by Claire Dupont, Jeffrey Rosamond and Bishoy L. Zaki
In our recent article published in Policy & Politics, we provide an historical overview of the evolution of some of the knowledge processes and linkages that are involved in EU climate policy. We explore whether developments in these knowledge exchanges reflect shifts in the politicisation of climate change.
To address this question, we outline a conceptual model of politicisation that accounts for two different effects: (i) prioritisation leading to enabling conditions for knowledge exchange, and (ii) polarisation leading to constraining conditions. We analyse the politicisation of climate change in the EU since the 1990s, and discuss two key aspects of how knowledge exchanges develop: formal and informal aspects. Focusing on knowledge exchange with the European Commission, our analysis reveals connections between the development of the formal and informal aspects of knowledge exchange and changes in politicisation over time. We find that when the politicisation of climate change led to a negative or constraining context, informal knowledge exchanges stopped, making it more challenging for multidisciplinary scientific knowledge to be included. However, formal knowledge exchanges remained active, even under constraining conditions.
In this way, our article provides a nuanced assessment of the connections between the effects of politicisation and the potential for meaningful scientific-policy knowledge exchange. It enhances our understanding of both the politicisation of climate change and the development of knowledge exchanges at the policy-science interface.
You can read the original research in Policy & Politics at
Dupont, C., Rosamond, J., & Zaki, B. L. (2023). Investigating the scientific knowledge–policy interface in EU climate policy. Policy & Politics (published online ahead of print 2023). Retrieved Nov 8, 2023, from https://doi.org/10.1332/030557321X16861511996074
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Metzler, I., & Åm, H. (2022). How the governance of and through digital contact tracing technologies shapes geographies of power. Policy & Politics, 50(2), 181-198. Retrieved Nov 8, 2023, from https://doi.org/10.1332/030557321X16420096592965
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