TY - JOUR
T1 - Local governments in the driving seat? A comparative analysis of public and private responsibilities for adaptation to climate change in European and North-American cities
AU - Mees, Heleen
PY - 2017/9
Y1 - 2017/9
N2 - The division of responsibilities between public and private actors has become a key governance issue for adaptation to climate change in urban areas. This paper offers a systematic, comparative analysis of three empirical studies which analysed how and why responsibilities were divided between public and private actors for the governance of local urban climate adaptation. For 20 governance arrangements in European and North-American cities, the divisions of responsibilities and the underlying rationales of actors for those divisions were analysed and compared. Data were gathered through content analysis of over 100 policy documents, 97 in-depth interviews and 2 multi-stakeholder workshops. The comparative analysis reveals that local public authorities are the key actors, as they bear the majority of responsibilities for climate proofing their cities. In this stage of policy emergence, local authorities are clearly in the driving seat. It is envisaged that local public authorities need to more actively engage the different private actors such as citizens, civil society and businesses through governance networks along with the maturation of the policy field and the expected acceleration of climate impacts in the coming decades.
AB - The division of responsibilities between public and private actors has become a key governance issue for adaptation to climate change in urban areas. This paper offers a systematic, comparative analysis of three empirical studies which analysed how and why responsibilities were divided between public and private actors for the governance of local urban climate adaptation. For 20 governance arrangements in European and North-American cities, the divisions of responsibilities and the underlying rationales of actors for those divisions were analysed and compared. Data were gathered through content analysis of over 100 policy documents, 97 in-depth interviews and 2 multi-stakeholder workshops. The comparative analysis reveals that local public authorities are the key actors, as they bear the majority of responsibilities for climate proofing their cities. In this stage of policy emergence, local authorities are clearly in the driving seat. It is envisaged that local public authorities need to more actively engage the different private actors such as citizens, civil society and businesses through governance networks along with the maturation of the policy field and the expected acceleration of climate impacts in the coming decades.
KW - Cities
KW - climate change adaptation
KW - comparative case studies
KW - governance
KW - public and private responsibilities
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=84984691678&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1080/1523908X.2016.1223540
DO - 10.1080/1523908X.2016.1223540
M3 - Article
AN - SCOPUS:84984691678
SN - 1523-908X
VL - 19
SP - 374
EP - 390
JO - Journal of Environmental Policy and Planning
JF - Journal of Environmental Policy and Planning
IS - 4
ER -