Special section: advancing the role of cities in climate governance – promise,limits, politics

This special issue contributes to scholarly debates about the role of cities in global climate governance, reflecting on the promise, limits, and politics of cities as agents of change. It takes an empirically-informed approach drawing on multiple diverse geographical and political contexts. Overall, the special issue aims to stimulate reflection and debate about where understanding and practice needs improvement to advance the role of cities in global climate governance. Key questions that are addressed in the special issue include: To what extent do real world experiences confirm or disconfirm the high expectations of cities as agents and sites of change in addressing global climate change as expressed in urban climate governance literature? In what ways do internal political dynamics of cities enable or constrain urban climate governance? How is climate governance in cities enabled and constrained by interactions with broader governance levels? In what ways can climate governance in cities be advanced through critical attention to the previous issues?     

Environmental practices of governance of companies in emerging markets: An analysis of structural relationships

The aim of this study is to analyze the structural relationships between strategy, environmental performance, and disclosure in view of the lack of research on these endogenous activities. To analyze these relationships, an environmental governance proxy consisting of five dimensions was developed for Brazilian companies. Hence, from an economic perspective, a trend is expected of companies disclosing more information and maintaining an environmental governance structure to avoid or reduce potential political costs. Using the structural equation technique, 573 Brazilian companies were analyzed. According to the results, the Brazilian companies’ mean compliance level with environmental governance practices is 49.2%. There is evidence of a positive association between the governance structure and the environmental management system (GSEM) as well as environmental performance (EP) and environmental disclosure levels (DISC). In addition, the level of environmental conflicts of interest a sector faces increased the need for environmental disclosure. Furthermore, the results demonstrate that the latent variables, GSEM and EP, exert direct and indirect positive effects on DISC. In other words, companies with more structured environmental management systems have obtained better performance indicators, and consequently, are more likely to feel encouraged to disseminate environmental information and to reduce political costs than is the case with other companies.     

国际水法对长江流域立法的启示和意义

随着长江经济带建设的推进,长江流域治理亟待法治化。由于调整对象、事项和目标方面的相似性,国际水法的理论、原则、规则和实践对于长江流域立法具有重要且有益的参考价值。长江流域立法面临着利益主体多元、生态环境和资源保护任务艰巨以及治理体制机制很不合理三个方面的巨大挑战。国际水法关于生态整体性路径、公平合理利用原则以及流域治理体制机制三个基本方面的理论、法律和指南以及实践,对于长江流域立法有效应对这些挑战具有重要启示。其意义体现在：直接促进长江流域治理的法治化,间接推进中国流域立法与国际水法之间的兼容性;直接示范国内其他流域,间接助推实现我国成为全球生态文明建设重要参与者、贡献者和引领者的战略。     

加强环境部门治理的责任研究

伴随经济的发展,中国环境问题日益严重,环境部门的环境治理力度有待加强.长期以来,环境部门应改变传统的重微观层面环境治理职责的实施,改变轻宏观层面环境治理结构架构的做法,调整环境治理方式,充分发挥环境保护多元主体的积极性,突出环境部门在环境治理中的主导作用,明确环境责任.环境责任的关键在于转变环境治理结构中的角色定位,变管理为治理,充分调动多方面力量参与到环境治理,尤其应当重视企业和公众的力量,充分参与治理,实现环境善治.     

白城市环境保护“十三五”规划思路与主要任务

白城市是吉林省重要的防风固沙屏障,但是受客观存在的不利因素与多年来人为的不合理开发影响,生态环境仍然较为脆弱.“十三五”期间,立足白城生态环境实际,以提升环境质量为主线,以突出的环境问题为导向,以生态保护与修复为重点,实施河湖连通工程、造林绿化工程、土地整理工程、湿地保护工程、草原治理工程等5大工程.针对关系百姓切身利益的环境问题,以大气、水、土壤为重点,实施蓝天工程、清水工程、土壤恢复治理工程.健全生态制度,推进生态文明建设,实现区域环境质量得到较大提高和生态脆弱环境得到明显改善.     

