Exploring the contours of climate governance: An interdisciplinary systematic literature review from a southern perspective

Abstract

Dealing with climate change is one of this century's most difficult challenges demanding new strategies to steer societies towards common transformational goals. A growing literature involving “climate governance” is evolving and should advance the discussion on transformations and the involvement of different actors in climate action. However, it is unclear that the Global South's particularities are being integrated. This study has a three‐fold goal: (a) identify the different approaches to climate governance found in the mainstream literature, (b) explore the degree of integration of the Global South in those approaches, and (c) contribute to the ongoing discussion on this issue from a southern perspective. A systematic literature review on “climate governance” was conducted, distinguishing different approaches and their significance for the Global South. Results clustered in six groups use the characterizations: multi‐level, global, adaptive, transnational, polycentric, and experimental/transformative. These terms account for different levels of decision‐making, emerging values, and the importance of non‐State and sub‐national actors. Approaches vary, in relation to change and participation, from an incremental improvement focus to a more transformative perspective and from the promotion of community influence to processes based on traditional institutions. In the Global South, multi‐level, multi‐actor climate governance occurs in a context of deep inequality and asymmetric power relations, rising environmental conflicts, and a lack of adequate mechanisms for community participation. Addressing climate change here will require, acknowledging the State alone cannot solve the issue, that different views must be considered and that contextualized perspectives from the Global South must be integrated.

Climate Adaptation Strategies and Associated Governance Structures in Mountain Areas. The Case of the Alpine Regions

“…Devolution of power was implemented in all considered countries. Referring to Sapiains et al [7] and their clustering of climate adaptation governance, different models adopted in the European countries can be included among the clusters considered. The governance structure adopted at Alpine level by the three international institutions refer to the first cluster; it can be assimilated to a multi-governance system where different players are included in a broader scheme.…”

“…Traditional approaches to this problem view multilateral agreements negotiated by the national government as the central mechanism of climate change governance [7]. The Paris Conference is at its core and remains a central forum for global climate governance [8].…”

“…Zelli and van Asselt [16] or Keohane and Victor [17] promote the horizontal differentiation at the international level and do not support the hypothesis of a single regime for climate change. By contrast, other authors claim there is potential "anarchic inefficiency" because of this fragmentation of the competences for the adaptation climate policies [18] or conflicting expectations regarding the role and influence of several bodies [7]. Others investigate emerging new bodies in the governance arena (NGOs, associations, private citizens, etc), and their relations [19] or the growth of transnational climate change governance [20].…”

“…Many other approaches are formulated and varied in relation to the choices made in terms of shared components (mechanisms, stakeholders' involvement and links with wider-scale strategies). Sapiains et al [7] list 30 different types of climate and/or environmental governance with a focus on climate change and cluster them into six groups. One of these is related to the multi-level governance which gathers different components (organisations, scales and interactions) into a broader scheme (e.g., [34,35]).…”

Gobernanza policéntrica para la resiliencia al cambio climático: análisis legislativo comparado y Ley Marco de Cambio en Chile

“…La literatura especializada declara de manera consistente que el cambio climático representa un fenómeno complejo y controvertido (Sun y Yang 2016;Ostrom 2014), que demanda acción colectiva a escala global (Ostrom 2010b). El concepto de 'gobernanza climática', a este respecto, ha recibido una creciente atención en el debate internacional, dando lugar a una variedad de enfoques y perspectivas heterogéneas y en parte contrastantes (Sapiains et al 2020). En términos generales, en este artículo se entenderá por gobernanza del cambio climático un conjunto articulado de instituciones (normas, mecanismos decisionales, estándares, etcétera), investidas de algún grado de autoridad, que coordina la acción colectiva alrededor de un propósito o problema común (Lindahl 2018).…”