Environmental Policy and Governance最新文献

The scale of energy service demands and the efficiency with which they are provided determine the size of energy systems. As most modern energy systems are powered predominantly by fossil fuels, the size of the system determines the scale of the decarbonisation challenge enshrined in net-zero targets. It is commonly acknowledged that energy demand reduction, and the consequent reduction in size of the energy system, represents the lowest-cost, lowest-risk option for lowering emissions. Energy demand reductions arise from increasing the efficiency of providing energy services and avoiding such services in the first place. In the United Kingdom, however, government support for such energy demand reduction has stalled in recent years, especially in the context of housing. Expanding and diversifying energy supply resources, technologies and markets, on the other hand, receive strong political support, and increasingly so following Russia's invasion of the Ukraine and associated energy security challenges. The nature of this increasing policy asymmetry between energy demand and supply in the United Kingdom vis-à-vis the EU27 between February and October 2022 is analysed using comparative secondary data in the context of the quasi-natural experimental conditions imposed by Russia's invasion. Primary data, mainly derived from interviews, is used to identify the drivers of this policy asymmetry in the United Kingdom with a particular focus on ideology and institutions. The results indicate to that extreme free-market ideologies and institutions have been significant drivers of energy policy asymmetry during this period to the detriment of both the efficiency of the residential building stock and energy system decarbonisation.

In this study, we analyze how energy efficiency actions, policies, and outcomes are tied to wider socio-economic and political contexts that are important from a sustainable energy transition perspective. In our two-part study, we first conduct a bibliometric analysis of 206 publications to identify some of the dominant discourses in the literary construction of energy efficiency actions and outcomes from a sustainable energy transition policy perspective using keywords–energy efficiency, energy policy, sustainable transition, political, conflict, consumption, and equity. Next, we identify and take up five comparatively understudied themes to understand the how and why questions surrounding residential energy efficiency actions, policies, and outcomes for sustainable transition-(i) efficiency versus consumption; (ii) barriers and conflicts at the individual, household, and institutional levels; (iii) policy processes and heterogeneity; (iv) demonstrable savings versus normative ethics and equity ideals; and (v) public policy and market-based frameworks. Using a multi-disciplinary lens, we explore the underlying paradigms, dynamics, synergies, and trade-offs between different actors, institutions, and situational contexts influencing complex energy efficiency policy processes. We note the role of bargaining, negotiations, and political dynamics as important elements of policy processes that influence adoption, applicability, and jurisdictions of energy efficiency policies. Our study also highlights the need for policies that target absolute energy consumption and careful balancing of socially equitable objectives with economically efficient outcomes in a market-based framework. We believe that a better understanding and comprehensive discussion of these challenges will inform policymaking and ensure better outcomes.

Private sustainability fisheries certification has become increasingly popular over the past years as a new form of governance for fisheries in developing countries. The certification scheme is very promising because it offers benefits through market-based incentives, including market access, social benefits by empowering fishers, and environmental impacts on sustainability. The process can introduce new actors and relationships into a governance landscape that often falls outside the conventional governance model. However, there is still relatively little information about the interplay between the state, certification, market, community, and other actors within the landscape. In this study, we use a case study of Fair Trade USA small-scale tuna fishery certification in Indonesia to explore the impact of certification on the governance landscape of small-scale tuna fishery and the governance capabilities of key stakeholders in promoting sustainability. We found that hybrid governance between state and private certification through informal interactions is promising for promoting sustainability beyond certification. Effective implementation requires strong governance capabilities, with an NGO acting as a bridging institution through a formal and legitimate collaborative arrangement. However, this mode of governance is challenging when the key stakeholders, aside from those certified, cannot contest their roles over time.

The extant literature largely ignores the micro-governance of collaborative networks (CNs), that is, the day-to-day functions that CN coordinators need to perform to produce a collaborative environment that stimulates joint action. This paper aims to identify which configurations of micro-governance functions foster an internal collaborative environment in CNs. We collected data from 36 CNs for water protection in Brazil and performed a Qualitative Comparative Analysis (QCA). Results show two configurations that may be adopted in different situations. Although the first configuration requires all six micro-governance functions to be performed, the second one does not require high monitoring. This configuration is adopted by CNs whose stakeholders do not have a previous history of conflict. Our study advances the theory of collaborative governance by empirically demonstrating how micro-governance functions enable effective implementation in natural resources management. We contribute to the practice of collaborative governance by describing how CN coordinators may enhance their day-to-day activities.

