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Between Local Innovation and Global Impact: Cities, Networks and the Governance of Climate Change, Canadian Foreign Policy Journal, 19(3): 288-307
Abstract
Global climate governance conducted in settings such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Major Economies Forum, and Group of Twenty (G20) has proven incapable, to date, of generating an effective response. Greenhouse gas emissions have steadily increased since the issue was added to the global agenda in the early 1990s and prospects appear slim for a single, all-encompassing international legal agreement. Outside the formal regime, however, there are signs of dynamism as non-nation state actors engage in a variety of climate governance experiments. Cities, and city-networks such as the C40 Climate Leadership Group, represent important sources of innovation in the broader system of global climate governance: they challenge prevailing norms regarding who should govern climate change, and how coordinated governance responses can be generated. This paper presents a brief history of the C40, and assesses, drawing on ideas from network theory, some of the opportunities and limitations of networked climate governance. Recognizing that cities, and city-networks, exist within a broader multi-level governance context, the paper concludes with some thoughts related to updating Canadian federal climate policy in order to leverage and enable innovative city-network governance initiatives, address gaps in current federal climate policy, and link climate change to other, pressing issues, on the urban agenda.
... Specifically, there exist two types of horizontal cooperation, one happens between the same areas at different geographical/administrative levels, such as natural resource management in different countries, and the other occurs between different areas, such as the economic, energy, food, science and technology, and environmental sectors [74]. Inter-state cooperation to address climate change has long been underway, such as the 1993 North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, the 2014 US-China Joint Statement on Climate Change, the 2015 Paris Agreement, and the 2017 Letter of Intent between the China Meteorological Administration and the World Meteorological Organization on Promoting Regional Meteorological Cooperation and Building a Belt and Road Together. ...
... the way down to households and producers, everyone collaborates with each other and makes decisions from different sectors and at different scales. Specifically, there exist two types of horizontal cooperation, one happens between the same areas at different geographical/administrative levels, such as natural resource management in different countries, and the other occurs between different areas, such as the economic, energy, food, science and technology, and environmental sectors [74]. Interstate cooperation to address climate change has long been underway, such as the 1993 North American Agreement on Environmental Cooperation, the 2014 US-China Joint Statement on Climate Change, the 2015 Paris Agreement, and the 2017 Letter of Intent between the China Meteorological Administration and the World Meteorological Organization on Promoting Regional Meteorological Cooperation and Building a Belt and Road Together. ...
Regional climate change is affected by global warming, large-scale inter-regional circulation, and land use/cover. As a result of different ecological, economic, and social conditions, climate adaptation actions vary from region to region, including community-based adaptation in small island developing states, enhancing flood resilience in Europe, weather index insurance promotion in Africa, climate change adaptation based on traditional knowledge in the Polar Regions, and global joint decision-making in terms of regional issues of the Ocean. This paper takes the above five typical cases as the research objects, and the multi-case comparative research method is adopted to discuss regional climate change adaptation based on the pressure–state–response framework. It found that: (1) regional climate change adaptation faces significant pressure from cross-regional flows of finance, population, and species under climate change; (2) climate change hotspot maps based on climate change projections show regional climate vulnerability; (3) responses for regional climate change adaptation require active promotion of multi-level governance with horizontal and vertical cooperation. In the future, regional climate change adaptation should focus on inter-regional climate justice and equality, regional climate change adaptation pathways optimization, and how to effectively learn from typical regional climate adaptation cases.
... One of C40ʹs founders in 2005, he became its chair five years later, and implemented a 'data-driven approach' to cities' tackling climate change (Parvez et al. 2019(Parvez et al. , C40 2022. In 2011, Bloomberg merged C40 with the Clinton Climate Initiative (Gordon 2013) and signed a partnership with the World Bank to strengthen the network. Bloomberg Philanthropies became one of the network's most important funders. ...
... Although we take a broad approach to analyzing Bloomberg's interconnected initiatives, our data focuses especially on C40. Networks like C40 have created novel governance practices to steer cities toward improved climate policy (Román 2010, Gordon 2013, Spaans and Waterhout 2017, Papin 2010. Bloomberg started to promote climate action after the US Congress refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, joining the 2005 Mayors Climate Protection Agreement (Bagley and Gallucci 2013, p. 49) and founding, with 17 other cities, what would become C40. ...
