An international review of local governance for climate change: implications for Hong Kong

Cities have increasingly become the focal point for climate change initiatives. However, how cities respond to climate change challenges and through what mechanisms have remained largely unexplored. This paper develops a framework for local governance to examine and explain climate change initiatives in cities. Based on the analysis of 20 climate change initiatives in major cities and a detailed case study of Hong Kong, this paper has two main findings. First, local governments at the city level have an important role to play in climate change policies by embracing some key strategies (such as deliberation and partnership) and values (such as equity and legitimacy) of good governance. Second, by comparing and contrasting the experience in other cities, our case study of Hong Kong provides insights about the barriers that may limit a city's ability to adapt to new forms of governance that would enable it to better respond to climate change. The paper concludes by exploring the potential role of local governance as a model to strengthen climate change initiatives at the city level.     

“多规合一”的空间管治分区体系构建

本文首先从多规空间分区存在的差异分析入手,重点分析技术方法与编制思路差异、空间边界与管制手段差异。其次,对"多规合一"实践中的空间矛盾解决途径进行梳理,包括空间图斑差异协调模式、机构改革和规划事权改革模式、构建新的空间管制体系模式,总结存在的困难与障碍。最后,抛开部门之争和体制障碍,不局限于技术手段衔接,践行十八届五中全会提出的以主体功能区规划为基础统筹各类空间规划,探索提出一套具有可推广、复制特征的"三条底线(生态保护红线、永久基本农田红线、城市开发边界)+三大空间(城镇、农业、生态)+八大空间管治区"县域空间管治分区体系,配合空间管治规则的融合与创新及部门空间事权的分离与引导,达到用途管制的目的。     

The environmental state at sea

Seas and oceans are confronted with a plethora of environmental problems, caused by land-based activities (agriculture, industries, and ports) and by maritime activities (such as shipping, fishing, oil and gas drilling, tourism, and navigational dredging). Environmental problems at sea challenge the efficacy of state sovereignty. Who is responsible, accountable, and regulates environmental and spatial problems at the level of regional seas, and what is the role of states in these processes of governance? In the regional seas and on the high seas, the environmental state is challenged by two developments: states become players at different levels, and states are confronted with the activities of big market players where they have no or little jurisdiction. The different forms of the environmental state in Europe’s regional seas and in the Arctic Ocean are examined.     

A rights foundation for ecological democracy

ABSTRACT

What would it mean to conceptualize some environmental relationships as bundles of rights, rather than as a good as generally defined by liberalism? Environmental rights are a category of human rights necessarily central to both democracy and global environmental protection and governance (ecological democracy). The world of democratic politics and governance since mid-twentieth century has been transformed by a rights revolution in which recognized rights have come to constitute a ‘global normative order.’ There are several policy spaces in which persuasive environmental rights discourses have been emerging from existing or foreseeable congruences of elite and popular environmental norms, including (1) rights involving access to information and decision-making processes; (2) rights ensuring access to food and water; and (3) rights providing environmental security to all. We analyze these three rights discourses and assess their current and necessary future trajectories. We identify next steps in achieving better understanding and more meaningful establishment of environmental rights and their integration into our thinking about human rights, with attention to how they can be reconciled with the social and cultural diversity of democratic environmental governance in coming turbulent times.     

Place-based local governance and sustainable communities: lessons from Canadian biosphere reserves

The quest for sustainable communities might be fostered by a new ‘place-based’ governing approach that engages civil society and other actors in local decision-making processes. In Canada, lessons can be learned from the establishment and maintenance of biosphere reserves by networks of local communities of interests and other organisations. Biosphere reserves are created to promote conservation, biodiversity and sustainable livelihoods. Municipal and public participation in these reserves can be encouraged, promoting a local sense of place as well as sustainable community and regional development. An examination of two Canadian biosphere reserves, Riding Mountain and Long Point, illustrates how local governments and these reserves might assist each other in their mutual goals of long-term sustainability while offering a worthwhile model of local collaborative, place-based governance.     

