Municipalities as intermediaries for the design and local implementation of climate visions

Abstract

The transition to a sustainable society requires the development of visions paving the way for socio-technical changes. In recent years, the literature on sustainable transitions and urban planning has highlighted the intermediation role of municipalities to implement international and national goals and visions at a local level. Yet, empirical research studying municipalities from the lens of the intermediation theory are sparse. This paper aims at contributing to a better understanding of what strategies municipalities use when intermediating between and within different scales of governance (i.e. local, national and international), and what factors influence the choice of strategies. Through semi-structured interviews and document studies, three Swedish municipalities are studied. Results show that these municipalities translate the visions through local experiments, task delegation and coalitions. Additionally, the analysis indicates that the local circumstances, rather than the relations between the local level and the higher levels of governance or the guidance of national policies, influence the choice of intermediation strategy. Particularly, whether the management approach is centralized or decentralized, result-or process-oriented, participative or exclusive, is determinant. Results also indicate that municipalities perform both top-down and bottom-up intermediation, i.e. closing the loop from the local to the national and/or international levels. ARTICLE HISTORY

Approaches to Social Innovation in Positive Energy Districts (PEDs)—A Comparison of Norwegian Projects

“…This calls for an intermediary which encompasses both perspectives, to create a counterbalance and engender consensus over important decisions [21,22]. The public sector represents an intermediary of social innovation in the urban environment [23]. Broad stakeholder interaction is supported for PED implementation in the view of the EU Smart Cities Information System (SCIS) and ongoing Horizon 2020 PED Lighthouse projects [24].…”

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“…Intermediaries can also play a significant role in urban experimentation and refer to NGOs, government or semi-government agencies that connect actors at different scales. Gustafsson and Mignon (2020) have shown how municipalities in Sweden used intermediation to translate international or national climate visions into local action through performing local experiments, task delegation, and creating coalitions in the context of local energy infrastructure.…”

SEA screening practice and the inclusion of environmental objectives in Swedish energy and climate planning

“…The need for local energy and climate action encompasses the Swedish municipalities which, due to their autonomy and broad responsibilities, are considered to be vital to Sweden's climate change mitigation efforts (Gustafsson and Mignon 2019). Besides sovereignty with regard to land use planning (Högström et al 2018), the municipalities are instructed by the Act on Municipal Energy Planning to have a Municipal Energy Plan (MEP) for the provision of energy (1977:439).…”