Paper Short Abstract:

This paper examines the politics of EU climate policy-making that informs the creation and implementation of climate policy initiatives, such as the EU Mission 100, launched by the European Commission to encourage cities to draft and implement plans to become climate-neutral by 2030. The examination of the politics of EU climate policy-making centers on historicizing the urgency and inevitability written into initiatives of anticipatory governance, such as the Mission 100, by outlining and recasting the EU as one of numerous multilateral polities, institutions, and organizations involved in bringing climate change into policy focus and action. Presenting ongoing research conducted for the project titled ‘Competing Urgencies: Translating Climate Neutrality Policy in the European Union,’ the paper discusses the analytical benefits of exploring the genealogy of EU climate change policies as a means of critically engaging with the claims of urgency, inevitability, legitimacy, and expertise upon which they are based.

Paper Abstract:

This paper examines the politics of EU climate policy-making that informs the creation and implementation of climate policy initiatives, such as the EU Mission 100, launched by the European Commission to encourage cities to draft and implement plans to become climate-neutral by 2030. In its climate change policies, the EU has identified cities as being crucial sites for climate change policy implementation. While cities take up only 4% of the territory of the EU, they are home to almost three-quarters of all EU citizens. Policymakers estimate that the process of EU urbanization will increase in the future, only augmenting the necessity and urgency attributed to implementing measures to render cities – and their inhabitants – more resilient to the inevitable changes that are to come.

The examination of the politics of EU climate policy-making centers on historicizing the urgency and inevitability written into initiatives of anticipatory governance, such as the Mission 100, by outlining and recasting the EU as one of numerous multilateral polities, institutions, and organizations involved in bringing climate change into policy focus and action. Presenting ongoing research conducted for the project titled ‘Competing Urgencies: Translating Climate Neutrality Policy in the European Union,’ the paper discusses the analytical benefits of exploring the genealogy of EU climate change policies as a means of critically engaging with the claims of urgency, inevitability, legitimacy, and expertise upon which they are based.