全球环境治理的制度困境与行动转向

在环境治理的问题上,20世纪人类社会所表现出来的是一种对契约、技术与制度的崇尚,反映了近代以来社会治理中的价值中立与道德祛魅精神。然而,随着环境危机事件的频发,特别是在环境以及生态问题构成了风险社会的一个重要维度的情况下,依靠契约、制度、技术的环境治理方案陷入低效甚至失灵的境地。人类命运共同体理念的提出,开拓了环境治理的新思路,让我们看到构建人与人、人与自然生命共同体的环境合作治理模式建立的希望。环境合作治理是一种可以将所有力量整合到合作行动体系中的治理模式,能够有效应对日趋恶化的环境问题,并将人类的生存与发展建立在环境友好的基础上。只有当环境治理采用了合作模式,才能在环境的维度上增强人类命运共同体的现实性。     

Environmental Co-governance,Legitimacy, and the Quest for Compliance: When and Why Is Stakeholder Participation Desirable?

Deliberative forms of stakeholder participation have been widely embraced as a key measure for addressing legitimacy deficits and non-compliance in environmental governance. However, the great significance of such collaborative structures for state-stakeholder interaction is much too often accepted uncritically as an established truth in the environmental policy discourse. Building on examples from the literature on fisheries co-governance, this article constructs a conceptual and normative framework for interpreting and assessing such views about co-governance, legitimacy and compliance. Analysing central claims in this discourse in relation to different concepts and standards of legitimacy helps us identify and distinguish many powerful reasons to welcome co-governance. However, the article defends the need to do so cautiously and reflectively. It is conceptually misleading to suggest that more intense forms of co-governance will generally improve the overall level of social legitimacy and, thereby, compliance rates among stakeholders. Furthermore, it is argued that the democratic value of co-governance is not fundamental. The democratic desirability of such arrangements should be primarily assessed on instrumental-pragmatic grounds, focusing on their capacity to serve the wider ideals of equal citizenship and public reason.     

新型城镇化发展下的生态环境管治策略探析

与传统城镇化相比,新型城镇化具有"以人为本、四化同步、优化布局、生态文明、文化传承"的特点。在生态文明、新型城镇化建设全面推进的背景下,如何解决城镇化建设过程中的城市生态环境问题,优化空间布局,促进区域可持续发展,成为亟需解决的重大问题。本文基于城乡耦合系统理论,提出通过城镇规模和空间优化、功能完善提升生态环境管治。针对我国城镇化发展现状,本文认为新型城镇体系下的生态环境管治应基于城镇的资源环境承载能力,在新型城镇化建设中努力夯实生态环境的基础性地位,充分发挥生态环境约束的先导作用,并通过实施有效的城镇生态环境功能分区管治策略、提升生态环境空间管治效率、构建政企民共同参与的新型城镇生态环境治理体系等措施来提升生态环境管治能力。     

有色多金属矿山砷污染对生态环境的影响及其治理分析

砷是一种易使人致癌和对动、植物生长有较大危害的有毒微量元素。我国的砷矿资源主要以伴生砷矿赋存于有色多金属矿床中,含砷有色多金属矿床的采、选、冶加工等,是砷污染的最主要来源,含砷废石尾矿的大量堆积被氧化和淋滤溶解,砷对矿区下游水体、农田和生态环境都造成不同程度的污染危害。针对砷的污染危害,从废水治理、土壤生态治理、生物修复及综合利用等方面提出了治理砷污染的对策。     

问策老庄——生态治理的道家智慧

老庄道家思想蕴含着丰富的生态智慧,前人的研究为其在生态治理中"致大用"提供了现实举证与理论观点。老庄思想中辩证的"反向性"有助于生态危机面前人类的自我反省,其"道"的"本根性"有助于引领生态治理走向最佳路径。当前生态治理存在主体松散化、客体碎片化、政府治理单边化、生态公正边缘化、生态修复人工化的困局。老庄道家思想为我们提供了具有针对性的行为准则。生态治理主体应具有"以天下观天下"的大智慧、大胸襟,生态问题防御要以"正反相随、祸福相依"的观念总揽根源,政府要善用"无为"来调动生态环境的社会共治,生态公正需要树立"以小为大"的价值观,生态修复需要树立"辅万物之自然"的生存理念。