Category: Cities

Study exploring municipalities on the frontline of climate action

13 September 2023 /
Daniel Lindvall

What motivates urban climate leaders? Daniel Lindvall, senior researcher in the Climate Change Leadership unit, provides answers to that question in a recent article published in the International Journal of Urban Sustainable Development.  

 

Cities are often described as frontrunners in the transition to a low-carbon society. Cities are more progressive and perceptive than national governments, and when they act together, in networks such as the C40, they can influence policymaking on both national and global levels. This notion of urban leadership contests the conventional description of the climate crises as a problem of collective action, and confirms the theories of Elinor Ostrom, and the approach of polycentric governance.

What drives urban climate policies?

While the description of urban climate leadership is attractive, it has also been criticised for being overly idealistic. Cities are often reliant on regulations or funding of national governments, and the climate ambitions of different cities differ substantially. Certain cities are progressive, prioritising climate action, but others are lagging behind. The question is thus what motivates urban climate leaders?

To identify different factors motivating urban climate policies, interviews were made with local politicians and civil servants in five Swedish municipalities that have been top-ranked in the environment policy index Miljöbarometern, and three ranked as less ambitious.

Political consensus is key for climate action

The study demonstrates that political consensus among, and willingness of, the local political leadership is a key factor for progressive climate actions. The most progressive cities have over the years been governed by both left-, liberal-, and conservative-leaning parties, often in coalition with the green party, but the political makeup of the local government was not considered to be as decisive as political consensus. In line with previous research, pioneering moves by individual ambitious politicians or civil servants have been important for initiating transformative policies, however with the adoption of national and EU policies, local climate policies are becoming increasingly institutionalised. This institutionalisation of climate policies makes municipalities less of an independent climate actor, while national and subnational policies have become more important for driving cities forward.

Barriers for citizen involvement in urban climate leadership

The pressure of local business community with high climate ambitions and concerned voters were also considered to be important. Several cities had actively tried to involve citizens; however, the study shows that there are normative, administrative, and technocratic barriers for the inclusion of citizens in the local policymaking process. Most of the interviewees stated, on the other hand, that the engagement and direct involvement of urban residents has not had any significant impact on local climate policies.

Few of the18 interviewees (eight civil servants and ten politicians) claimed that community engagement and pressure from the electorate had any decisive influence on the policymaking process.

Resources and instruments for successful urban climate action

The most important driver for local climate policies, according to several of the interviewees, was the institutional capacities of the municipalities, such as an independent local administration with adequate resources and competences to adopt strategies, action plans, and targets, as well as instruments for progress evaluations. Such instruments could ensure long-term policy stability and enable systematic emission reductions. Networks of cities, setting common emission reduction targets and sharing experience and knowledge, are also relevant to push action forward.

Read more

Lindvall, D. What motivates urban climate leaders? A study of urban climate governance in eight Swedish municipalities. International Journal of Urban Sustainable Development 15 (1) 2023 https://doi.org/10.1080/19463138.2023.2253755

The Non-Human Animal: Negotiating Bio Relations

14 December 2020 /
Download the report hereDownload

In this report you can read about the 2019 collaboration between Zennström Climate Change Leadership at Uppsala University and the Uppsala Art Museum. Some of the ideas and findings from this report are elaborated upon in a forthcoming publication.

This report is written in English.

Några ord från Kuratorn, Rebecka Wigh Abrahamsson, Uppsala Art Museum

En rapport om samarbetet mellan Uppsala konstmuseum och Uppsala universitet kring utställningen ”The Non-Human Animal –  Negotiating Bio-relations”  hösten 2019. Samarbetet leddes av Keri Facer, Zennströmprofessor i Climate Change Leadership vid Uppsala universitet, som i sin forskning har ett stort fokus på konstens och humanioras roll i samtalet om och förståelsen kring klimatförändringarna.

Här beskrivs de olika aktiviteterna och de multidisciplinära perspektiv som vävdes samman i projektet, från pedagogiska och rituella, till diskussion om den politiska infrastrukturen.  

En premiss i papporten är behovet av skapa fler intellektuella och emotionella rum för att diskutera alla de konflikter och motstridiga intressen som blir tydliga under antropocen, t ex möjligheten att bearbeta sorg. Här diskuteras vilken effekt ramverket kring dessa skapade rum får på samtalen.

Flera exempel på olika interdisciplinära modeller som prövades under projektet lyfts fram, samt den stora potential som finns i att se över och tänka nytt kring vad det betyder att vara människa idag genom pedagogiska, imaginära, rituella och politiska strukturer.

