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Using process tracing to analyse official documents, parliamentary records, and stakeholder submissions between 2019 and 2024, this paper maps the policy linkages and identifies the agents driving the rise of the EU green economic statecraft.

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Recent scholarship characterizes the 2019 European Union´s Green Deal as the pillar of an emerging "green superpower" projecting influence through climate leadership. Yet this characterization emphasizes normative leadership and market size while leaving underspecified the policy instruments through which the EU constructs structural dependencies. Building on Thurbon et al.'s concept of "green energy statecraft" (2024) - the strategic deployment of state capacity to shape clean energy transitions - this paper extends the framework from East Asian developmental states to a supranational regulatory polity, and broadens the analysis beyond energy to examine coordination across regulatory, industrial, and resource security instruments.

The EU coordinates environmental regulations, industrial policies, and partnership frameworks to build structural economic interdependence with trade partners. This paper asks whether this coordination constitutes green economic statecraft: the deliberate linking of standard-setting, industrial positioning, and supply chain control for geoeconomic purposes. Analysis of three components of the EU's green regulatory-industrial complex—the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM), Net-Zero Industry Act (NZIA), and Critical Raw Materials Act (CRMA)—examines how these instruments relate to one another. CBAM creates demand for decarbonized production, NZIA positions European firms to supply clean technologies, and CRMA secures the material inputs both require. Using process tracing to analyse official documents, parliamentary records, and stakeholder submissions between 2019 and 2024, this paper maps the policy linkages and identifies the agents driving the rise of the EU green economic statecraft.

Keywords: Green Economic Statecraft; European Union; Carbon Border Adjustment; Net-Zero Industry Act; Critical Raw Materials; Developmental Environmentalism

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This paper presents a comparative political economy analysis of the World Bank's Mission 300 electrification agenda, examining how national compacts are being negotiated and implemented in Ghana, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia, and what this reveals about energy reforms and green transitions in Africa

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The World Bank and African Development Bank’s Mission 300 agenda aims to provide electricity to 300 million people in Africa by 2030. With energy framed as the foundation for development, M300 also seeks to catalyse the region’s economic transformation. Its central instrument is the “national energy compact”, through which governments can articulate energy targets, investment strategies and reform agendas. M300 is heralded as a departure from conditionality-based, one-size-fits-all reforms towards country ownership, while offering potential to leverage large-scale private finance by aligning African governments’ development priorities with the risk-return expectations of international capital.

The paper develops an exploratory comparative political economy analysis of how Ghana, Tanzania, Uganda and Zambia are engaging with M300. Selected for their diverse political systems, ideological orientations, energy institutions and access rates, the cases are used to explore how the overarching M300 agenda –and the ever-expanding constellation of development finance institutions, donors, philanthropies and institutional investors supporting it– is interacting with distinct domestic political economies. The analysis examines whether compacts reflect genuinely differentiated priorities or converge around particular reform trajectories and investment models, shaped by wider structural, disciplinary and ideational forces.

Situating M300 within wider debates on the financialisation of development, the paper analyses evolving approaches to development finance, de-risking and private capital mobilisation. It also explores ambiguities surrounding renewable energy adoption, fossil fuels and balance between grid and off-grid solutions. Finally, it considers the politics of implementation, highlighting how reforms may be resisted, reinterpreted or unevenly enacted, and the implications for green transitions in Africa.

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Global North countries maintain control over climate technologies, hindering knowledge transfer to the Global South. This reinforces financial dependency, perpetuates colonial legacies, and fuels exploitation of resources for the green transition, undermining true global climate justice.

Paper long abstract

The global green transition is marked by significant epistemic asymmetries and geopolitical imbalances, where the Global North continues to control access to critical climate technologies and knowledge. These power dynamics hinder the Global South’s ability to implement effective mitigation and adaptation strategies, as they often face restricted technology transfer and exploitative financial mechanisms, such as predatory loans and exorbitant interest rates. This perpetuates a cycle of dependency, particularly in countries who not only seek to address their respective climate vulnerabilities, but are also most impacted by an increasingly warming world.

Case studies from the Philippines illustrate how these dynamics play out in practice. TDespite being rich in mineral resources essential for renewable energy technologies, the country remains locked in an extractive relationship, where the benefits flow primarily to the Global North. Local communities face displacement and significant environmental degradation due to resource extraction, yet do not receive the benefits of the green transition, such as technology and knowledge transfer. Nationally, the Philippines struggles with the high costs of green technologies, even though these resources are extracted from its own land.