Several billionaires have recently emerged as leaders of climate governance. So far, little research has examined how they legitimize their involvement in climate networks. We argue that billionaire governance entrepreneurs have high levels of resources but low procedural legitimacy. They pursue output legitimacy to support their political action, highlighting their effectiveness in managing climate issues. Their main strategies, depoliticization, outgrouping, and technical solutionism, may give them short-term legitimacy but risk undermining their long-term goals of addressing climate change. We analyze the discursive legitimation strategies of a successful billionaire entrepreneur in transnational climate governance, Michael Bloomberg. Our empirical analysis is based on the study of more than 800 statements, speeches, and news releases related to Bloomberg’s climate action from 2010 to 2021. It contributes to the study of entrepreneurship, leadership, philanthropy, and transnational actors in climate governance.
... They have focused on their emergence and functions in a multilevel governance system, identifying information-sharing and norm-setting as some of the most significant network activities (Andonova et al., 2009;Betsill & Bulkeley, 2004;Davies, 2005;Hickmann, 2016;Lee & Jung, 2018;Papin, 2020). They have also studied their influence over local climate policies (Busch, 2015;Domorenok et al., 2020;Hakelberg, 2014;Hughes et al., 2018;Steffen et al., 2019) or global climate governance (Bansard et al., 2017;Gordon, 2013Gordon, , 2020. ...
Global politics has shown increasing interest in cities, particularly in the field of climate policy and governance. Yet, we still have little understanding of which cities engage the most in global urban climate governance. Answering this question is a first step towards understanding who decides for whom in a system that has decisive influence on wider global policy processes. In this article, we seek to identify and analyse the characteristics and position of cities in global urban climate governance to reassess its composition. To do so, we conduct a social network analysis of 15 transnational city networks. Results emphasise that global and large cities are the most central, but small and middle‐size cities are the most numerous actors of the system. Global South cities are larger than their Northern counterparts in the system. Those less central and understudied actors likely have less influence over which norms are shared, yet they should not be seen as followers or imitators of climate policy. It is important to pay more attention to them to understand their multifaceted role in cities' collective efforts to address climate change.
... Multiple networks have recently been formed that connect jurisdictional programs within and across countries. In terms of their overall design, purpose, and functionality, these networks bear some resemblance to municipal networks, such as those that exist in climate governance (e.g., Betsill and Bulkeley 2004;Gordon 2013). Global philanthropists, (e.g., David and Lucile Packard Foundation) similarly support the implementation of jurisdictional programs in several countries. ...
Jurisdictional approaches (JAs) have emerged over the past decade as a significant mode of sustainable commodity governance, particularly in tropical forest countries. JAs are characterized by multi-stakeholder initiatives with substantial government involvement, aiming to integrate environmental, social, and economic objectives in land use management within territorial jurisdictions. Often framed as a progression beyond certification-based approaches, JAs offer a complementary strategy to supply chain-driven initiatives. Despite their novelty in the voluntary sustainability standards (VSS) context, JAs draw on longstanding policy agendas by governments and previous conservation efforts. Built upon initiatives like the United Nations' REDD+, contemporary JAs represent a convergence of different governance practices. This paper aims to provide conceptual clarity and a critical analysis of JAs, drawing on a global cross-commodity review of academic literature and policy publications. Five key themes are identified: a conceptual analysis of JAs, inclusion, and participation, the influence of social and political contexts, interactions with external governing institutions, and an assessment of impact and effectiveness. The synthesis highlights the flexibility of JAs and the diverse interpretations within the literature. The paper concludes with policy implications and avenues for future research, emphasizing the need for a nuanced understanding of JAs' potential contribution to sustainability governance.
... Having a background in democratic theory, law or public governance, both strands of discussion evaluate procedural practices and the meaning that political actors assign to power-sharing with the inhabitants of cities and bottom-up politics. Empirically, the research on city diplomacy and better policymaking mostly refers to migration and climate change mitigation (Acuto et al., 2016;Gordon, 2013). Due to the advancement of European integration, there is also a growing literature on how cities engage as lobby organisations and what they achieve on the EU level (Marks et al., 2002;Callanan & Tatham, 2014). ...
Since December 2020, the Pact of Free Cities, founded by the mayors of the Visegrád capitals, has expressed the dire wish not to be held hostage for their national governments’ disrespect for the rule of law. Being cut off from financial support out of political intentions, they lobby for direct EU support. The article explores the dynamics of this initiative, its strategies to reach out to European institutions and their resonance, as well as the meaning of the Pact’s city diplomacy from a democratic perspective. The analysis of various documents published by the Pact of Free Cities shows how it combines its efforts to promote democracy, the rule of law and sustainable policies by engaging on the EU level. The Pact developed a distinct type of urban experimentalism that established a new link between the European and the city level.
... While it is true that farmers are likely to support policies and programs that aim to address climate change when they perceive potential consequences, boosting adoption levels depends on deliberate efforts to build their adaptive capacity, especially in the case of externally driven innovations (Gordon, 2013). This is because farmers need to be empowered with knowledge on the practices and their implementation to achieve the desired results. ...