New frontiers of climate governance: imagining the modern timber city

17 November 2020 /
Image source: Sumimoto Forestry

On the 17th of November the Cemus research Forum had the pleasure of welcoming Bregje van Veelen. She gave a talk about the emergent imaginary of the ‘plyscraper, which is available below:

Bregje summarizes the talk as follows:

Climate governance must be a project of not only regulatory undertaking, but also of deep-rooted societal and spatial (re)imagination. But how do we re-imagine our world, who is involved, and what is left out? In this presentation, I explore these questions in relation to a still underexplored front of climate action: proposals for a revolution in low-carbon materials, that seek to establish a 21st century bio–economy. Specifically, I will do this through the emergent imaginary of the ‘plyscraper’, which put timber skyscrapers at the heart of the vision for low-carbon living of the future. While the use of wood in construction has long been practiced (as evidenced by the red timber houses that dot the Swedish country side), what makes the new timber imaginary different is that it positions itself as distinctly urban and modern. But how ‘green’ is it? How does the imaginary establish timber’s green qualities and with what effect? By exploring the jostling involved in bringing this imaginary into being, I consider a number of yet unresolved issues around establishing the green/low-carbon qualities of this new frontier of climate action, and the broader implications for climate governance

Helena Fornstedt, Coordinator CEMUS research Forum

AIM Day and Climate Change

13 November 2019 /

In the middle of October, I joined in the AIM Day at Uppsala University, organised by the university Innovation Team. This day is an opening up of the university to businesses and institutions who want to pick at difficult questions with researchers. This year’s theme was Hållbara Städer (Sustainable Cities). This year it was in Swedish, and with my limited language abilities (disclaimer: I therefore might have missed some important points to many of the discussions), I joined in on some of their workshops.

Overall this day was an enlightening experience, where the necessity for transdisciplinary approaches to tricky questions, and collaborations across universities, civil society and public institutions, was abundantly clear. However, as a representative of the Climate Change Leadership Initiative (CCL), it was disappointing to see that the discussions did not want to grapple with the elephant in the room: the added complexity of climate change (and biodiversity loss) to social sustainability and development questions.

The first question I attended was one that struck at the core of a project CCL is working on at the moment: “Hur bygger vi tillit och vågar vi ta tillvara kraften i initiativ som vilar på religiös eller kulturell grund och möjliggör för olika sorters drivkrafter för ett områdes utveckling?” (How do we build trust and courage to harness power of initiatives driven by cultural or religious grounds? And that enable different kinds of driving forces for an area’s development?) posed by representatives of the Kommun. Joining me in this meeting were researchers from Centrum för forskning om religion och samhälle (CRS) , as well as employees of Upplandsidrottsförbund. It was positive to hear that this was being considered, in particular concerning a suburb of Uppsala that we are interested in working with.

“Hur kan konst bidra till att stärka identitet och skapa gemensamma rum i stadsmiljön och hur sker konstnärlig medverkan på bästa sätt genom hela planerings- och byggnadsprocessen?” (How can art help to strengthen identity and create common spaces in the urban environment? And how does artistic participation take place in the best way throughout the planning and building process?) posed by Region Gotland, was the second workshop I attended. Having very recently organised an interactive and artistic process in collaboration with Uppsala Art Museum, which was designed to enable residents of the city to explore how we think about the space of the non-human in urban environments, I was particularly excited by this discussion. Sadly, there did not seem to be shared interest in the role that the arts can play with the idea of the urban as a space for wilderness and other species. Though the conversation was fascinating in that we covered the role of graffiti to shape identities of the space and its residents, a very important facet I had not previously considered, it was disappointing that the conversation could not include how we might use artistic process and design to stretch the possibilities of urban space in times of climate change. This discussion highlights CCL’s concerns that processes of urban development continue to neglect the role of the city in mitigating species extinction and adapting to climate change.

The final two workshops I attended were similar discussions on social innovation and meeting spaces. The first, chaired by Coompanion Uppsala Län, wanted to discuss “Stödsystem för social innovation, särskilt inom hållbar stadsutveckling” (Support systems for social innovation, particularly within sustainable city development). The latter, chaired by Uppsalahem, covered “Sociala investeringsprojekt för barn och unga (Mötesplats Gottsunda)” (Social investment projects for children and youth (Meeting Place Gottsunda). By this point, my Swedish was fairly exhausted and my contributions to the discussion were in english. Our discussions touched upon vulnerable groups across the cities and regions and who should be the targets for support systems (could they be non-Swedish speakers?), neglect and social segregation were repeated here, and we were fairly stuck on the meaning of social innovation at points. A shining star from this discussion came from Idrottsförbundet who work closely in Gottsunda, and recounted an experience of engaging with women residents of the area. She told us that she was trying to understand what types of sports opportunities women living in Gottsunda wanted. She reached out to several contacts who then sent out a mass whatsapp message. Expecting only a handful of people to turn up, she was overwhelmed by the interest when 60 people joined the discussion. Looking at their feedback (which was largely written in Arabic), she found that generally residents did not want to attend meetings to discuss types of sports, but rather were happy to be messaged through this channel and told when and where dance classes or swimming opportunities, or other events, would occur. Understanding the different methods of engagement with different localities of Uppsala city is crucial for CCL’s work with civil society.

Over all AIM day was great fun. It was wonderful to meet so many colleagues working in similar areas of democracy and development. What struck me, though, was that we are not thinking strategically about climate change in all of these challenges. Trends of privatisation, or art and urban development, and (disrupted) investments in social innovation projects are turbulent and challenging changes. With the added complexity of climate change, and our responsibilities to act upon it, we must include strategic ways of engaging with these problems. I look forward to attending AIM Days in the future and continuing to be a thorn in the side of these discussions.

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