Kick-Starting Government Action against Climate Change: Effective Political Strategies

With drastic action needing to be taken now, rather than over the 30 years to 2050, this book addresses the crucial question of how to get action from governments who will always put short-term considerations (e.g. post Covid economic growth) over longer term climate priorities – unless forced to do otherwise.

How might governments be persuaded to implement policies that will result in effective action? And how can this be achieved at an international, as well as national, level? These are the questions that this book focuses on. Taking a systematic political science point of view and drawing on collective choice and other theories of political action, this book analyses the key political and economic dynamics shaping climate policies around the world, identifying major political opportunities that can be exploited by well-informed and determined political actors, such as NGOs and social movements.

This book describes how to advance and accelerate climate action around the world and will be of interest internationally to climate change campaigners, activists, political and environmental scientists.

Ian Budge is a political scientist who has pioneered the use of quantitative methods to study party democracy across countries. Currently Emeritus Professor of the Department of Government, University of Essex, he has been Professor at the European University Institute, Florence, and visiting professor at various institutions in five other countries.