Setting the scene in Europe: Emerging national and transnational social policy responses to climate change

Abstract

This editorial argues for the importance of examining European social policy-making in relation to climate change from a global social policy perspective. It highlights that climate change significantly impacts social policy, both in cushioning its negative effects and in recognising how traditional welfare state models have contributed to ecological crises with severe inequalities between countries. The European Union, with its relatively advanced social policy integration and its historical responsibility in the transgression of planetary boundaries, plays a crucial role in responding to climate change and has the potential to position its eco-social policy model as a global exemplar, which is critically examined in this issue. The special issue covers a range of topics, from conceptual advancements to both qualitative and quantitative analyses, across national and supranational levels of European social policy-making with respect to climate change. The articles suggest that social policy primarily functions adaptively as a mechanism to lessen the adverse social effects of climate change (mitigation), including industrial transitions, rather than being applied in a transformative way that would mitigate climate change escalation in the first place.