Climate Politics in Small European States

Neil Carter, Conor Little, Diarmuid Torney, Neil Carter, Connor Little, Diarmuid Torney

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2020
• ISBN:
  9781000288964
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Ciencias biológicas
• Subtopic: Ciencia medioambiental

The characteristics of small states generate multiple and contradictory expectations concerning their climate policies and politics. Do small states perceive themselves as market- and rule-takers, which are largely irrelevant to a global problem, and which must prioritise international competitiveness above climate policy goals? Or do their institutions and their small size foster consensus, coordination, and nimble responses to a changing international scene, allowing them to attain competitive advantages and become climate leaders?

Climate Politics in Small European States examines how the characteristics of small states structure climate politics and both enable and constrain ambitious climate policies. This volume contributes to our knowledge of how institutions, including electoral institutions and institutions of interest intermediation, actors such as parties, interest groups, individuals, governments, and ideas shape climate policy and politics. The volume also contributes to redressing a deficit in the attention given to smaller states in the study of comparative climate politics.

The chapters in this book were originally published as a special issue of Environmental Politics.

Does size matter? Comparing the party politics of climate change in Australia and Norway

Fay Madeleine Farstad

ABSTRACT
The implications of state size for the party politics of climate change are examined, and in particular its effect in facilitating or impeding cross-party consensus on the issue. This issue is explored through an in-depth, qualitative comparison of Australia and Norway, which are shown to be comparable in important respects yet differ in terms of their size and climate politics. Original primary data is presented from 44 interviews with policymakers and policy-shapers in both countries, which shows that, to the limited extent that state size moderates the parties’ behaviour, it is the countries’ geographical – not economic – size that matters. Institutional factors are found to play a more significant role, however, and the corporatist features of state-business cooperation, strong ENGOs and compensatory welfare arrangements are highlighted as particularly important.

Introduction

Although the literature seeking to explain variation in countries’ climate change policies and ambition has been developing for some time (e.g. Lachapelle and Paterson 2013, Fankhauser et al. 2015), there are important omissions from this body of scholarship. First, the role of political parties has been largely neglected (for exceptions see Båtstrand 2014, 2015, Carter et al. 2017, Farstad 2017). Second, although various state features have been examined for their relevance in explaining climate policy variation, ‘size’ has rarely been one of them. Here, I help to fill both these gaps in the literature, and also provide a significant contribution by examining how these two features interlink, i.e. analysing the implications of size for the party politics of climate change. These are important gaps to fill. Political parties lie at the heart of climate change politics, as party competition significantly shapes government policy and national governments are central to policymaking on climate change. The critical role of political parties for reaching national climate change targets was noted by Jensen and Spoon (2011). Furthermore, political parties are important in ensuring the stability and ultimate success of climate policies. Given the long-term character of climate change, commensurately long-term investments are needed. Such investments require continued, and thus bi-partisan, support for their survival and success. Countries with cross-party consensus on climate change often experience more stable and ambitious climate policies (such as the UK and Norway). In contrast, in countries such as Australia, Canada and the US, parties have polarised over the issue, with detrimental effects on climate policy and investment security (Tranter 2013, Dunlap et al. 2016). As the countries experiencing party polarisation on climate change tend to be large, and the countries experiencing cross-party consensus are generally small, size seems intuitively to play a critical role in shaping cross-party agreement on climate change, and consequently stable and successful climate policy. It is thus timely that the effect of state size is examined. If state size is revealed to significantly shape the party politics of climate change, this knowledge could be used when designing or re-designing political institutions to improve climate change outcomes.

To test the assumption that size matters for the party politics of climate change this article compares two countries with significant similarities yet differing sizes and climate politics. Australia and Norway are two developed and major fossil fuel exporters, but with smaller Norway experiencing cross-party consensus on its ambitious climate policies whereas large Australia has seen the major parties polarise over climate change, significantly weakening its national policy ambition. The countries are compared through analysing secondary literature and primary data from 44 interviews with policymakers and policy-shapers in both countries.

