Oct 196 min read

Why do countries go towards clean energy policies?

Introduction

These days, environmental problems draw attention as one of the major issues for international society to tackle immediately. Climate change is thought to be coming from increased emission of greenhouse gases and therefore, the reduction of carbon dioxide is the main focus of environmental policies. While many non-state actors are continuously emerging and advocating for a transition to clean energy, states have been considered to be the main actors in global environmental politics, particularly great powers.

The reason that states are regarded as important actors in this field is quite simple. In today’s world, states have sovereignty over their domestic political decisions which should not be intervened by other states. Certainly, environmental issues are a global problem which affects the entire globe, however there is no world government in the international society leading to practical actors such as individual states taking actions toward those environmental missions implementing domestic policies within their territories on how to establish or promote clean energy systems.

Given the importance of states in this field, many researches have studied how states’ behaviours in environmental politics are altered. If the mechanism of their behavious are made clear, it may give us policy implications on environmental issues. For example, such implications have been taken into account when making the structure of international regimes aimed at securing states’ commitments to environmental goal.

This article will analyse the hinted at questions about states’ environmental policy, engaging with the opinions of many previous researches. Contrary to multiple studies that have assumed tension and conflict between pursuit of national interests to be based on the absolute sovereignty of each state and necessity of international cooperation beyond the border of sovereignty, this article finally argues that these overlap, promoting progress toward environmental mission. Lastly, this article points out that states’ behaviours are shaped by many factors including domestic affairs and prevalent norms as well as economic incentives.

Collective Action Problem

The discussion on environmental politics has focused on how and to what extent states’ sovereignty can be limited in order to secure their equal commitments to the transition to clean energy and other environmental efforts. In other words, international politics on environmental issues have been understood mainly based on the conflictive structure between absolute sovereignty of each state and beyond-sovereignty compelling power of international regimes required for enforcement of international cooperation.

Why do countries go towards clean energy policies?

In fact, while states have a main role in making progress towards the solution of climate change, many scholars have argued the necessity of international regimes such as regular international conferences to regulate and bind states’ behaviours to secure their commitments and make their efforts coherent with other countries’. COP is amongst the most important international conferences composed of states which are held for “to review the national communications and emission inventories submitted by Parties. Based on this information, the COP assesses the effects of the measures taken by Parties and the progress made in achieving the ultimate objective of the Convention” according to the United nations.

These arguments and practices are based on collective action theory. Collective action theory supposes the international politics where states share the commons, which here corresponds to a clean environment on the earth. In order to maintain the commons from which we benefit, a certain cost needs to be paid by countries. In this situation, each country has an incentive to free-ride other countries’ efforts and avoid paying any further individual costs.

Particularly from a realist perspective, fear of other states’ free-riding can have a significant impact on states’ behaviour. Even if a certain state could obtain an absolute long-term benefit by paying some costs, other states can also benefit from the protected commons increasing their national power without payment contribution, diminishing the relative power of the paying state. This scenario is risky in terms of international security, leading to every state hesitating to take unilateral measures.

In much literature , the mechanism of international politics over environmental issues has been explained based on this theory. The investment in transition of energy source from fossil fuels to renewable energy is one of the most important state roles protecting the environment as the commons on the earth. However, states have been thought to hesitate to invest in clean energy because of the incentive of free-riding on other countries’ environmental efforts to cut the costs they pay.

This explanation has brought about the policy implication that binding power and transparency beyond national sovereignty is integral to realise the international cooperation on environmental politics. Specifically, the main role of international regimes such as international organisations and treaties has been supposed to enhance the transparency and verification of commitments to environmental policy to solve the collective action problem between countries and prevent free-riding.

Hence, based on collective action theory, the relationship between international regimes and states in international relations has mainly been understood based on the conflictive structure between the absoluteness of sovereignty of each state and the necessity of cooperation beyond the border of sovereignty. Conflict in international regimes has been assumed to be able to promote the latter by binding states’ behaviours to a certain extent using a reward and punishment system.

