The role of transnational non-state initiatives in polycentric climate governance

With the landmark Paris Agreement of 2015, the international community agreed to put society on a decarbonisation path, with the goal to keep the rise in global average temperature well below 2 degrees Celsius compared to pre-industrial levels and to advance efforts to curb the temperature increase even further to 1.5 degrees Celsius (UNFCCC, 2015). To meet these internationally agreed boundaries, the emissions gap must be closed as rapidly as possible, as urged in the latest UN Emissions Gap Report (UNEP, 2018). This requires rapid, deep and society-wide efforts engendering decarbonisation, such as technological innovation, bold investments, a deep scientific understanding of the climate system and, crucially, ambitious action by non-state and subnational actors as well as governments.
This realisation is anchored in the text of the Paris Agreement. It captures the central role not only of state (government) actors, but also non-state actors in decarbonisation. Crucially, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) seeks to accelerate the development of a more complex, multi-levelled and polycentric landscape of climate governance that has slowly emerged over the last decade. Voluntary initiatives by non-state actors, involving transnational actors such as businesses, cities, and civil society organisations pledging to decarbonise, have clustered around the multilateral process facilitated by the UNFCCC. The engagement is diverse and spans online as well as offline participation. The initiatives include reporting of emissions reduction targets, technical contributions to expert meetings or written submissions to inform multi-stakeholder partnerships.
While the existing literature on these novel processes offers an insight into the formal involvement of non-state transnational actors in multilateral climate diplomacy, knowledge on the precise working of climate governance through voluntary transnational non-state initiatives is still very sparse. The research project seeks to shed new light on the relationship between transnational and multilateral governance processes. In particular, using Nobel Laureate, Lin Ostrom's polycentric theory as an explanatory framework, the aim of the thesis is to understand the emergence of voluntary non-state transnational initiatives and underlying linkages between them in the context of the UNFCCC.
The project aim will adopt a three-step approach, using a novel combination of qualitative and quantitative methods. It will, first, provide a comprehensive map of the landscape of non-state voluntary initiatives clustered around the UNFCCC from 1992 to 2020 by using network analysis; second, it will undertake case studies and quantitative analysis to determine the type of linkages between the UNFCCC and the initiatives to understand the 'real' nature of the engagement of non-state actors; and third, it will involve semi-structured interviews to investigate the motivations of these actors to engage voluntarily in the UNFCCC process.
The empirical work will advance polycentric theory as well as provide practical, policy relevant insights for the strategic coordination of stakeholders in global climate policy. Methodological and theoretical advancements will be achieved, by applying network analysis to a large dataset in global climate governance and by empirically testing the underlying assumptions of polycentric theory on a global level. On a practical level, lessons will be derived for strategic coordination by non-state actors and/or the UNFCCC. Ultimately, better predictions will be made on the durability and effectiveness of the initiatives and of the overall polycentric climate regime for engendering the much required changes needed to rapidly and fully decarbonise society.