Beyond standard economic approaches: complex networks in climate finance

Abstract

The financial system is a key tool to enable the shift towards a climate-smart economy: by reallocating capital to low-carbon assets, it internalizes the climate externality. However, the financial sector operates as an ecosystem of evolving agents continuously shaping the outcomes they jointly generate. Hence, the consequences of global warming and the climate impacts are potentially amplified by the micro and meso dynamics of agents interacting with each other and with technologies and institutions in the space they operate. In this working paper, we present a concise but exhaustive review about complex networks models and methods applied to climate finance. We show where networks can overcome the limitations of standard economic models in both macroprudential regulation and capital allocation. We present the main challenges ahead and we discuss the importance of a renewed research-policy dialogue to advance the discipline.