this paper closes the research gap by exploring how the third sector drives urban climate governance in small and medium-sized cities. The paper found that the two purposively selected NGOs: CIKOD and GAYO in the Wa Municipality and the Cape Coast Metropolis, respectively, are engaged in diverse initiatives focused on climate adaptation. Some identified adaptation actions included local empowerment through capacity building, climate advocacy, and waste management. Because of the adaptation focus, the paper concludes that collaborations and partnerships among state and nonstate actors will help generate resilience benefits for local communities.

The leading role of cities in public and private discourses on urban climate governance

The paper analyses how the discourse on climate governance is re-worked in the urban context. It does so in order to better understand the meaning and possible impact of a growing rhetoric that proclaims the leadership in terms of climate governance of cities that are transitioning towards sustainable futures. By using an approach that employs critical discourse analysis, it examines the institutional climate governance discourse issued by public and private actors in the city of Barcelona, and compares it with the locally-contextualised discourses issued by these same actors during the Car-Free Day campaigns in 2005, 2012 and 2015. The objective is to analyse if private and public discourses internalise and take on the city’s leadership discourse and transfer it to urban climate governance. The comparative examination of texts released by public and private actors points to the discursive strategies of climate governance at the city level taking on meanings that are more descriptive than normative. The paper claims that this has implications for expectations regarding the city’s leadership in transitions towards sustainable futures.

Civic Stewardship and Urban Climate Governance: Opportunities for Transboundary Planning

Using interview data with civic environmental stewardship groups in New York City ( n = 26), we identify strategies through which civic stewards engage in transboundary environmental governance and urban climate adaptation planning. Our findings articulate the diverse ways that civic stewards engage with planning in urban socio-ecological systems, as they (1) shape physical spaces, (2) broker partnerships, (3) disrupt the status quo, (4) build civic capacity, and (5) envision new futures. We contribute to the literature by embedding civic stewardship within urban planning discourse, suggesting partnerships between civic stewards and government planners that facilitate the co-production of innovative urban climate governance efforts.

Towards a Science of Scaling for Urban Climate Action and Governance

AbstractThe scaling of urban climate action and its governance is rapidly becoming a central focus in the urban climate governance literature and policy debates. Building on the broader scaling literature and inspired by related initiatives in other fields, this article calls for the development of a systematic “science of scaling” for urban climate governance. Such a science of scaling may help to give a better understanding of how well-performing urban climate action and its governance can be multiplied, accelerated and broadened (ie horizontal and vertical scaling and scaling out, up and down), and it may help to uncover scaling trajectories towards systemic change in cities (ie deep scaling).

In the name of “low-carbon cities”: National rhetoric, local leverage, and divergent exploitation of the greening of urban governance in China

ABSTRACT The imaginary significance of cities to address the climate change crisis seems to have no ceiling. But the outcomes of urban climate governance have fallen short of the high promise placed on cities to contribute climate solutions. This research examines the widely observed gap between the highly expected role of cities in climate control and the disappointing reality from a perspective of the environmental state. Through a comparative study of two low-carbon city (LCC) experiments in Shenzhen and Huizhou, as well as an analysis of nation-wide administrative legal disputes related to decarbonization issues, this paper identifies an interesting legitimacy space created and manipulated locally along with the emergence of a carbon-focused environmental nation-state. Four rationales, namely carbon re-regulation, carbon formalization, carbon rationalization, and carbon exceptionalism, are identified underpinning different urban actors’ articulation and leverage of the national priority of decarbonization to advance their respective agendas. Success or failure of urban climate experiments is found to be contingent upon the effective management and mediation of different rationales, giving rise to a distinctive process of “localizing the low-carbon state.” The findings of this research shed light on the multifaceted effects of the greening state on the urban politics of climate change.

Becoming global climate governors: How cities are moving from climate ambition to coordinated action and delivery

Global policy increasingly acknowledges city-level action as vital to keeping the Paris Agreement’s 1.5°C goal within reach. While responsible for around two-thirds of global emissions, cities are also leaders in policy innovation to tackle the climate emergency. This local innovation has been accompanied by a surge in transnational collaboration around urban climate governance, making it one of the most prominent areas of city diplomacy.