This paper examines how these intersecting dynamics create a contested terrain for the Philippines in the green transition. By exploring these issues, it argues for the need to reframe global climate policies to address the colonial legacies of knowledge, power, and resource extraction, ensuring that the Global South is not merely a passive recipient but an active agent in shaping a just climate future.

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This paper explores the rise and fall of Black Star Energy, a private sector-led initiative in Ghana's minigrid landscape. The study highlights the roles of crisis-driven reforms, regulatory discretion, and shifting elite sponsorship in both enabling and reversing policy experimentation.

Paper long abstract

While energy transitions are often framed as universally progressive, in countries like Ghana, they unfold within entrenched geopolitical and domestic political realities. In 2014, Black Star Energy (BSE), a private company, entered Ghana’s rural electrification landscape through the deployment of small-scale renewable minigrid systems. By 2018, it had developed minigrids across 15 communities, with ambitious plans to expand access to many unelectrified communities by 2030. BSE gained recognition from the donor community as evidence of how private-led minigrids could accelerate universal access and deliver improved energy service in developing country contexts. Despite this praise and the aspiration for wider coverage, BSE’s momentum was halted in 2019 following a Government of Ghana policy directive mandating a public-led model for minigrids. The BSE case presents a paradox in the politics of energy reform, which this paper addresses through a set of interrelated questions. How and why did a temporary opening for private-led minigrid emerge in Ghana’s state-dominated electricity distribution system? What political, regulatory, and institutional dynamics shaped BSE’s rise and exit? And what does the withdrawal of BSE’s opening imply for long-term survival of reforms in Ghana’s green energy transition efforts? This paper draws upon in-depth interviews with government officials, donor agencies, private sector actors, and energy experts, as well as extensive documentary reviews. The study offers critical reflections on the fragility of renewable energy reforms and the contingent nature of private sector participation in contexts where global ambitions for sustainable energy must ultimately be mediated through local political and institutional realities.

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Despite Nigeria’s rich renewable resources, its energy system remains fossil fuel-dominated. Political, economic, and structural barriers, including policy bias, vested interests, and financial constraints, slow renewable deployment and rural electrification, slowing the energy transition.

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This study examines the nature and progress of the energy transition in low-income, fossil fuel-dependent countries, using Nigeria as a case study. Despite abundant renewable energy resources, solar, hydropower, and wind, Nigeria’s electricity system remains heavily reliant on fossil fuels, with 78% of generation sourced from oil and gas as of 2020. Low electrification rates, particularly in rural areas where only 24.46% of the population has access, exacerbate socio-economic challenges amid rising energy demand. This research employs a qualitative policy and political economy analysis to investigate barriers and drivers of renewable energy adoption. Findings indicate that while Nigeria has articulated decarbonisation commitments through its Nationally Determined Contributions under the 2015 Paris Agreement and the 2021 Climate Change Act, implementation remains slow. Hydropower expansion is constrained by displacement conflicts, solar energy uptake faces technical and financial challenges, and wind energy remains largely undeveloped. Policy incentives favour fossil fuel investments, reinforcing conventional market dominance. Furthermore, political and economic dynamics, including the influence of fossil fuel interest groups and the limited capacity of renewable energy advocates, impede structural reform. Financial limitations, market barriers, and policy inconsistencies further restrict renewable energy deployment, particularly for rural electrification. The study concludes that Nigeria has significant technical potential for a sustainable energy transition, but progress is hampered by political economy and structural constraints. Insights from this analysis offer guidance for policymakers, investors, and researchers aiming to accelerate renewable energy adoption in low-income, fossil fuel-reliant contexts.

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Japan’s pragmatic energy transition model challenges Western renewable-only paradigms. In Indonesia, it advances hybrid solutions that include fossil fuels. This paper examines both the benefits and issues of this approach, drawing on extensive fieldwork conducted in 2024–2025.

Paper long abstract

The trajectory of energy transition in emerging economies is no longer determined exclusively by Western models. Japan, once a central player in Asia’s industrial and technological rise, has emerged as a distinctive actor shaping alternative pathways that challenge the prevailing norm of relying solely on renewable energy sources. This paper investigates the Japanese approach to energy transition and its influence on Indonesia, one of Southeast Asia’s leading economies. By examining Japan’s strategies—ranging from technological cooperation to policy frameworks—the study highlights how these initiatives have influenced Indonesia’s energy diversification while simultaneously raising new challenges.