Environmental problems are often wicked and face multiple challenges, making policy coherence a goal of high relevance. The issue of nitrogen pollution is an outstanding example, representing the pressing demand on different policy fields and levels to achieve coherence of the respective objectives, instruments, and measures. However, policy coherence analysis often provides a horizontal perspective only and likely misses the opportunities a more complex analysis may reveal. This study provides a multi-level policy coherence analysis, focusing on emerging forest-related water protection measures as an example of multi-functional measures such as agroforestry systems or short rotation plantations. We analyze the degree of policy coherence across policy fields (agriculture, forestry, water protection) and political levels (Europe, Germany, Thuringia) based on a qualitative content analysis of policy objectives and instruments. Surprisingly, we find a high degree of policy coherence between the areas of interest on all political levels. However, incoherence is also present, especially between the policy fields of forestry and water in consideration of agriculture. Analytically, this study shows the importance of complex analyses to understand the ramifications of wicked nexus problems in multi-level governance systems. Overall, the results show valuable entry points from a multi-level policy coherence perspective.

In December 2019, the European Commission launched the European Green Deal (EGD) and hereby ramped up the climate ambitions of the European Union. Responding to a mounting sense of climate urgency, the European Commission proposed a comprehensive reform program to make the EU's economy climate neutral by 2050. In this paper, we trace the practical work undertaken to ensure that Europe's green transition is just and leaves no one behind. To that end, we turn to the Just Transition Platform, an online portal coordinated by the European Commission. By analysing the many guidelines, checklists, and event reports produced by this platform, we trace the problem objects towards which the EU's just transition efforts are directed, what practical techniques are deployed to act upon them in order to transform them, and ultimately, how they define what it means to be a modern and green European.

Grassroots innovations are increasingly recognized as crucial actors in sustainability transitions, offering localized, bottom-up solutions to local and global challenges. These initiatives contribute to sustainability by diffusing sustainable innovations and practices to broader societal sectors. However, the functioning of grassroots innovations is influenced by projectification, that is, the structuring of efforts around temporary, grant-funded projects. Projectification has a significant impact on both the development and diffusion of grassroots innovations. This process also plays a key role in shaping the internal governance and functioning of grassroots innovations networks, influencing how these initiatives operate and evolve. Focusing on the European branch of the Global Ecovillage Network, we explore the interaction between projectification processes and the diffusion of ecovillage practices. Employing the embedding framework, we analyze how projects facilitate or constrain the diffusion of sustainable practices across and beyond the network. Methodologically, the research is based on in-depth fieldwork trips to three European ecovillages, resulting in 16 semi-structured interviews with ecovillage members and members of the European ecovillage network. Our findings indicate that while projects enable certain embedding processes, they also introduce tensions that could limit the long-term sustainability of these initiatives. This study underscores the need for a balanced approach to projectification, ensuring that it supports rather than undermines grassroots innovation's objectives.

In this paper, we consider knowledge cumulation in one of the most polarized areas of environmental governance research: forest carbon offsetting in developing countries. Our specific contribution is a critical review of the ontological and epistemological positioning of 31 studies published in the peer-reviewed literature on forest carbon offsetting in Uganda. At the surface, differences appear related to methodological gaps along the qualitative-quantitative divide. However, probing deeper suggests a lack of agreement on fundamental ontological and epistemological issues, which challenges traditional understandings of scientific knowledge cumulation. Among our key findings is that research into forest carbon offsetting in Uganda is predominated by epistemologies we characterize as neopositivist (approximately half) and neo-Marxist overdetermination (approximately one-third). Structural ontologies were significantly more frequently identified in our critical review than agentic ontologies, while structure–agency balancing ontologies were the least represented. Notably, research most critical of forest carbon offsetting was characterized by an epistemology of neo-Marxist overdetermination and structural/synchronic ontology. While recognizing the limits of our critical review into forest carbon offsetting in Uganda, knowledge cumulation appears to be frustrated by a lack of agreement on fundamental ontological and epistemological presuppositions. Nonetheless, given the polarized debate on forest carbon offsetting, delineating such fundamental differences may help lay the groundwork for promoting dialogue between different research traditions. But such epistemic fragmentation or diversity may not in itself constitute epistemic justice, which requires additional attention to broader power imbalances involved in the conduct of environmental governance research in developing countries.

This article investigates environmental under-performance by exploring Greece, a typical laggard case within the European Union. It introduces a newly developed capacity–intentionality framework (CIF), which expands the policy capacity model of Wu, Ramesh, and Howlett by integrating the dimension of political agency and purposeful action. The CIF is employed to explain Greece's persistent implementation deficits in EU environmental legislation. Methodologically, the study maps environmental infringements in Greece from 2000 to 2022 and analyzes qualitative data from 42 elite interviews with key Greek environmental actors. While reaffirming prior findings of systemic and organizational capacity shortfalls, the analysis goes further to identify deficits in intentionality—a lack of sustained commitment and strategic alignment by key actors—as a critical explanatory factor. The findings underscore that addressing environmental implementation failures in Greece requires not only institutional capacity-building but also the development of deliberate political and societal commitment to environmental goals.