Climate consultants and complementarity: Local procurement, green industry and decarbonization in Australia, Singapore, and the United States

Private climate expertise matters for the local political economy of urban climate governance. City climate policy often pairs decarbonization efforts with investment into the growth of local “green industries”, seeking complementarity between environmental and economic goals. Underappreciated is that this pairing is increasingly achieved by local government purchasing of decarbonization services directly from private expertise within local green industries. This involves local government procurement of climate mitigation services from local environmental services firms, where service delivery facilitates greenhouse gas emissions reduction, while the local nature of procurement generates new growth in existing green industries. By these means, local governments can achieve both decarbonization and local green industry growth goals with the same policy stroke. Three case studies of this strategy in Singapore, Knoxville (USA) and Melbourne (Australia) between 2005 and 2012 are examined in detail. This study contributes new evidence of the role of local procurement in the process of eco-state restructuring, a concept which describes a more active role of the state in negotiating environmental and economic interests in climate change governance.

Designing and leading collaborative urban climate governance: Comparative experiences of co‐creation from Copenhagen and Oslo

AbstractThis article has a twofold aim. First, inspired by collaborative governance theory, the article develops an analytical framework built around three ideal co‐creation strategies utilized by city governments for building capacity and addressing urban climate solutions. Second, this co‐creation framework is applied to a comparative case study of climate governance in two climate‐ambitious Scandinavian cities, Copenhagen and Oslo, to illustrate the role of co‐creation as an approach and tool for urban climate governance. The comparative analysis reveals how the two cities navigate differently within a polycentric ecosystem of actors depending on a variety of contextual factors and whether climate responses are geared mainly towards assembling and aligning public, private business or citizen actors, respectively, for collaborative efforts. The findings suggest that both cities combine two ideal co‐creation strategies, a whole of government strategy with an externally focused stakeholder strategy, while neither of the cities has adopted a full‐fledged externally focused civil society co‐creation strategy. The findings have implications for co‐creation theory and urban climate leadership. In both cities, the benefits of co‐creation are found to depend on support from both conducive institutional design and new forms of public leadership. Over time, leadership has started to congeal into a distinctive type of co‐creational leadership based on both hands‐on and hands‐off tools and instruments in climate responses. The findings suggest that a co‐creation approach benefits the debate on citizen participation in climate governance as it brings a nuanced understanding of the multiple roles that citizens can play in relation to both public and private services and business actors; as residents, consumers, climate agents, as well as voters with rights and responsibilities who can provide the city leadership with legitimacy but also oppose climate action.

Urban climate change experiments in Gandhinagar, India

Climate change has become a major sustainability issue in the Global South cities. In response to this, the study utilized ‘urban climate change experiments’ framework to understand the urban climate governance in the case study of National Solar City Project in the Gandhinagar city of India. The case study focused on the roles of various social actors in the context of establishing institutional arrangements of solar city project and then linked with the path-breaking innovation of 5 MW Solar Rooftop Project. The case analysis is primarily based on field work carried out in the Gandhinagar city and supplemented by secondary data. First, the study showed the shifting institutional structure of the project which signified the linkages of national and urban government in governing climate change. Second, the study revealed the well co-ordinated national and state policy networks leading to the innovation of solar rooftop project. Structuring PPP model, offering Green Incentive and generating clean energy without land constrains are the key innovations which make the solar rooftop project successful. Third, the solar city project has led to the reduction of carbon emissions at the city level which is effective in combating climate change. However, the urban actors faced some challenges while promoting solar technologies due to the lack of public acceptance.

Practice and Politics of Land Use for Urban Climate Mitigation and Adaptation in Blantyre and Lilongwe Cities, Malawi

