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Much existing empirical research on polycentric climate governance (PCG) systems examines small-N examples. In response, we aim to advance studies of PCG by exploring, and reflecting on, the use of large-N data sets for analyzing PCG. We use Python (a programming language) to create a novel data set from the United Nations' Global Climate Action Portal. This method allows us to quantify key variables for 12,568 businesses located in Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development countries: the number of businesses' climate commitments, their progress toward meeting those commitments, and businesses' memberships in "more polycentric" networks via transnational climate initiatives (TCIs). Our analysis of these data reveals that greater interconnectedness may strengthen climate policy performance, since businesses with memberships in TCIs more commonly achieved their commitments. Additional research using these data, and/or similar methods, could be conducted on climate governance and on other areas of international environmental governance, such as mining and oil production. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent years, climate governance has shifted from the global, multilateral regime to voluntary initiatives from multiple directions. Scholars frequently use a polycentric governance lens to study the complex and multijurisdictional reality. The polycentric perspective helps to grasp the new reality at a general level, but it is lacking in specificity. To fill this research gap, this article attempts to enhance the analytical power of the polycentric governance perspective by exploring four issues: the role of the state, diffusion of local action, integration of local democratic preferences, and the role of power. These issues are discussed by doing a systematic literature review of empirical polycentric governance literature regarding climate change mitigation. The results show the importance of states at the national level and provide insights into how local initiatives share and transfer knowledge, get supported by transnational networks, and secure compliance with local democratic preferences. The literature provides less insight into the role of power. The article concludes by developing research agendas for further cumulation of knowledge and to strengthen climate action at all levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Under the Paris Agreement, global climate governance has become decidedly more polycentric. However, it is still debated whether the turn toward greater polycentricity leads to more effectiveness in delivering public goods like climate change mitigation. This article argues that engagement in polycentric climate governance is linked to both more ambitious mitigation targets and stronger mitigation policy effort at the national level. Empirically, we analyze the extent to which countries' mitigation ambition and policy effort are associated with state-level memberships in transnational climate governance initiatives and with sub- and nonstate actors' memberships, while controlling for other potential explanations. We find that while polycentric engagement is not associated with higher ambition of countries' mitigation targets, it does correlate with greater policy effort. This is particularly the case for former non–Annex I countries, that is, countries without mitigation commitments under the old Kyoto regime. We explain these synergies with a discussion of polycentric systems' contribution to supporting knowledge exchange and learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate performance in publicly traded companies has become an important focus for climate action. Non–state actor–led initiatives have emerged as influential governors in this arena, intended to plug gaps in public climate change regulation. This article addresses the key question, are such non–state led climate initiatives exerting a positive influence on corporate climate performance? To answer this question, we empirically evaluate the effects of eighteen such climate initiatives on corporate climate performance, distinguishing between "internal" and "external" initiatives. Based on an original data set of corporate climate initiatives that prioritize climate performance in the private sector, we find that each additional climate initiative has little to no impact on climate performance, modeled as scope 1 direct emissions, but does exert a positive influence on scope 2 indirect emissions. Our findings have implications for the trajectory of the private sector's climate transition, as well as the potential of corporate initiatives to steward effective climate action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The diversification of actors in global climate governance may entail risks, but it is also linked to enhanced democratic performance and opportunities for innovation. To what extent has this diversification fostered a parallel multiplication of perspectives in urban climate policy? To answer this question, we analyze the evolution of urban narratives based on 463 international policy documents issued between 1946 and 2020. Our analysis shows that, instead of leading to diversification, the proliferation of actors is accompanied by a growing homogenization of urban narratives. Language appears to become progressively uniform across organizations and over time, with approaches emphasizing multi-actor governance, integrated planning, and co-benefits becoming dominant. Three factors explain this homogenization. First, actors with a long history of involvement in international development exert a significant amount of influence. Second, there is a tendency toward language harmonization in international policy. Third, urban climate narratives stabilize through association with broader policy paradigms. In conclusion, the diversification of actors in international climate policy is mediated by processes of narrative alignment, which foreclose possibilities for divergent thinking. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers the puzzle of Norway and Canada, two countries that have adopted ambitious Paris Agreement targets yet are also major fossil fuel exporters. To date, both countries have taken full advantage of the international convention that assigns responsibility only for emissions within a country's borders. However, climate activists, First Nations, and green politicians increasingly have challenged fossil fuel production via campaigns centered on issues salient to voters in nonproducing regions: opposing new exploration licenses in Norway and pipelines in Canada. While supply-side campaigns have sometimes succeeded in ending expansion, neither country has seriously entertained restricting current production. We attribute these outcomes to continued public support for fossil fuel–driven prosperity; institutions that assign responsibility for production and climate to different government agencies; and the success of counternarratives that unilateral supply restrictions are futile, prosperity from petroleum exports will fund domestic clean-energy transitions, and gas exports advance global climate action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Renewable energy (RE) will play a significant role in national climate mitigation strategies, including those put forth in the context of the Paris Agreement. This article examines the role of industrial policy in supporting renewables and how it compares to the use of other types of RE policies in both location and quantity around the world. On the basis of an original database of RE policy support measures developed for this analysis, the article illustrates which measures are most commonly being used around the world and what types of countries are using them. It highlights the use of a wide range of policy types, including many industrial policies, and a disparity in the use of industrial policies between smaller emitters and larger emitters, with important implications for which countries stand to benefit from the development of domestic RE industries and for our ability to achieve long-term climate goals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article theorizes about the implications for domestic climate politics of three distinct roles countries play in the global carbon supply chain: fossil fuel producer, manufacturer of carbon-intensive goods, and final consumer. Because international responsibility is assigned to territorial emissions, countries at either end of the global supply chain effectively evade environmental responsibility by shifting fossil fuel combustion to manufacturing countries. In so doing, they lessen the political challenges of reducing domestic emissions. Although exporters of carbon-intensive goods are reluctant to disadvantage local producers, importers can craft policies that both reduce territorial emissions and create local jobs. Ironically, fossil fuel exporters can emerge as leaders in reducing their own territorial emissions, a finding illustrated by case studies of British Columbia and Norway. The conclusion argues that shifting responsibility for carbon emissions to the point of either final consumption or fossil fuel extraction could facilitate an international climate agreement. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article considers carbon footprints as a form of climate governance. Drawing on science studies to consider the contingent nature of calculative devices and governmentality studies to examine the intrinsic relationship between how problems are framed and remedied, this article advances two arguments. First, it argues that efforts to define and deploy carbon footprints contributed to a conceptual shift in emissions accounting, from a narrower metric focused on emissions from fossil fuel and electricity use--Carbon Footprint 1.0--to a more expansive metric that includes emissions embodied in consumption and trade--Carbon Footprint 2.0. Second, this article argues that these approaches to carbon footprints at the individual level have intersected with broader discussions about allocating emissions responsibilities and examining mitigation strategies at the national and international levels, offering alternative grounds for assigning responsibility for climate-change mitigation and expanding the range of policy options available for addressing emissions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]