The role of networked governance for local climate policy output. Evidence from Europe

Abstract

2020 was a crucial year for global climate policy. While the performance of national governments regarding their 2020 targets has been widely addressed in science and media, stocktaking of voluntary local targets remains opaque. This voluntary action by municipalities was developed in Europe as a complex system of multi-level and polycentric governance structures. ‘Climate intermediaries’ are meant to facilitate progress of local authorities in these complex network structures. There is little systematic evidence on the role of these structures for local climate policy output performance. This paper addresses this research gap. Based on a new dataset on local climate policy in more than 9000 local and regional entities across 36 European countries, it studies the effect of networked climate intermediaries on local climate policy output performance. The results substantiate claims that a profound institutional network and the assistance through intermediaries improves local policy output.