Currently, there is an increased interest in promoting climate-smart agricultural practices (CSAPs) around the globe, however, application of these practices may vary for different climate risk hotspots. Although, climate field schools (CFS) are conducted with the aim of empowering farmers with knowledge on the various agricultural practices, little attention has been devoted to building the capacity of smallholder farmers to facilitate adoption of appropriate CSAPs. Given the effects of climate change on agriculture, it is fundamental for agricultural sustainability to answer the question that has hardly benefited from empirical analysis in previous land use studies, which is: Do CFS build farmers' capacity to adopt CSA in flood prone areas? Cross-sectional data from 600 rural farm households in south Bangladesh is used and the recursive bivariate probit (RBP) is applied to address this knowledge gap. The results reveal that participation in CFS increases the probability of a farmer's soil salinity consciousness by 25% and eventually improves the probability to adopt climate-smart agricultural practices by 20%. We also analyzed the spillover effects of CFS participation on CSA adoption and found that there is a strong spillover effect which has important implications on the cost
... (Hafteck, 2003;Kania, 2021;Kihlgren Grandi, 2020, S. 53-67;OECD, 2018OECD, , 2019a Kommunale Entwicklungspolitik bezieht sich speziell auf die entwicklungspolitischen Aktivitäten von Kommunen. Diese können auf unterschiedliche Weise entwicklungspolitisch aktiv werden, zum Beispiel indem sie sich in transnationalen Netzwerken für mehr Klimaschutz einsetzen (Acuto, 2013;Gordon, 2013Gordon, , 2020Gordon und Johnson, 2017), 5 indem sie Partnerschaften mit Kommunen im globalen Süden eingehen (Bontenbal, 2009a(Bontenbal, , 2009bBontenbal und van Lindert, 2011;Mayer und Nguyen Long, 2021) oder indem sie sich um die lokale Umsetzung internationaler Entwicklungsagenden bemühen (Hermanns, 2000;Kern et al., 2007;Koch et al., 2019;Koch und Krellenberg, 2021;Valencia et al., 2019). ...
Seit 2013 fördert das Bundesministerium für wirtschaftliche Zusammenarbeit und Entwicklung (BMZ) die kommunale Entwicklungspolitik über einen eigenen Titel im Bundeshaushalt. Die Mittel des Haushaltstitels fließen fast vollständig an die Servicestelle Kommunen in der Einen Welt (SKEW), die als Teil der Engagement Global gGmbH Beratungs-, Vernetzungs-, Informations- und Förderangebote für Kommunen bereitstellt, um diese in ihrem entwicklungspolitischen Engagement zu unterstützen. Die vorliegende Evaluierung hat das Gesamtprogramm der SKEW hinsichtlich der sechs OECD-DAC-Evaluierungskriterien Relevanz, Kohärenz, Effizienz, Effektivität, Nachhaltigkeit und Impact untersucht.
... They make up for this limited capacity by learning, emulating, or adopting policies that are successful in other countries (Rose, 1993;Dolowitz & Marsh, 2000;Baldwin et al., 2019). Research has addressed multiple aspects of this, such as how particular policies are learned from abroad and why specific policies are selected for adoption (Braun & Gilardi, 2006;Knill & Tosun, 2009), and the roles of transnational institutions and networks for policy learning, emulation, and transfer Gordon, 2013;Maggetti & Gilardi, 2014;Yazar et al., 2020). It is well recognized that international policy diffusion and transfer are conditional upon domestic politics, such as political opportunity (Biesenbender & Tosun, 2014), and economic underpinnings, such as privatization and deregulation of national economies (Graham et al., 2008). ...
Although climate policy diffusion is widely studied, we know comparatively little about how these global policies and the norms that surround them are used by various political actors seeking to advance their own agendas. In this article, we focus on how global climate norms are diffused differently at national and local scales and used to repoliticize or depoliticize climate change. We focus on the case of Turkey, which carries the stark contrast of showing willingness to achieve global climate goals in the international arena but less so in domestic politics and actions. The article employs a novel methodological approach, using topic modeling and network analyses on a range of climate change-related policy documents, and interviews with high-level officers, conducted at the three jurisdictional levels in Turkey. The findings reveal that although global climate policy is diffused to both national and local governments, it is used in different ways at these levels. The national government uses climate policy diffusion to depoliticize climate change by creating ad hoc climate coalitions and limiting local climate actions to seeking external climate-related funds. Meanwhile, the metropolitan municipalities replicate nationally adopted climate goals, whereas the district municipalities domesticate ambitious climate norms and repo-liticize climate change via local climate entrepreneurs and civic action. The paper contributes to understanding how climate policy diffusion and norm domestication can have different political outcomes in achieving global climate goals and argues for increased policy attention to the strategic use of climate policy diffusion for the depoliticization of climate change.