The gap report of global climate change mitigation,finance, and governance after the United States declared its withdrawal from the Paris Agreement

On 1 June 2017, the US President Donald Trump officially announced the withdrawal from the Paris Agreement, thus the study on the reasons of withdrawal, the potential impacts, and coping strategies has become a focus among policy circles and of the international community. Based on the self-developed US Policy Assessment Model, this paper systematically evaluates the three potential “major deficits” in terms of mitigation, climate finance, and global climate governance, as a result of the US withdrawal from the Paris Agreement and puts forward policy suggestions for coping with such transformations accordingly. The study shows that the United States ’withdrawal from the Paris Agreement will affect the existence and implementation of successive climate policies and result in an additional 8.8–13.4% increase in the global emissions reduction deficit. The United States’ withdrawal will also deteriorate the existing climate finance mechanism. The Green Climate Fund (GCF)’s funding gap will increase by US$2 billion, while the gap of long-term climate finance will increase by about US$5 billion a year. Either the China–EU or the “BASIC plus” mechanism could fill the governance deficit caused by the United States and the lack of political momentum may continue for a while in the future.     

The territorialization of transnational sustainability governance: production,power and globalization in Iceland’s fisheries

To contribute to the literature on transnational sustainability governance hybrids, a new fisheries certification program in Iceland that was originally developed as an alternative to the non-governmental Marine Stewardship Council is examined. While this new program appears on the surface to constitute a purely nationalistic reaction against external non-state authority, the new governance institution is also non-governmental and incorporates international norms and institutions. To explain this new governance hybrid, Robert Cox’s International Political Economy approach to production and power is engaged. This approach theorizes the co-constitution of the social forces of production, state–society complexes and global governance. It is argued that the Icelandic case is not entirely localized or unique; it is part of a broader movement in which social forces of production respond to new market-oriented transnational sustainability governance institutions by developing territorially embedded but transnationally legitimate alternatives.     

Application of the Anthropogenic Allee Effect Model to Trophy Hunting as a Conservation Tool

Trophy hunting can provide economic incentives to conserve wild species, but it can also involve risk when rare species are hunted. The anthropogenic Allee effect (AAE) is a conceptual model that seeks to explain how rarity may spread the seeds of further endangerment. The AAE model has increasingly been invoked in the context of trophy hunting, increasing concerns that such hunting may undermine rather than enhance conservation efforts. We question the appropriateness of uncritically applying the AAE model to trophy hunting for 4 reasons. First, the AAE assumes an open‐access resource, which is a poor characterization of most trophy‐hunting programs and obscures the potential for state, communal, or private‐property use rights to generate positive incentives for conservation. Second, study results that show the price of hunting increases as the rarity of the animal increases are insufficient to indicate the presence of AAE. Third, AAE ignores the existence of biological and behavioral factors operating in most trophy‐hunting contexts that tend to regulate the effect of hunting. We argue that site‐specific data, rather than aggregated hunting statistics, are required to demonstrate that patterns of unsustainable exploitation can be well explained by an AAE model. Instead, we suggest that conservation managers seeking to investigate and identify constraints that limit the potential conservation role of trophy hunting, should focus on the critical governance characteristics that shape the potential conservation role of trophy hunting, such as corruption, insecure property rights, and inadequate sharing of benefits with local people. Aplicación del Modelo Antropogénico del Efecto Allee sobre la Caza de Trofeos como una Herramienta de Conservación     

Adapting cities to climate change – exploring the flood risk management role of green infrastructure landscapes

There is now an emerging sense of the scope and nature of response that can be implemented at building and neighbourhood scales to help adapt cities and urban areas to the changing climate. In comparison, the role of larger natural and semi-natural landscapes that surround and permeate cities is less well understood. Addressing this knowledge gap, this paper outlines two case studies that describe and map the flood risk management functions offered by green infrastructure landscapes situated within the Urban Mersey Basin in North West England. The case studies establish that areas potentially exposed to flooding can be located at some distance, and within different jurisdictions, from upstream areas where the flood hazard may be generated and could be moderated via functions provided by green infrastructure landscapes. This raises planning and governance challenges connected to supporting and enhancing flood risk management functions provided by green infrastructure landscapes.     

跨省流域生态补偿机制的创新——基于区域治理的视角

在传统行政区行政理念的主导下,流域政府皆以追求本地利益最大化为基本目标,甚少关注甚至漠视流域公共利益,流域政府间利益冲突严重,因此,难以对跨省流域生态补偿达成一致意见.跨省流域生态补偿的实施有赖于政府行政管理理念向区域治理理念的转变和相应的机制创新,包括建立流域政府间的民主协商机制、多元主体联合供给机制和中央对流域政府的选择性激励机制.