Distributed accountability: picking a carbon price for cost–benefit analysis

Abstract

Despite general disagreement over what the most suitable monetary value for a carbon price is, one particular carbon price somehow became the most commonly used price in cost–benefit analysis in the transport sector in Norway for a short period. This article examines how that came about by tracing that particular carbon price through several documents over the course of ten years. In understanding how the carbon price could travel, this study looks at the carbon price and its movements as a sequence of detachments, what I call ‘price picking.’ The study shows how a distribution of accountability stabilized the carbon price, and that certain guiding principles in the field of economics took part in steering and maintaining the carbon price. The study concludes that the distribution of accountability through price picking is both an expression of, and a response to, price realization being both a moral and political practice.