... Sugden and Silva (2014) 53 stressed the significance of gender-sensitive methods to planning and developing climate policy, using case studies from Bangladesh, India, and Nepal. Gordon (2013) 54 argues that cities and networks play an essential role in global governance on climate change. Sethi and Mohapatra (2013) 55 examine the governance deficit and the need for improvement in India's response to climate change. ...
Financial policy and sustainability can play a critical role in reducing the harmful effects of climate change and hastening the shift to a low-carbon, more sustainable economy. Monetary policy can be used to encourage the creation of new technologies that can lower greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, such as research and development (R&D) tax credits, government grants, and other types of financial assistance. These include targeted lending, green bonds, loan guarantees, weather-indexed insurance, tax credits, feed-in tariffs (FiT), national development banks (NDBs), national climate funds, and disclosure regulations. This evidence review examines the effects of financial policy on climate change and energy transitions. Careful design and implementation are crucial for the success of loan guarantee programs. Nations have used a variety of policy tools to support climate change and sustainable energy initiatives. The success of these programs must be understood to determine the best approaches for designing and implementing loan guarantee policies. The studies reviewed classified climate finance policies into seven categories based on their functions: regulation and guidelines, market-based incentives, financial measures, information and capacity, de-risking, domestic and international public finance, and other. National development banks have a clear public policy mission to support low-carbon development in a particular nation.
Climate change affects cities disproportionately, and some cities have limited fiscal capacity to address climate change. It is therefore necessary to ensure that the climate funds cities do have at their disposal are used in a way that maximises their impact. However, financial mismanagement and corruption have led to significant money losses in climate funds. Although measures against general public sector corruption can be used to improve climate finance management, the climate finance market poses some unique challenges. Traditional anti-corruption measures can be rethought to maintain their effectiveness against corruption in climate finance. Against this background, the article explores how international and regional law can be used by cities to improve the management of climate funds. Eight financial controls are identified and critically discussed to show how they can be effective in the specific case of climate finance. The article also shows some examples of where these financial controls have been implemented in cities
Academics and policymakers frequently discuss global governance but they treat governance as a structure or process, rarely considering who actually does the governing. This volume focuses on the agents of global governance: 'global governors'. The global policy arena is filled with a wide variety of actors such as international organizations, corporations, professional associations, and advocacy groups, all seeking to 'govern' activity surrounding their issues of concern. Who Governs the Globe? lays out a theoretical framework for understanding and investigating governors in world politics. It then applies this framework to various governors and policy arenas, including arms control, human rights, economic development, and global education. Edited by three of the world's leading international relations scholars, this is an important contribution that will be useful for courses, as well as for researchers in international studies and international organizations.
Urban areas are home to over half the world's people and are at the forefront of the climate change issue. The need for a global research effort to establish the current understanding of climate change adaptation and mitigation at the city level is urgent. To meet this goal a coalition of international researchers - the Urban Climate Change Research Network (UCCRN) - was formed at the time of the C40 Large Cities Climate Summit in New York in 2007. This book is the First UCCRN Assessment Report on Climate Change and Cities. The authors are all international experts from a diverse range of cities with varying socio-economic conditions, from both the developing and developed world. It is invaluable for mayors, city officials and policymakers; urban sustainability officers and urban planners; and researchers, professors and advanced students.
Canada has been an engaged participant in global climate change negotiations since the late 1980s. Until recently, Canadian policy seemed to be driven in large part by a desire to join in multilateral efforts to address climate change. By contrast, current policy is seeking a "made in Canada" approach to the issue. Recent government-sponsored analytic efforts as well as the government's own stated policies have been focused almost entirely on domestic regulation and incentives, domestic opportunities for technological responses, domestic costs, domestic carbon markets, and the setting of a domestic carbon "price" at a level that sends the appropriate marketplace signal to produce needed reductions. A Globally Integrated Climate Policy for Canada builds on the premise that Canada is in need of an approach that effectively integrates domestic priorities and global policy imperatives. Leading Canadian and international experts explore policy ideas and options from a range of disciplinary perspectives, including science, law, political science, economics, and sociology. Chapters explore the costs, opportunities, or imperatives to participate in international diplomatic initiatives and regimes, the opportunities and impacts of regional or global carbon markets, the proper mix of domestic policy tools, the parameters of Canadian energy policy, and the dynamics that propel or hinder the Canadian policy process.