Whose Responsibility? Swedish Local Decision Makers and the Scale of Climate Change Abatement

Abstract

This article uses a framework combining the discourse of scalar politics with a social dilemma perspective. The aim is to find answers to why political interests advocate a specific scalar arrangement. Analyzing informant interviews with top politicians and administrators in four municipal governments in the Gothenburg region of southwestern Sweden, we find that although all recognize the social dilemma, the size and capacity of their local government lead to different scalar arguments about responsibility for climate change. Regardless of municipal size and capacity, however, actors' recommendations finally converge in a pattern of path dependence. Already well-entrenched structures of intermunicipal urban cooperation are seen as the scalarly most appropriate vehicle for addressing the social dilemma and for allocating responsibility for climate-related regional action. This opens up for comparative urban research on how new and existing transboundary urban structures handle climate issues in terms of legitimacy and efficiency.

Local governments in the driving seat? A comparative analysis of public and private responsibilities for adaptation to climate change in European and North-American cities

“…The setup of the research, as illustrated in Table 2, allowed a comparison among governance arrangements in different cities/ countries for one and the same adaptation measure, as well as a comparison across three adaptation measures for three important urban climate adaptation issues. The decision to focus on the level of adaptation measures was informed by the dominant framing that adaptation is most important at the local scale, since this is the scale where concrete adaptation measures are implemented (Amundsen et al, 2010;Lundqvist & Von Borgstede, 2008;Nalau et al, 2015). The three cases represent adaptation measures (see Table 2) that are not the default adaptation option, but innovative alternatives: green roofs instead of sewerage capacity extension; adaptive building instead of flood defences; and local heat prevention measures instead of a national heat response plan (Tennekes, Driessen, van Rijswick, & van Bree, 2014).…”

“…The number of empirical studies on the governance of adaptation and the division of responsibilities is gradually increasing, but those studies are conducted on a case-by-case basis (e.g. Amundsen et al, 2010;Fünfgeld, 2010;Lundqvist & Von Borgstede, 2008;Storbjörk, 2007;Wamsler & Brink, 2014). A systematic empirical analysis of governance arrangements for climate adaptation and their underlying rationales is lacking.…”

“Sometimes Climate Adaptation is Politically Correct”: A Case Study of Planners and Politicians Negotiating Climate Adaptation in Waterfront Spatial Planning

“…Compared with other EU countries, Sweden lacks strong regional planning to coordinate state and municipal land use planning (EC, 2000). Instead, Swedish municipalities' autonomy and "local planning monopoly" gives them the exclusive right to develop and adopt local land use plans (Lundqvist & Borgstede, 2008). Local spatial planning is structured around municipal comprehensive plans and local development plans, the former specifying long-term land use goals.…”

Prepared for climate change? A method for the ex-ante assessment of formal responsibilities for climate adaptation in specific sectors

“…Various empirical studies have been conducted on this subject (e.g. Storbjörk 2007;Lundqvist and Von Borgstede 2008;Amundsen et al 2010;Gilissen 2013;Mees et al 2014a;Wamsler and Brink 2014). Private responsibilities are analysed by Schneider (2014), whereas Wamsler (2014) addresses citizens' institutions' responsibilities for adaptation.…”