Cities Leading Climate Action

Urban Policy and Planning

Sabrina Dekker

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2018
• ISBN:
  9781351047784
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politics & International Relations
• Subtopic: Environment & Energy Policy
• Index: Politics & International Relations

This book provides local governments and interested stakeholders with insights into the challenges and opportunities inherent in addressing climate change.

Drawing on in-depth case study research on Vancouver, Portland, Glasgow and Dublin, Dekker examines the policy development processes employed by urban policy makers to respond to climate change, looking specifically at the utilisation of collaborative planning. Emerging from the case studies are lessons for local governments in relation to the role of organisational structure in supporting climate leadership; the importance of leadership, trust, relationship building and narratives for supporting ownership of the responses to climate change by stakeholders; and the need for creative and innovative public engagement to expand the reach of traditional methods such as social media and other technology-based solutions. Finally, Dekker reflects on her experience in the development of climate change action plans for the Dublin Local Authorities.

This book will be of great relevance to students, scholars and policy makers with an interest in climate change resilience, environmental policy and urban planning.

1 Cities leading on climate action

Introduction

Cities are home to over half of the world’s population (Castán Broto, et al., 2013; United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), 2016): as hubs of economic and social life they continue to draw people with the promise of better opportunities. In recent times though, the flow of populations to urban centres is also being driven by climate change (Campbell-Lendrum and Corvalàn, 2007; Crawford et al., 2010; IPCC, 2014; Gouldson et al., 2016; United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), 2016; Siders, 2017), the impacts of which have created challenges for rural populations; for example droughts, extreme weather events, and extreme temperatures have had adverse impacts on food and water supplies. Extreme weather events, such as Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Sandy, Hurricane Irma and more recently Storm Emma, flooding, and the growing frequency and intensity of heat waves globally, have seen cities grapple with human casualty and the high economic and social costs of climate change.

Climate change’s impacts are not limited to rural and urban areas, or developing and developed countries; they are global, which consequently has seen responses of a global nature be developed and implemented through international agreements and national commitments. Increasingly though, it has become evident that global level policies are too far removed from the everyday anthropogenic causes of climate change (United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), 2016). Global targets can be set, but the reality is that achieving targets is not fully within the capacity of international bodies. In short, it is people in their daily lives who can engage in tangible actions that enable adaptation to the impacts of climate change. How people’s behaviours are influenced and changed and who leads, guides, and promotes these pressing changes is a question for which one answer is the level of government responsible for living environments. As such there has been an emerging recognition that the potential for achieving gains in the realm of climate change adaptation lies in the capacity of local government and their ability to respond. Cities acknowledge their role in addressing climate change and the challenges they face in creating tangible responses (Doherty et al., 2016; Eckersley, 2016; Huang-Lachmann and Lovett, 2016; Mees, 2017). This is demonstrated by movements and partnerships led by cities namely: the EU Covenant of Mayors, C40 Cities for Climate Change, ICLEI’s Green Growth Cities, the World Mayor’s Council on Climate Change and Rockefeller’s 100 Resilient Cities. These movements are aimed at developing the capacities of cities to respond to urban challenges, namely climate change, by creating an environment where knowledge can be exchanged and cities can ‘compete’ with each other.

Often though, the demand to respond to climate change comes to the fore in the aftermath of a natural disaster that has resulted in a high number of casualties, e.g. Hurricanes Irma, Katrina and Sandy, heat waves, floods and droughts. However, climate change must be understood in the context of day-to-day life, as it is not a sudden shift, but a gradual one whose cumulative effects have far-reaching consequences. This is significant for developing policies and plans; it is in this context that the research, that is the basis for this book, set out to explore how cities, particularly the local governments that are responsible for them, are responding to anticipated climate change risks through the development and implementation of policies that adapt and build resilience to climate change. In other words, the research investigates how cities are taking the lead on climate action, in the face of constraints.

