Framework climate change laws are a growing phenomenon in national climate governance and beyond. While their form differs across countries, they typically contain long and medium term decarbonisation targets and mechanisms to incorporate scientific advice. As such, they can be viewed as depoliticising mechanisms, but by placing more or less binding GHG constraints they can also make explicit trade-offs and political choices, including between economic sectors, and can thus serve to politicise even as they depoliticise. This contribution will attempt to situate the growing literature on framework climate laws in the context of the tension between politicisation and depoliticisation.
