Paper Titles & Abstracts

Today it is widely acknowledged that cities have become important players in governing climate change in the European Union. This paper starts from the assumption that implementation of EU climate change policy at local level changes local policies and, vice versa, local climate governance influences the development of EU climate policy. This assumption is supported by the fact that many cities have opened offices in Brussels and that more than 4,600 cities signed the 'Covenant of Mayors', an initiative of the EU Commission which establishes direct relations between the EU Commission and European cities and aims to reduce the GHG emissions of cities by more than 20 percent and. The main goal of this paper is to analyze the role cities play in EU multi-level climate governance. First, multi-level climate governance implies that EU programs are eventually implemented at local level. This top-down approach has shaped the debate on climate governance in the EU (hierarchical climate governance). Second, cities have tried to alter the effects of hierarchical climate governance by establishing direct links with EU institutions (such as the Covenant of Mayors). This perspective combines top-down with bottom-up approaches (vertical climate governance). Third, these types of climate governance need to be complemented by a third type because cities have developed tools to facilitate knowledge transfer among cities (horizontal climate governance). Although EU institutions play either no role here or merely a facilitative one (in particular through project funding), horizontal climate governance has become an essential part of EU climate governance.