At the global level, through the work of the International Panel for Climate Change (IPCC) (IPCC, 2014), there has been an acknowledgement that responses to climate change need to be multifaceted (Rodin, 2014; Carter et al., 2015; Gouldson et al., 2016) and include measures that cut across the environment, economy, and society. As such, responses need to engage a range of stakeholders (Betsill and Bulkeley, 2007; Dodman, 2009; Rosenzweig et al., 2010; Carter et al., 2015). Therefore, this book explores the role of adaptive governance in building urban resilience and the role of interactive, stakeholder-based policy making in developing pathways to a more resilient future, through the lens of collaborative planning. Critically, the book aims to understand how local governments develop policies to respond to climate change to achieve urban resilience, specifically to:

1 Understand how local governments perceive their role in addressing climate change.

2 Examine the processes of building institutional capacity for adaptive governance through the lens of collaborative planning.

3 Understand how collaborative processes with multiple stakeholders can inform the policy development process. In doing so examine how collaborative governance informs climate change planning and how climate change re-shapes planning, both practice and theory.

4 Identify the barriers/challenges to successful collaboration as experienced by urban policy-makers through ‘stories of practice’.

5 Identify the narratives employed by urban policy makers to engage stakeholders, from citizens to higher levels of government in policy development and implementation process.

6 Connect theory with practice and vice versa through lessons from the development process of climate change action plans based on the research findings emerging from stories of practice.

To develop an understanding of how cities are responding a three-part methodology was employed. The first phase was a content analysis of plans globally of cities with populations over 500,000 and that were members of a climate initiative. Second was a survey of these cities, to assess their perceptions of their role in responding to climate change, and finally four case studies of the challenges and opportunities that responding to climate change have provided and how the cities have taken a lead, which are the subject of this book.

Through investigating the processes of policy development via case studies (Vancouver, Canada; Portland, USA; Glasgow, UK and Dublin, Ireland), the book aims to contribute to theoretical and practical understandings of resilience and collaborative planning, particularly the importance of: policy ownership by local government and stakeholders, the role of the planner, leadership, technology, and narratives. Further, as the author was involved in the development of the climate change action plans for the four local authorities of County Dublin in Ireland: Dublin City Council, Fingal County Council, South Dublin County Council and Dún Laoghaire-Rathdown County Council, findings of the initial research were applied to the development of the climate change action plans and the process is discussed in the final chapter of this book.

This chapter discusses the key climate change issues facing cities and the role that cities have in responding to climate change based on the recognition that climate change, while a global issue, calls for action at the local level. The challenges faced by cities in transposing global policy recommendations into policy suited to local contexts are also examined. The chapter also discusses the theoretical framework that guided the research and was used to understand the processes of developing climate change adaptation policy, specifically the concept of resilience and the practice of collaborative planning as they pertain to cities and climate change response in cities aimed at achieving climate resilience. Lastly an outline of the remaining chapters is provided.

Cities and climate change

The scientific research investigating the impacts of climate change indicates that it is happening now, and that action needs to be taken now (Betsill and Bulkeley, 2007; Le Treut, 2007; Dodman, 2009; IPCC, 2014; Carter et al., 2015; Doherty et al., 2016; Huang-Lachmann and Lovett, 2016; United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), 2016; Mees, 2017; Siders, 2017). In the dialogue and debates around how to respond to climate change, cities are increasingly viewed as being the level of government best able to respond and to form policy that will build climate resilience (Betsill and Bulkeley, 2007; Dodman, 2009; Rosenzweig et al., 2010; Carter et al., 2015). Moreover, with the knowledge that at present, 50 per cent of the world’s population lives in cities and by 2050 this number will rise to 70 per cent, the need for cities to have the capacity to respond is pressing and challenging (Castán Broto et al., 2013; Foss, 2016; Huang-Lachmann and Lovett, 2016; United Nations Human Settlements Programme (UN-Habitat), 2016; Mees, 2017). Cities acknowledge their unique position and capacity to engage with people and lead people in the process of adapting to climate change and to address the anthropogenic causes of climate change. However, whilst cities may increasingly present themselves as leaders in responding to climate change, there are possible limitations to their capacity to respond stemming from institutional structures, legislation, and financial capacity, to name a few. How cities and the local governments that run them respond to these barriers and challenges to achieve climate resilience is valuable to building capacity of cities globally.