However, can this theory really explain empirical facts in today’s environmental politics in international society? Are states’ behaviours shaped by incentives to free-ride and is it only external binding regimes that makes states advance their green deal? In the next section, this paper analyses counter arguments which suggests another explanation of environmental politics.

Sho Magario

Distributive Conflict Politics

Collective action theory is based on the assumption that the transition to clean energy is not beneficial to a country if it is implemented unilaterally. This assumption, however, is empirically dubious according to research by Aklin and Mildenberger (2020). Their study proves that empirical support for collective action accounts is relatively weak given the prevalence of the theory.

As evidence to disprove validity of explanation based on this theory, the paper pointed out two facts; defection is not automatically reciprocated and climate policy responses exist independent of international regimes to monitor cooperation. For example, it is pointed out that many European countries continued extensive unilateral climate policy enactment after the US defection.

Instead of collective action theory, they suggest distributive conflict hypothesis that “climate policy involves a dramatic renegotiation of the institutions that structure economic and social activity within each economy” and that sharp divisions in the material interests of political and economic stake- holders subsequently trigger distributive conflict over climate policy making” without involving the importance of free-riding concerns. This theory is supported by the empirical fact that regardless of what other countries do, both national publics and national political actors tend to support active efforts towards a clean environment and as a result, states act when pro-climate forces are powerful enough to neutralise politically climate reform opponents.

Aklin and Mildenberger argue that governments’ preferences on climate change are shaped by conflicts between interest-groups within each state or each economy and that international regimes can promote interstate cooperation on environmental policy more effectively by empowering interest groups toward green deal and neutralizing veto players including fossil fuel industries and traders of those energy sources. More concretely, they argue that international institutions can help coordinate domestic constituencies by providing pro-climate groups with information which enables them to monitor the actions of competitors.

It is important to note that there is not a conflictive construct between the sovereignty of states and the cooperation beyond states’ sovereignty in this theory. Distributive conflict theory says that by empowering interest groups within countries, rather than directly empowering states, countries will take a more proactive stance on environmental policy reflecting the preferences of those groups.

1. Collective action theory : International society (regime) → prevent states from free-riding and empower states’ behaviour

2. Distributive action theory : International society (regime) → empower interest groups or individuals within each state → change states’ behaviour via them

Why do countries go towards clean energy policies?

Norms

While distributive conflict theory focuses on domestic groups and suggests an explanation from a different perspective which does not depend on the mechanism of free-riding, the theory still relies on economic rationality and interest-based models just as collective action theory. But the explanation does not necessarily have to stick to those interest-based models. Another type of explanation can be applied to international politics. For example, it is possible that domestic individuals and groups are empowered not only by economic rationality, but also by socialised norms, i.e. logical appropriateness. A representative study suggesting this type of explanation is that of Michael and Federica.

They argue that “both interests and norms function as complementary explanations that improve our understanding of individual policy preferences.” The argument is evidenced by the observations that individuals working in pollutive industries are less likely to support climate cooperation than individuals employed in cleaner sectors while reciprocal and altruistic individuals are more supportive of global climate policy.

According to constructivist theory , diffusion of such norms tend to follow a pattern characterised by ‘norm emergence’, ‘tipping point’, ‘norm cascade’ and finally ‘norm internalisation’ by state actors. Because of globalisation, states’ domestic politics are increasingly influenced by ideas and actors outside of the traditional sphere of local politics and local interest-groups tend to use transnational norms and ideas to put pressure on governments.

Nowadays, many norm entrepreneurs - those who engage with the process of norm emergence - create transnational advocacy network s (TAN). TAN is networks of activists, distinguishable largely by the centrality of principled ideas or values in motivating their formation. This situation can be explained as an expansion of the structure of sovereignty in the sense that those non-state actors play a significant role in environmental politics by making influences beyond national borders.