Completed Research Projects - Energy and Climate Change Policies

Climate change adaptation strategies in Switzerland

This project addresses the research question on how local climate change adaptation strategies are designed and may evolve. We strongly focus on the impact of extreme events on the design and policy formulation of adaptation measures. Climate change adaptation becomes nowadays particularly crucial for the resource water, mainly in relation with the principles outlined in Integrated Water Resources Management (IWRM) addressing the challenge of coordinating the use of, and the protection of and from the resource water. The protection from the resource water directly links to flood events and natural disasters that may be impacted by global climate change. Furthermore, the integration of actors in different policy sectors, political entities and decision-making levels can be seen as a way how to improve the adaptive capacity within the water sector. Thus, integrated water resources management constitutes one major challenge of current and future generations when it comes to find sustainable responses to climate change impacts. We therefore analyze adaptation to climate change in the case of flood risk management, and compare various actors’ preferences for measures and measure mixes with the current implemented measures as a contribution to IWRM.

Project Start: September 2014 – July 2020
Funding: Sinergia SNF, OCCR, IPW
Team: Karin Ingold, Anik Glaus
Project partners and associate members: Gunter Stephan and Ralph Winkler, Rolf Weingartner and Team (Oeschger Centre for Climate Change Research (OCCR)); (University of Bern); Philip Thalmann (EPFL)

Related publications:

  • Ingold, K.; Gavilano, A. (2020). “Under What Conditions Does an Extreme Event Deploy Its Power: Towards Collaborative Management in Swiss Flood Risk Management”. In: Collaborative Crisis Management – Inter-Organizational Approaches to Extreme Events, ed. F. Byander and D. Nohrstedt. New York/London: Routledge, 132-147. (PDF, 112KB)
  • Metz, F.; Glaus, A. (2019). Integrated Water Resources Management and Policy Integration: Lessons from 169 Years of Flood Policies in Switzerland. Water, 11(6), 1173. DOI: 10.3390/w11061173.
  • Ingold, K. (2017). How to create and preserve social capital in climate adaptation policies: a network approach. Ecological Economics, 131, 414-424. DOI:10.1016/j.ecolecon.2016.08.033.
  • Balsiger, J.; Ingold, K. (2016). In the Eye of the Beholder: Network location and sustainability perception in flood prevention. Environmental Policy and Governance, 26(4), 242-256. DOI:10.1002/eet.1715.
  • Ingold, K. (2014). How involved are they really? A comparative network analysis of the institutional drivers of local actor inclusion. Land Use Policy, 39, 376-387. DOI:10.1016/j.landusepol.2014.01.013.
  • Ingold, K.; Zimmermann, W. (2011). How and why forest managers adapt to socio-economic changes: a case study analysis in Swiss forest enterprises. Forest Policy and Economics, 13(2), 97-103. DOI:10.1016/j.forpol.2010.06.003.
  • Ingold, K.; Balsiger, J.; Hirschi, C. (2010). Climate change in mountain regions: how local communities adapt to extreme events. Local Environment, 15(7), 651-661. DOI:10.1080/13549839.2010.498811.

Decision-making processes in national and international climate policy and politics

Climate change is an environmental problem of global scale. In consequence, policy, which aims at mitigating climate change, is necessarily at the crossroads between international dynamics and national policymaking. This “two-level “game is the focus of this research area. Particularly, we are interested in the factors and mechanisms, which explain the selection of policy instruments and targets. We investigate the implementation of different policy instruments to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, through a detailed analysis and comparison of preferences and decision-making strategies of political elites in national processes and delegates in international climate conferences. Moreover, we analyse the reasons for the often-observed divergence of international commitments and national positions. A second focus of this research area is the comparison of different methods to analysis policy preferences and decision-making processes in climate policy. We rely on both quantitative and qualitative methods, for example discourse network analysis, social network analysis, regression, and multicriteria analysis.

