At the international climate change arena I study participating actors (state and non-state), what they do and what they want to achieve through their participation. We have here developed new concepts such as the governance profile and methods. Our research group mainly utilize the internationally unique series of surveys of the participants in the United Nations climate change negotiations. The INS gauges the participants’ views on topics as solutions and policies, leadership and roles of non-state actors. Combining surveys with interviews and document analyses enables new and original analyses of climate policy issues. Our results are used by, inter alia, the Secretariat of UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the negotiation teams of several states.
Visualizing urban climate transformation
In the local arena for climate action, I struggle with the question whether it is possible to “see” urban transition and transformation? There is yet no agreement on how to distinguish transition and more radical transformation from merely gradual change. Consequently, we do not know yet how to measure urban transition; what triggers it initially, what’s maintaining it, what’s embedding it and what’s scaling it up?
Three factors limiting urban transformation
Our previous studies on climate responses in Swedish cities have established three weak spots: leadership and governance for resource mobilisation, public-private collaboration and citizen dialogue that currently limits transformative force. In close collaboration with Swedish municipalities we are testing methods and tools to overcome the weak spots. We will re-visit some of the thirty municipalities to establish whether the same factors are limiting their climate action today. We will also visit those cities in the world that are considered a frontrunners with respect to the three weak spots. In the Norrköping Decision Arena we will test different tools together with groups of local planners, politicians, businesses, citizens and other actors.