The research is grounded in empirical fieldwork conducted in Spring 2024 and 2025, encompassing interviews with key stakeholders at national and local levels in Jakarta, Java, and Sumatra. Findings reveal that Japan’s emphasis on pragmatic energy solutions, including transitional technologies and infrastructure investment, has accelerated Indonesia’s progress toward balancing economic growth with sustainability. However, this approach has also generated tensions, particularly regarding uneven local adoption and questions of long-term environmental impact.

By situating Japan’s role within the broader discourse on global energy transition, the paper underscores the importance of recognising diverse models beyond Western paradigms. The Indonesian case illustrates both the opportunities and complexities of adopting hybrid energy strategies in emerging economies. Ultimately, the study contributes to understanding how non-Western actors are reshaping the global energy landscape and offers insights into the contested nature of sustainable development in Southeast Asia.

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China dominates ASEAN green investment post-2021, yet "captive coal" loopholes and governance deficits persist. Defining China as a "distorted but essential catalyst," the paper concludes success hinges on closing policy gaps.

Paper long abstract

A closer relationship between China and countries in Southeast Asia has become an important modality for economic relations, especially amid geopolitical turbulence. However, China's engagement in the energy sector presents a contradictory picture, positioning it as both an indispensable enabler of renewable energy (RE) and a source of significant socio-environmental challenges. This paper analyses Chinese foreign direct investment (FDI) in green energy in ASEAN from 2013 to 2024, revealing a fundamental transformation in its role. The data shows China has become the region's dominant green investor, leading in nations like Indonesia, Vietnam, and Laos. A dramatic pivot occurred after President Xi Jinping’s 2021 pledge to end overseas coal financing, with investment shifting decisively to RE, causing the green share of China’s energy portfolio to surpass 60% by 2024.

However, this green momentum is undermined by two critical issues. First, the "captive coal" loophole allows new coal plants to be built for industrial parks, creating long-term carbon lock-in. Second, the combination of domestic governance deficit with policy instability in host countries often threatens the progress of green energy transition. Furthermore, the intensity of these investment flows is largely determined by commitments of ASEAN states. The paper concludes that China is a distorted but essential catalyst in which the sustainability of the relationship hinges on closing policy loopholes.

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This paper examines the political economy of green transitions in the Global South through electric mobility in Peru. It shows how China-linked technology diffusion and industry lobbying erode fuel excises revenues and generate distributional conflict over replacement fiscal instruments.

Paper long abstract

Green transitions are increasingly driven by global decarbonisation agendas and technology diffusion, yet their outcomes depend on how these forces interact with domestic political economy structures in the Global South. This paper examines the political economy of green transitions through the case of electric mobility in Peru.

In Peru, the electrification of road transport has been promoted through a coordinated package of fiscal incentives, regulatory reforms, and infrastructure planning. China plays a protagonist role in this transition through the supply of electric vehicles and related technologies and through industry coalitions that have actively lobbied for tax exemptions and regulatory adjustments. While these dynamics accelerate adoption, they also erode fuel-excise revenues that finance public goods and transport systems.

Drawing on an explanatory-sequential mixed-methods design, the paper combines scenario-based fiscal modelling and distributional incidence analysis with interviews and policy-document review. The analysis examines proposed replacement instruments such as distance-based road charges and ownership levies, showing how they redistribute the costs of transition across income groups and territories in an unequal and informal economy. These fiscal adjustments generate political contestation and raise risks for policy legitimacy and inclusion.

The paper argues that green transitions are not only technological or environmental processes but political struggles over revenue, distribution, and state capacity shaped by global–local interactions. It contributes to development studies by demonstrating why the sustainability of green transitions in the Global South depends on how external actors, domestic institutions, and distributive conflicts are managed.

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We criticise the dominant 'JUST' framing on the decarbonisation of energy systems, showing how it limits analysis and action through a critical comparison with Nancy Fraser's critical theory of justice and with case study evidence fromCanada and South Africa.

Paper long abstract

The concept of ‘just transition’ has become central to academic and policy discourse on the decarbonisation of energy systems. The ‘JUST’ Framework, introduced in 2018 and actively promoted to international organisations and national governments has become the dominant framing these debates. However, we argue that the inattention to questions of power and history within JUST fails to identify and challenge the social relations that produce injustice, and ecological destruction and limits action to what is possible within contemporary sociopolitical and economic structures. Drawing on Nancy Fraser, we call for a more radical approach to theorizing just transitions, one that not only addresses questions of redistribution, recognition and representation but centres on the uneven relations of power that generate injustices within and across these three dimensions. Case-study evidence from the global North and global South illustrates the potential of this new approach in analytical and political terms.