Team: Marlene Kammerer, Karin Ingold

Related publications:

  • Kammerer, M; Namhata, C. (2018). What drives the Adoption of Climate Change Mitigation Policy? A Dynamic Network Approach to Policy Diffusion. Policy Sciences, 51(4), 477-513. DOI: 10.1007/s11077-018-9332-6.
  • Castro, P; Kammerer, M. (2018). The politicization of the climate: How and why has the Annex I – non-Annex I division affected negotiations under the climate change regime? Conference Proceeding, ECPR General Conference, Hamburg 2018 (under review).
  • Ingold, K.; Varone, F.; Kammerer, M. et al. (2018). Measuring Policy Positions Through Elite Survey: Can We Trust All Policy Actors? Conference Proceeding, International Workshops on Public Policy, Pittsburgh, USA (under review).
  • Kammerer, M.; Wagner, P.; Ylä-Anttila, T.; Grönow, A. (2018). Collaboration to mitigate climate change – Does the institutional context matter? A comparative case study of Finland, South Korea, Switzerland, and the United States. Conference Proceeding, Environmental Policy and Governance Conference 2018, Stockholm.
  • Ingold, K.; Pflieger, G. (2016). Two Levels, Two Strategies: Explaining the Gap Between Swiss National and International Responses Toward Climate Change. European Policy Analysis Journal, 2(1), 20-38. DOI:10.18278/epa.2.1.4.
  • Ingold, K.; Manuel, F. (2014). Drivers of Collaboration to Mitigate Climate Change: An Illustration of Swiss Climate Policy over 15 Years. Global Environmental Change, 24, 88-98. DOI:10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2013.11.021.
  • Ingold, K.; Varone, F. (2012). Treating Policy Brokers Seriously: Evidence from the Climate Policy. Journal of Public Administration Research and Theory, 22(2), 319-346. DOI:10.1093/jopart/mur035.
  • Ingold, K. (2011). Network Structures within Policy Processes: Coalitions, Power, and Brokerage in Swiss Climate Policy. Policy Studies Journal, 39(3), 435-459. DOI:10.1111/j.1541-0072.2011.00416.x.

Future Energy Policy: how to make change happen? The acceptance of alternative electricity supply

The overarching question in this project is about how effective policy change towards renewable energy can be achieved. In this vein, we start with the idea that effective policy change leading to the realization of regional and local renewable energy projects can be determined by assessing different aspects of “social acceptance”. We argue that – besides technology acceptance by the market – the acceptance of policies and instrument mixes is a crucial pre-condition for project success. So we concentrate on the acceptance of policies and instrument mixes (e.g., regulatory and incentive measures) by (1) the political elite involved in energy policy decision-making (socio-political acceptance) and by (2) citizens as expressed through their vote or other political intervention (community acceptance).

Project Start: December 2014 - December 2017
Funding: NRP 71 SNF
Team: Karin Ingold, Lorenz Kammermann
Project lead: Isabelle Stadelmann-Steffen (Universität Bern)
Project partners: Clau Dermont (University of Bern);  Philip Thalmann (EPFL); Stefan Rieder (Interface Politikstudien)

Related publications:

  • Kammermann, L.; Ingold, K. (2019). Going beyond technocratic and democratic principles: Stakeholder acceptance of instruments in Swiss energy policy. Policy Sciences, 52(1), 43-65. DOI:10.1007/s11077-018-9341-5.
  • Ingold, K.; Stadelmann-Steffen, I.; Kammermann, L. (2018). The acceptance of instruments in instrument mix situations: Citizens’ perspective on Swiss energy transition. Research Policy, online. DOI:10.1016/j.respol.2018.10.018.
  • Kammermann, L.; Dermont, C. (2018). How beliefs of the political elite and citizens on climate change influence support for Swiss energy transition policy. Energy Research & Social Science, 43, 48-60. DOI:10.1016/j.erss.2018.05.010.
  • Dermont, C.; Ingold, K.; Kammermann, L.; Stadelmann-Steffen, I. (2017). Bringing the policy making perspective in: A political science approach to social acceptance. Energy Policy, 108, 359-368. DOI:10.1016/j.enpol.2017.05.062.
  • Markard, J.; Suter, M.; Ingold, K. (2016). Socio-technical transitions and policy change – Advocacy coalitions in Swiss energy policy. Environmental Innovation and Societal Transitions, 18, 215-237. DOI:10.1016/j.eist.2015.05.003.