The first section outlines the theoretical underpinnings of the investigation, namely the comparative climate policy, party politics and state size literature, before the second section outlines and justifies the cases for comparison. The third section reviews the interview findings, before the implications of these for the state size hypothesis and future research are discussed. I argue that the ‘size matters’ hypothesis finds somewhat limited support in the two case studies, with institutional features playing a more significant role in shaping the party politics of climate change. In particular, I highlight the benefits of corporatist features in facilitating cross-party agreement on climate change. To the limited extent that state size moderates the parties’ behaviour on the issue of climate change, it is the countries’ geographical – not economic – size that matters.

Variation in climate policy: state size and party politics

In the comparative climate policy literature various factors have been identified as relevant to explaining the variation in states’ climate policies. Countries with higher levels of economic prosperity (Neumayer 2002a, Liefferink et al. 2009) and democratic quality (Neumayer 2002b, Lachapelle and Paterson 2013) tend to have more ambitious climate change policies, as being wealthy frees up capacity to care about climate change and democracy enables citizens to put pressure on governments to act. Similarly, countries with proportional electoral systems usually have more ambitious climate policies (Scruggs 1999, Harrison and Sundstrom 2010, Spoon et al. 2014), as such systems make it easier for small (e.g. green) parties to enter parliament, amplifying the voices of the minority of voters for whom climate change is a priority and increasing party competition on the issue. Coordinated or corporatist economies also tend to have stronger climate policies (Scruggs 1999, Lachapelle and Paterson 2013, Ćetković and Buzogány 2016) as the cooperative relations between state and businesses enable the state to transform the interests and practices of businesses, and the increasing involvement of green groups in such relations counterbalances the potential negative influence of businesses. In contrast, liberal market or pluralist economies usually experience worse environmental outcomes as the competition between interest groups for government access tends to favour wealthier and better-organised business lobbies (Griffiths et al. 2007, Bernhagen 2008). Further, countries with high levels of fossil fuel dependency generally have weaker climate policies (Lachapelle and Paterson 2013, Fankhauser et al. 2015), reflecting the entrenched power of fossil fuel interests in such countries and problems of ‘carbon lock-in’ (Unruh 2000). Countries with numerous institutional veto points also tend to have weaker climate policies, as costly climate regulations are more difficult to implement than in countries where power is more concentrated (Lachapelle and Paterson 2013, Madden 2014).

Likewise, the party politics literature identifies a range of characteristics that make political parties more or less likely to embrace climate change as an issue. Right-wing parties tend to have weaker positions on climate change than left-wing parties, as they are typically more averse to the state intervention and market regulation that climate policy often warrants (McCright and Dunlap 2011, Båtstrand 2014, Farstad 2017). Smaller parties have a strategic incentive to emphasise niche positions such as climate change, both to attract voters and to achieve policy differentiation (Wagner 2012, Spoon et al. 2014, Abou-Chadi and Orlowski 2016). Lastly, the party competition literature suggests that opposition parties will more likely emphasise new issues such as climate change, as they will be eager to find ways of attacking the government (Klingemann et al. 1995, p. 28, Carter 2006). How do country and party characteristics interact to determine climate policy ambition, and importantly how does country size influence this relationship?

The expectations with regards to the effect of small country size are largely based on Katzenstein’s (1985) seminal work Small states in world markets. In examining the successes of small and economically vulnerable nations in western Europe, he found that they had managed to stay competitive and stable through what he terms ‘democratic corporatism’ – a mixture of bi-partisan consensus, centralised politics and coordination between politicians and businesses. This setup is an effective way of coping with a rapidly changing world, and also makes it possible to shield particularly vulnerable groups or industries through state spending (also see Keating 2015). Significantly, as discussed above, such corporatist coordination has been found to have a positive impact on climate policy. Although he was writing about political economy, the institutional setup outlined by Katzenstein is likely to facilitate cross-party consensus on the issue of climate change as well, through incentivising and making it easier for parties to cooperate in the face of such a global challenge. As Katzenstein (2003, p. 11) articulates it – ‘perceived vulnerability’ generates an ‘ideology of social partnership’ that acts ‘like a glue’ for the corporatist...