Climate policy meets national development contexts: Insights from Kenya and Mozambique

Abstract

Little is still known about how climate policy initiatives intersect with national level development agendas; the winners, losers and potential trade-offs between different goals, and the political and institutional factors which enable or inhibit integration across different policy areas. This paper addresses this gap by applying a political economic analysis to case studies on low carbon energy in Kenya and carbon forestry in Mozambique. In examining the intersection of climate and development policy, we demonstrate the critical importance of politics, power and interests when climate-motivated initiatives hit wider and more complex national policy contexts, ultimately determining the prospects of achieving integrated climate policy and development goals in practice. We advance the following arguments: (1) the importance of understanding both the informal nature and historical embeddedness of decision making around key issue areas and resource sectors of relevance to climate change policy; (2) The need to understand and engage with the interests, power relations and policy networks that will shape the prospects of realising climate policy goals; (3) the ways in which common global drivers have very different impacts upon national level climate change debates once refracted through national levels institutions and policy processes, and (4) how climate change and development outcomes, and the associated trade-offs, may look very different depending on how it is framed, who frames it, and in which actor coalitions. IntroductionThe need for climate policy goals to be integrated with development goals in developing countries is undisputed (REF). A number of developing countries now have strategies for development and climate change, under the banners of 'climate resilient development', 'climate compatible development' or similar concepts, which sets out goals, envisaged synergies across mitigation, adaptation and development, and implementation strategies (REF). There is also a limited, but growing body of literature that examines how various climate policy initiatives are implemented, as well as potential synergies and trade-offs between the different goals (Stringer et al. 2014; Suckall et al. 2013; Shames et al. 2013).What is less clear, however, is whether and how climate change and development benefits will materialise in the real world, including the processes whereby decisions are made, by whom, and who wins and who loses from various initiatives and actions to promote integration. Despite an emerging recognition that 'politics matter' in adaptation and mitigation policy at national and subnational levels in developing countries (e.g., Dodman and Mitlin, 2014; Nightingale et al., this issue), there is as yet little analysis of how, when, why and for whom they matter in particular settings. As noted by Lockwood (2013), the academic and policy debates on climate policy goals, such as those associated with 'triple wins' (REF), have little meaning unless they are analysed in relation to the politica...

Governing Transformation towards Low-carbon Societies: An Ideational Perspective from Developing Countries

“…Therefore understanding policy-making in a wider political context and advancing knowledge of how ideas (or change in ideas) shape governance institutions will enhance reflexivity in policy-making and build up the resilience of strategies aimed at transforming societal institutions (Hotimsky et al 2006). This dissertation thus responds to the broader emerging agenda in the literature that is calling for more research into the domestic politics of climate change in developing countries (Tanner and Allouche 2011;Dodman and Mitlin 2015;Naess et al 2015;Sovacool et al 2015;Newell and H. Bulkeley 2016;Funder et al 2017) and the emergence of new discourses of green transformation in the global South (Arnall et al 2013;Death 2015).…”

Influencing resilience: the role of policy entrepreneurs in mainstreaming climate adaptation

“…By externalising climate hazards from the natural and human systems that generate them, objective science is privileged in informing adaptation without challenging the political and economic drivers of climate change (Brown, 2015). Countering this technical framing, there is growing acknowledgement of the ways that climate change is constructed socio-politically, such that the different conceptualisations of the problem are influenced by political processes, which in turn determine which (and whose) knowledge and interests are represented and which are excluded (Hulme, 2010;Taylor, 2014;Naess et al, 2015;Nightingale, 2017).…”

“…The choice of adaptation actions to take is therefore governed by political negotiation and mediated by existing power relations (Naess et al, 2015). These actions create trade-offs that may favour some (usually weaker) groups at the expense of other (usually more powerful) groups, such as when flood protection moves flood water to poorer communities elsewhere (Bahadur and Tanner, 2015;Atteridge and Remling, 2018).…”

“…Yet the literature on political economy and policy processes also underlines the importance of understanding adaptation processes in terms of the more informal, tacit processes that are involved (Court and Maxwell, 2005;Birkmann et al, 2010;Naess et al, 2015). Yet the literature on political economy and policy processes also underlines the importance of understanding adaptation processes in terms of the more informal, tacit processes that are involved (Court and Maxwell, 2005;Birkmann et al, 2010;Naess et al, 2015).…”

“…Many of the transferable lessons on mainstreaming to date relate to technical approaches to supporting mainstreaming, such as providing training and preparing risk assessments and toolkits. Yet the literature on political economy and policy processes also underlines the importance of understanding adaptation processes in terms of the more informal, tacit processes that are involved (Court and Maxwell, 2005;Birkmann et al, 2010;Naess et al, 2015). This article combines perspective and theories on policy-influencing from the literature with empirical evidence from the Action on Climate Today (ACT) programme in South Asia, a five-year initiative that works closely with governments to develop strategies to build resilience to the impact of climate change.…”