Acceptance, Trade-Offs, and Resistance: Energy Policy Beyond Consensus

Abstract

Energy transitions increasingly depend on policy instruments and infrastructure choices that intervene directly in economic activity, territorial governance, and everyday practices. This panel examines how public acceptance, prioritisation, and trust condition the political feasibility of these interventions, with a focus on energy and environmental policy in Europe. Rather than treating public support as a residual constraint, the papers analyse it as a structured and contested dimension of policy design and governance. The contributions address issues such as how citizens evaluate trade-offs between different environmental objectives, including climate mitigation and biodiversity protection; how they respond to intrusive or restrictive policy instruments such as bans; and how acceptance varies across sectors, places, and social groups. Several papers examine the conditions under which energy infrastructures and emerging technologies generate consent or backlash, highlighting the role of local impacts, benefit-sharing arrangements, and participatory guarantees. The panel also engages with broader questions of governance and legitimacy under conditions of stress. It considers how crises, rapid policy shifts, and geopolitical shocks reshape public trust in governing institutions, and how visible policy action can either mitigate or exacerbate societal resistance. Across these themes, the papers emphasise that legitimacy in energy policy is not only a matter of long-term goals or aggregate outcomes, but of how conflicts, trade-offs, and distributional effects are managed.

Title	Details
Energy Crisis Governance and Public Trust: Assessing EU Policy Responses to the 2022–2023 Energy Shock	View Paper Details
Green Bans: Theory and Emprical Evidence	View Paper Details
Environmental Trade-Offs in Public Opinion: Prioritization for Biodiversity Loss Vs. Climate Change Policy Instruments	View Paper Details
Backlash Against Green Industrial Policy? The Acceptability of Solar Parks, Hydrogen Plants and Battery Factories in Four European Countries	View Paper Details
From Policy Strategies to Local Realities: Expectations of and Factors Shaping Public Engagement in Emerging Energy Infrastructures	View Paper Details