The transformative role of actor interactions: new approaches to the climate policy narrative

Despite much attention, both in the media and in scientific literature, the various global climate policy goals agreed upon in international climate conferences like the 2015 Paris agreement, lack implementation. The narrative around global climate policy is very strongly focused on gradual reduction of emissions through application of policies and targets, at the expense of alternative perspectives. Neither is it certain that these kinds of global agreements, on their own, can deliver ambitious changes to systemic issues (see e.g. Helm 2012). In this paper, we argue that this dominant narrative of gradual change does not reflect current knowledge about the system, and as such, is a poor guide to policy. Instead, we argue in favour of a non- incrementalist, complex systems view of the climate policy narrative. We support our argument by adapting the well-known system dynamic modelling framework to try to quantify the effect of actor behaviour on climate policy objectives, rather than, as in some conventional models, looking at only economics and emissions. In this way, we use our model to suggest, not what hypothetical actors should do, but what real actors are likely to do, on the basis of an analysis of their current and recent past behaviour. We calibrate our model with real-world data for the case of Spain, a country that has seen remarkable recent change in its climate policy. Our results suggest that efforts to meet global climate goals will likely not succeed unless a stronger emphasis is given on negotiating the balance of power between actors. The picture that emerges suggests that the focus of climate policy needs to shift from expecting actors and institutions to meet targets, to changing the way actors and institutions behave so that the required transformation can emerge