From the outset of this initiative, it was clear that proposing Planetary Boundaries would have important implications for global environmental governance, including the study thereof. The boundaries framework could serve to re-energise or redirect the debate on governance arrangements at the global or international level. Considering the boundaries from a global governance perspective raises big questions – en masse! An initial reflection is whether it is not misguided to, like in traditional global environmental governance studies, focus strongly on environmental governance regimes and instruments, such as multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs). Considering the generally poor track record of MEAs, as well as the drivers behind transgressing boundaries, it seems more urgent to study ‘upstream’ global governance arrangements, under which major public and private investment decisions are taken, technology choices made, and consumption patterns regulated (or not). This could be done by adopting an environmental policy integration (EPI) approach at the global level and considering how the boundaries framework could apply to, for example, the trade regime, regulation of the global financial system and intellectual property rights.
A second initial reflection – and the one I would like to pick your brains about in this short text – is how the principles of adaptive governance apply to the Planetary Boundaries, and global environmental governance more generally. Being uneducated in the literature on adaptive governance, I personally struggle with some questions and trade-offs it appears to raise and would like to use this opportunity to get your help on furthering the contextualisation of boundaries within an adaptive governance framework.
Starting with the most basic question; governance adaptive to what? My reading is that governance should be adaptive to new knowledge about functions, dynamics and conditions of social-ecological systems, rather than rigidly sticking to outdated knowledge about, for example, critical emission or resource extraction levels. An example here would be that current climate negotiations assume that the commonly accepted 2°C target [it is now proposed that we are on a path towards 4°C warming]
is associated with 450 ppm CO2 and thus calibrate emission targets to that level, whereas new research shows that the omission of certain feedbacks relating to ice-sheets and air pollution could mean that the target level should rather be 350 ppm CO2. If this reading is accurate, adaptive governance would to me represent an ideal version of knowledge-based governance. The problem then is how this vision of elevated status (and veto role?) of environment-related knowledge matches with today’s political and governance realities; competition over limited resources for environmental management and governance, asymmetry in power of interest groups, myopic decision-making, national sovereignty, etc. With this reading of adaptive governance, the key analytical problem seems to me to be how to – in theory and in practice – facilitate a transition from current governance to adaptive governance. Further, can this be done through incremental steps, or is a quick ‘fix’ necessary and possible? Below are some of the challenges and trade-offs I imagine would need to be overcome in such a transition. I will try and illustrate some of my thoughts with examples from climate change governance, a field in which I am working at the moment.
First, a key principle for adaptive governance is flexibility. I interpret this to refer to continuous re-evaluation of policy targets and legislation based on emerging knowledge, experimenting with policy and making use of crises. Against these obvious advantages, I see two major risks with increasing the level of flexibility in global environmental governance. The first classical problem is how to avoid delay in international policy action as a consequence of expectations of new and better knowledge. Already, calls have been made to put a post-2012 climate agreement on hold until the IPCC’s next round of assessment reports (AR5) are presented in 2013. With regards to the thorny issue of agreeing on financing of climate adaptation in developing countries, calls for new needs assessments are made despite finalised National Adaptation Programmes of Action for forty LDCs. How do we make the trade-off between early action based on ‘second-best’ knowledge and late action based on better (but never perfect) knowledge? Can adaptive governance enlighten us? The second problem is how to balance more flexible international policy targets and instruments, as a consequence of more fluid and frequent intake of new knowledge, with the need for stability and certainty of investment frameworks for the private sector and households. A common argument from business in international climate policy is that certainty itself is more important than the actual level of emission quotas or other costs imposed upon them, since investment cycles are long in many sectors – and definitely longer than most governments hold office. Considering these risks, what practical steps could be taken to facilitate a transition towards increased flexibility? Introducing more medium-term targets in addition short- and long-term ones? Imposing tougher targets as needed but also more support measures?
Another key concern I see in the adaptive governance literature is capacity to deal with surprise, as a result of dynamic systems and non-linear responses. My understanding here is that what we are talking about is a ‘known unknown’, in Rumsfeld-speak, i.e. that they can be planned and prepared for. In relation to global environmental governance, the responses to possible surprises that come to my mind are state-guaranteed insurance funds for nuclear accidents, insurance schemes for climate impacts being proposed under the UNFCCC, and of course general monitoring and relief provided for natural disasters. The challenges here, I assume, are to expand crisis response and disaster risk reduction to surprises which only indirectly affect humans, through eroded ecological resilience, and to shift from reactive disaster relief (such as insurance pay-outs) to preventive disaster risk reduction. In order to facilitate the transition to better deal with surprise, I imagine the first challenge would need to be addressed by better educating decision-makers at the national and international level about Earth system dynamics – something which the Planetary Boundaries initiative would contribute to. Overcoming the second challenge may not necessarily require fundamental philosophical shifts in risk preference (i.e. preferring to commit either type I or type II error), considering that there appears to be more and more evidence that prevention is more cost-effective than reactive responses.
A third key principle in adaptive governance is institutional diversity and redundancy, which I interpret as a primarily precautionary device, i.e. increasing the chances that someone (out of many) is governing effectively and appropriately, but also to stimulate learning, innovation and healthy competition. In relation to global environmental governance, an obvious challenge with, for example, using and creating more institutions alongside UNEP and others is how to cover the cost and who should pay for those institutions. There is a difficult-to-avoid trade-off here between effectiveness, in terms of addressing global environmental change (presumably benefiting from institutional redundancy), and efficiency, in terms of using scarce resources at the global level. The challenge is amplified by the economic inequalities at the global level – if not greater, then often more tangible and politically loaded than at the national and local levels – which make each dollar going into environmental governance rather than direct poverty reduction or some other just cause more controversial and harder to justify. Could a possible transitional response be to create an ‘artificial’ redundancy by expanding the mandates and responsibilities of already existing and financed institutions in ‘non-environmental’ fields (trade, finance, IPRs) to include stewarding the planetary boundaries, such as was argued for above?
A final key concern I want to raise here is the question of who makes decisions. My understanding of adaptive governance is that this literature emphasises the general appropriateness of networks (as opposed to hierarchical bureaucracies?), self-organisation, and broad public participation, at the same time as recognising the need for leadership. I assume here that this is because those with the best knowledge and incentives to act (well) should be allowed to do so. In global environmental governance, however, I wonder if these forms of organisation and implicit assigning of decision-making authority conflict with democratic norms. As has been seen in the climate regime on several occasions, procedural equity and fairness is considered equally or sometimes more important than the substantive outcome of negotiations. Of course, informal and formal networks operate also at the global level, such as recent G8 and Major Economies meetings on climate change. But the need for democratic representativity may be more pronounced at the global level, since the inequality of the distribution of costs and benefits of global environmental change is arguably higher and there may be both big winners and big losers. Would a transition phase involve trying to find compromise solutions where democratic norms are somehow maintained, but more appropriate representatives for the global demos than nation states are chosen? Or does adaptive governance provide other insights on issues of democracy?
I hope these are big, provocative and stupid enough questions to generate responses that will enable us to together start addressing the governance implications of Planetary Boundaries in the most informed and intelligent way possible.
Dear friends, here is a brief update of ongoing and future activities within the theme. This is just a selection, so please, please use the comment field at the bottom to add your activities!