The literature discussing resilience in relation to climate change calls for adaptive governance, which in this research is understood through the framework of collaborative planning. It is implied that addressing climate change globally and locally calls for the cooperation of multiple stakeholders, all of whom may have varying objectives and agendas. Building consensus on actions to respond to climate change is not a simple agreement that something must be done. It is much more nuanced and requires that stakeholders work together to address the complexities of climate change, which is not solely an environmental issue, but an economic and social issue. As such, it is no longer enough to agree that climate change is happening, and action should be taken. Recognising this, global agreements have called for national governments to address climate change by setting targets for emissions. However, setting targets for emissions is a challenge, as in the absence of tangible actions to achieve targets, reaching the target is an aspirational goal. It is in the development of actions to achieve those targets that cities (local governments) play a role. However, as discussed developing actions requires cooperation and an understanding of climate change.

To understand how cities, specifically urban policy makers, are responding to climate change through collaboration with stakeholders, from citizens to higher levels of government; the author interviewed policy makers in four cities. The cities were Glasgow, Vancouver, Portland and Dublin. Due to the author residing in Ireland, Dublin is a significantly more detailed case study. Further, the author’s role in the development of the climate change action plans for Dublin City Council and its neighbouring local authorities has provided the opportunity to apply the lessons from Vancouver, Portland, and Glasgow.

Finally, the case studies are of cities that, while similar in population and geographic size, operate within different institutional structures that shape the policy development process; thus, it is recognised that the capacity of the cities to develop policy will be different. However, given the global demand for cities to respond and the evidence of cities enacting policy to respond to climate change, this research endeavours to understand the policy development lessons that enable cities to take action irrespective of institutional challenges. Critically, demonstrating that through identifying narratives from which to engage diverse stakeholders in a dialogue around climate change adaptation, local governments can collaborate with stakeholders and lead on actions to achieve resilience to climate change.

Climate change: causes and impacts

While many factors continue to influence climate, scientists have determined that human activities have become a dominant force, and are responsible for most of the warming observed over the past 50 years. Human-caused climate change has resulted primarily from changes in the amounts of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, but also from changes in small particles, as well as, changes in land use.

(Le Treut, 2007), p. 105

Climate change is the result of complex interactions between humans and the environment (Betsill and Bulkeley, 2007; Le Treut, 2007; Dodman, 2011; Carter et al., 2015). There are three means by which to change the earth’s climate (Le Treut, 2007):

1 Changing the incoming solar radiation by altering the earth’s orbit or the sun’s.

2 Changing the fraction of the solar radiation that is reflected back into space (albedo) via cloud cover, particulate matter in the air, and terrestrial vegetation.

3 Changing the long-wave radiation from earth towards space through concentration changes of greenhouse gases (GHGs).

Human activities influence two of the three means for altering the earth’s climate: the fraction of solar radiation that is reflected and the concentration of GHGs. Research has determined that human activities during which GHGs and aerosols are released and land-use change are the key contributors to climate change. GHGs enter the atmosphere through dust from agriculture, smoke from the burning of biomass and other industrial waste, and exhaust fumes from vehicles. GHGs consist of water vapour, carbon dioxide, methane, ozone, and nitrous oxide. Once in the atmosphere, GHGs alter the absorption and scattering of solar radiation, consequently impacting on the earth’s natural greenhouse effect. As the gases are suspended in the atmosphere they act as barriers to radiation coming in and leaving the earth (Le Treut, 2007; Dodman, 2009; IPCC, 2014). Radiation bounces off the gas particles in a range of directions, thus heating the air and transferring energy through the atmosphere. Increasing the concentration of GHGs decreases the ability of excess heat to leave the atmosphere. Land use change, for example, forestry, agriculture, industry and urban development in addition to releasing particles in to the atmosphere alter the natural environment. Research has shown that land use change has impacted on surface albedo; this is the reflection of solar radiation back into the atmosphere by the earth. (Dark surfaces absorb light and heat while light surfaces reflect light and heat.) The ‘snow/ice-albedo feedback’ is amplifying the impacts of climate change, as increased concentrations of GHGs that warm the atmosphere result in snow and ice melt...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table of Contents
• List of illustrations
• List of boxes
• 1 Cities leading on climate action
• 2 Governance structures for adaptive and collaborative climate change action
• 3 Responding to climate change: formal to informal
• 4 Lessons for collaborative planning from practice
• 5 Dublin
• 6 Dublin: from theory to practice and back
• Index