Malawi’s population is fast growing, with a good share of urban residents being susceptible to environmental risks and disasters. This risk is aggravated by climate change. Blantyre and Lilongwe cities are not spared by this scenario. The study used household survey, key informant interviews, observation, and experience to gather primary data, and desk study to solicit secondary data. Random and purposive sampling was employed to identify survey respondents and informants, respectively. Content analysis was used to establish themes and relationships. A good number of regulatory frameworks (policies) and programmes for abating urban climate change mitigation and adaptation have been in place, but implementation is a challenge. Political interference tends to shift priorities on policies to be implemented at one particular point in time of a political regime, and this has culminated into a sour relationship between politics and land use planning, with the former jeopardizing the practice by the latter. Funding insufficiency, uncontrolled development, political interference, corruption and lack of transparency, insufficient stakeholder engagement, and poor planning contribute to poor and insufficient disaster risk management, and to increased disaster risks in Blantyre and Lilongwe cities. Citizen involvement in appropriate and effective land use planning process, regular communication on the availability of safety information, and robust emergency notification system can make communities in Lilongwe and Blantyre cities resilient from climate-related risks. The urban governance system has to be strengthened. There is need for adequate political will for mobilization of urban climate governance efforts.

The role of network participation in climate change mitigation: a city-level analysis

ABSTRACT Cities and networks play an important role in climate change mitigation. Various international, regional, and local networks seek to increase cooperation between cities or between cities and other stakeholders. However, we still have a poor understanding of how these formalised networks help cities to mitigate climate change at different levels of urban climate governance. Here, I analyse experiences of participation in formal climate change mitigation-related networks from the global to the local level in three European capital cities: Helsinki, Madrid, and Stockholm. As multilevel networking is a strategic tool for cities, different benefits are highlighted at different levels of governance. Some networks are more oriented towards politics and planning, while others are more practical. Formalised networking is also networking between individual people, which should be studied further. The results demonstrate both the advantages of networks and challenges in developing beneficial networking to support climate change mitigation.

Rethinking the potential of collaboration for urban climate governance: The case of Hong Kong

AbstractCollaboration is strongly promoted as an effective means for cities to respond to climate change. While collaboration is perceived to offer opportunities to progress climate action in cities, little is known about how collaboration can enable low‐carbon transformation in practice. Furthermore, while collaboration is largely framed as a positive endeavour, there is a need to more carefully explore the challenges and barriers that may arise. This paper explores the aims, processes, and outcomes of collaboration within urban climate governance. Drawing on a policy review and semi‐structured interviews, we present empirical findings from the case study of Hong Kong. This paper identifies three types of collaboration that are structured by regulations, oriented to policy goals, and emerge as everyday practices within the governance of climate change and the energy system. The forms of collaboration challenge the assumptions that collaboration always brings positive outcomes in mobilising action for climate change. While collaboration opens up different modes of governance within cities, the paper highlights significant barriers in terms of the diverse roles of actors, ongoing power imbalances, and shifting governance spaces for intervention. Given the prevailing interest in working together, it is critical to review carefully how collaboration facilitates cities to achieve their climate goals and create momentum for action.

A bibliometric analysis on urban climate governance

With cities being one of the vulnerable subjects to climate change and related disasters, urban climate governance has been of great concern in academia focusing on theoretical frameworks and empirical practices of urban climate governance. It is constructive to conduct quantitative analysis of the literature in the field to investigate the current research status and future research trends using bibliometric analysis. Based on a study of the coupled and evolving literature on different research subjects including country/region, institutions, and author, research keywords, and research sub-fields in urban climate governance, this paper analyzes the intellectual base, research trajectories, and intellectual communities in this field, aiming to shed some light on the current status, development, and future directions of urban climate risks and governance from a bibliometric perspective combined with a literature review method.

Experimental governance and urban climate action – a mainstreaming paradox?

This article reflects on experimental governance in the context of stimulating urban climate action in the European Union (EU). Experimental governance endorse and support climate action by encouraging the transfer of urban innovations by upscaling climate best practices in and across cities in the EU. Policymakers, practitioners and academics view this as increasing urban climate activities and as a path to cope with urban climate change mitigation challenges.The article describes and analyses the complexities ingrained in experimental climate governance by studying the climate trajectory of the mid-sized city of Turku in Finland. The article increases the understanding of urban climate governance challenges and advocate for a debate regarding the norms used to incentivize innovative urban climate action. These norms do not consider urban variances and fail to contextualize exchange of innovative climate action experiences. The feasibility of experimental governance as expanding urban climate action in and across cities is dubious, as it increases short-term disjointed climate action, rises the possibilities for misaligned action routines that may desynchronize urban actor orientation, and decreases organizational transparency, ultimately complicating a mainstreaming of urban climate efforts.