Climate policy is a prime example of the growing importance of expert advice. A plethora of advisory bodies and processes have emerged around the world to inform mitigation and adaptation policies. However, there are marked differences in the organization and practice of science-policy interactions in national contexts.Against this background, the article aims to provide an in-depth account of the imprints of the peculiar Austrian neo-corporatist culture on scientific advice in the new field of climate policy. Because scholars have observed a decline in the underlying Austrian political culture, we aim to clarify whether a hybridization of neo-corporatist and pluralist advisory features can be found or to what extent neo-corporatist advisory patterns still prevail in the new domain of climate policy. Our research draws on the approaches of 'national styles of policy-making' and 'civic epistemologies' to develop an analytical framework. We briefly present the main features of Austrian climate policy before analyzing pertinent patterns of scientific advice. Our article particularly focuses on mapping the actors and organizational advisory formats, categorizing the selection criteria for researchers' expertise, assessing the overall relevance of scientific knowledge and identifying dominant patterns of sciencepolicy interactions. Overall, our analysis indicates that neo-corporatist advisory features prevail in Austrian scientific climate policy advice. Only a limited extent of pluralist patterns and, therefore, a low degree of hybridization could be revealed.
Scientific expertise plays an important role in the complex field of climate policy. Consequently, science-policy interactions have been institutionalized in many countries. However, science-policy arenas vary considerably across countries. Scholars mainly attribute these differences to the influence of specific political cultures. The literature has primarily compared science-policy arenas of countries with diverging political cultures, whereas comparisons of countries with similar political cultures are rare. The latter is especially true for neo-corporatist cultures. Against this background, we compare the climate science-policy arenas of three neo-corporatist countries, Austria, the Netherlands, and Switzerland. Conceptually, we draw on the literature regarding politico-cultural imprints in science-policy arenas. We operationalize national science-policy arenas along four dimensions: the knowledge actors, the organizational formats, the styles of science-policy interactions, and their transparency and visibility. Overall, the three arenas reveal many similarities and much fewer differences. Most similarities correspond to neocorporatist patterns. However, some similarities consistently deviate from neocorporatist patterns. Interestingly, almost all differences between the countries match national variations of neo-corporatism. In light of these observations and the specific problem structure of climate policy, we develop research questions to investigate potential explanations for correspondence to and deviation from neocorporatist patterns. ARTICLE HISTORY
Newspapers are important fora for communicating scientific expertise to the public. Our article asks how researchers convey their expertise and link it to political actions in Austrian newspaper coverage of climate change. Based on researchers' understanding of climate change and the degree of prescriptiveness of their policy recommendations, we identify three positions: alerters, critics, and objectivists. We illustrate how these three types advance different framings of the climate change debate and generate contradictory representations of climate science. Finally, we discuss our findings against the background of scholarly works on the nationally specific media representation of climate research.
ZusammenfassungDer Begriff "Heimat" wurde in Österreich lange insbesondere durch rechte und konservative PolitikerInnen besetzt. Mittlerweile ist der Begriff zunehmend umkämpft, da PolitikerInnen anderer Parteien versuchen, ihn mit alternativen Bedeutungen zu füllen. Vor diesem Hintergrund werden die Deutungsangebote für "Heimat" im österreichischen Bundespräsidentschaftswahlkampf 2016 analysiert. Der Artikel greift hierfür auf diskurstheoretische Überlegungen und insbesondere Laclaus Konzept der "leeren Signifikanten" zurück. Er rekonstruiert die Heimatverständnisse der Stichwahlkandidaten Van der Bellen und Hofer entlang ihrer räumlichen, zeitlichen, thematischen, normativen, emotionalen und symbolischen Bezüge sowie der dadurch bereitgestellten Identitätsangebote. Abschließend diskutiert der Artikel die Erkenntnisse in Bezug auf die Forschungsliteratur und mögliche (wahlkampf-)strategische Erwägungen. AbstractIn Austria, the term "Heimat" has primarily been used by right-wing and conservative politicians for a long time. Nowadays the term becomes increasingly contested because politicians of other parties attempt to assign different meanings to it. Against this background, the article analyzes the interpretations of "Heimat" during the Austrian Presidential Election Campaign of 2016. Therefore, it draws on discourse theoretical considerations and particularly Laclau's concept of "empty signifiers". The different understandings of "Heimat" of the second ballot candidates Van der Bellen and Hofer are reconstructed along their geographical, temporal, topical, normative, emotional and symbolic references and the thereby provided concepts of identity. The article concludes by discussing its findings regarding scholarly works on the term "Heimat" and potential (election) strategic considerations.
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