Barriers and Opportunities to Implementing Climate Action Policy in Irish Local Authorities

“Think local, act global” has emerged as a maxim in climate action over recent years. This has placed a greater focus on local government’s role in climate action. However, the translation of national climate action ambitions into specific local strategies faces significant challenges. In Ireland, local government has been criticised for ad hoc implementation of climate action and struggling to successfully balance its long-term challenges with everyday politics and administration. This research brings local context to the fore to understand how the objectives of locally developed climate adaptation and mitigation strategies are translated into actions on the ground, and the processes, decisions and discretion involved in doing so. The study is focused on three local authorities in Ireland and attempts to build a theory of street-level policy implementation in the area of climate policy, drawing on the broader literature on street-level bureaucracy which addresses the mechanics of policy implementation in other policy domains. This type of in-depth research of a small number of cases has been identified as being crucial to capturing interesting and important nuances in decision-making processes that generate varying policy outputs and outcomes in the area of climate governance. Using a combination of semi-structured interviews and participant observation, this research examines climate policy implementation through the lens of bureaucrats working in local government; how they incorporate climate action into their work; and the enabling and constraining factors they encounter in doing so. Crucially, it addresses a gap in the literature in understanding how climate action is taking shape in local government settings. In addressing these issues, this research explores larger theoretical questions about local agency; capacity for leadership within a multi-level governance system, and the extent to which local government officials can be considered impactful policy actors in their own right. This abstract directly addresses two topics that have been identified for this panel: local climate policies and measures and the role of local agency in progressing or hindering climate policy. It also taps into interest in local climate governance coming from both practitioners and scholars which has been identified in the call for paper.