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The paper analyses emerging global green finance norms and how they are addressed in South Africa. The ambition is to identify the challenges and opportunities that the changing access to finance present to South African agrifood production.

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In South Africa—a frontier country in green finance—the adoption of emerging green finance norms presents both opportunities and challenges. These norms can unlock new flows of sustainable capital and align the country with global climate commitments, but they also risk creating barriers for sectors that struggle to meet stringent requirements.

The first section of the paper addresses the context and broader issues in green finance discussions. While there is optimism about innovative green instruments, little attention has been paid to their local manifestations in the Global South. Specifically, discussions of green transformation often focus on three core issues: information disclosure, taxonomies, and the role of intermediary financial institutions (Lund Larsen 2022; Mendez & Houghton 2020).

The second section explores this dynamic in depth by mapping institutions and actor groups shaping green finance norms. The landscape is more diverse than typical UN-led norm creation. The section identifies norms in terms of (i) the problems they seek to address, (ii) the values they emphasize, and (iii) the behaviours they propose that relevant actors adopt (Winston 2018).

The third section connects green finance norms to South Africa’s national green finance discourse and, in particular, the South African Green Finance Taxonomy (National Treasury 2022) and the South African Climate Finance Landscape 2025 (de Aragão Fernandes et al. 2025) to identify similarities and differences between national policies and global trends. Moreover, the section examines how these norms translate into responses to national challenges in particular in relation to the agrifood value chains.

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This paper describes and analyses China's role in Cambodia's green transition, which involves mainly a change from coal and hydro power to solar power. It shows how various Cambodian actors try to utilize Chinese interests for defining the trajectory of Cambodia's development.

Paper long abstract

China has been the main investor, aid provider, and diplomatic ally of Cambodia in the latter's post-civil war decades. As Cambodia pursues a more sustainable development plan and deals with the instability of hydro power supply under climate change, China is well positioned to play the most important role in the country's green transition. Although Cambodia is endowed with abundant solar power, the development in this sector has so far been quite slow. This paper delves into this puzzle and provides some explanations by analyzing the political economy of Cambodia's energy transition. It underlines the important roles played by the Cambodian government agencies, state-owned and small businesses, the ruling elite, civil society, and local communities in this process, and how they interact with Chinese companies, Western donors, and international organizations for defining the trajectory of Cambodia's development. It finds that although vested interests try to keep control of their grip on the economy especially the energy sector, the society-wide demand for cheaper, cleaner energy is challenging their control, and Chinese investments and technology are helping with that challenge, even though the Chinese and Cambodian governments are close allies in diplomacy and politics. Moreover, there should especially be caution with the social and environmental impacts of renewable energy projects in a country with less transparency and authoritarian rule.

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Decarbonization creates winners and losers everywhere. A political economy framework, grounded in just transition, explains these spatial injustices across the North-South divide, challenging climate justice orthodoxy.

Paper long abstract

Global greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise, making extreme climate impacts unavoidable and reinforcing the need to integrate mitigation and adaptation. Yet climate actions often produce trade-offs rather than synergies: mitigation initiatives can displace vulnerable communities or divert resources from resilience efforts, while adaptation measures may increase energy demand and undermine mitigation goals. Although governance is frequently cited as crucial for managing these tensions, its role in shaping the mitigation–adaptation nexus remains under-theorized. This study develops a conceptual framework—grounded in just transition scholarship and interpreted through a political economy lens—to explain how governance arrangements influence interactions between mitigation and adaptation in decarbonization processes. The framework demonstrates how governance generates adaptation-related trade-offs through the uneven distribution of decarbonization costs and benefits across social groups and regions, challenging conventional framings of climate justice that focus on a simple Global North–Global South divide. Through a comparative examination of Ireland and Ethiopia, the study shows how distinct political–economic regimes—market-oriented or state-led—can produce parallel forms of spatial injustice during the green transition. The analysis argues that effective governance of the global green transition requires addressing structural drivers of injustice that cut across the North–South divide. A comparative North–South lens thus offers a richer understanding of how equitable governance can foster genuine synergies between mitigation and adaptation.