Local Government, Citizens and Climate Change: A role for participatory budgeting

Why have local authorities responded relatively poorly to climate change to date? Why do most of them remain nervous of giving more power to citizens? This book asks whether a fresh approach to climate change that explicitly involves citizens in making policy decisions could help local authorities establish a more positive relationship with members of their community. Participatory budgeting is one way in which this positive relationship could be established, as in addition to letting citizens determine how money is spent in their neighbourhoods, they will also be asked to meet some greenhouse gas emission targets at the same time. This book describes the process of developing "participatory emissions budgeting" (PEB), identifying the challenges inherent in attempting to estimate the greenhouse gas emissions attributable to a local authority project. It then describes trials of this decision-making method that were conducted with citizens and the subsequent discussions that took place with local authority officers and members to test the appetite for using this method. Given the significant barriers to implementation encountered, the author goes on to discuss why this might be and asks what lessons PEB can teach us about the relationship between local authorities and their citizens within the context of climate change. This book will be of great interest to students and scholars of climate governance and citizen participation.