The Politics of Hydraulic fracturing

Unconventional gas is extracted using new and controversial technologies of hydraulic fracturing (fracking). Fracking allows extracting sizable resources of natural gas from basins that were considered to be difficult or costly to exploit before. On the one hand, the extraction of unconventional gas can have important implications for the global energy market and geopolitical world map. On the other hand, fracking involves potential environmental risks such as the contamination of surface waters and aquifers, the causation of seismic activity, or the generation of fugitive methane emissions. The uncertainty with respect to the environmental impacts caused by fracking poses considerable challenges to political decision-making processes regulating fracking activities by increasing the difficulties in anticipating the behavior of actors and selecting appropriate policy instruments to tackle the uncertain problem.
This research project examines fracking politics in the UK and Switzerland. We ask which political conflicts and coalitions exist with respect to fracking regulation, what the resources and strategies of the actors and coalitions are, and how scientific and behavioral uncertainties influence political decision-making on this issue.

Project Start: September 2013 – December 2016
Team: Karin Ingold, Manuel Fischer
Project partners and associate members: P. Cairney (University of Stirling); T. Heykkila and C. Weible (University of Colorado Denver)

Related Publications:

  • Weible, C.M.; Heikkila, T.; Ingold, K.; Fischer, M. (2016). Policy Debates on Hydraulic Fracturing. Comparing Coalition Politics in North America and Europe. Palgrave Macmillan. DOI:10.1057/978-1-137-59574-4.
  • Weible, C.M.; Heikkila, T.; Ingold, K.; Fischer, M. (2016). “Introduction”. In: Policy Debates on Hydraulic Fracturing, ed. C.M. Wible, T. Heikkila, K. Ingold and M. Fischer. Palgrave Macmillan, 1-27. DOI:10.1057/978-1-137-59574-4_1.
  • Cairney, P.; Fischer, M.; Ingold, K. (2016). “Hydraulic Fracturing Policy in the United Kingdom: Coalition, Cooperation, and Opposition in the Face of Uncertainty”. In: Policy Debates on Hydraulic Fracturing, ed. C.M. Weible, T. Heikkila, K. Ingold and M. Fischer. Palgrave Macmillan, 81-113. DOI:10.1057/978-1-137-59574-4_4.
  • Ingold, K.; Fischer, M. (2016). “Belief Conflicts and Coalition Structures Driving Subnational Policy Responses: The Case of Swiss Regulation of Unconventional Gas Development”. In: Policy Debates on Hydraulic Fracturing, ed. C.M. Weible, T. Heikkila, K. Ingold and M. Fischer. Palgrave Macmillan, 201-237. DOI:10.1057/978-1-137-59574-4_8.
  • Ingold, K.; Fischer, M.; Heikkila, T.; Weible, C.M. (2016). “Assessments and Aspirations”. In: Policy Debates on Hydraulic Fracturing, ed. C.M. Weible, T. Heikkila, K. Ingold and M. Fischer. Palgrave Macmillan, 239-264. DOI:10.1057/978-1-137-59574-4_9.
  • Cairney, P.; Ingold, K.; Fischer, M. (2016). Fracking in the UK and Switzerland: why differences in policymaking systems don't always produce different outputs and outcomes. Policy and Politics, online. DOI:10.1332/030557316X14793989976783.
  • Ingold, K.; Fischer, M.; Cairney, P. (2016). Drivers for Policy Agreement in Nascent Subsystems: An Application of the Advocacy Coalition Framework to Fracking Policy in Switzerland and the UK. Policy Studies Journal, 45(2), 442-463. DOI:10.1111/psj.12173.