Taking Responsibility: is There a Climate ‘Governance Trap’ in the UK and Does it Matter?

Recent research has questioned the long-running assumption that politicians and publics pass responsibility for tackling climate change onto one another, and that this is a major impediment to political action on the issue (the ‘governance trap’ thesis) (Falck, 2024). This paper develops this debate through a matched survey of British MPs, local councillors and citizens, testing who they attribute responsibility for cutting greenhouse gas emissions to. The results are inconsistent with the notion that governments and the governed perceive one another to hold primary responsibility for tackling climate change. The findings also reveal that local and national politicians ascribe responsibility for climate change mitigation in a similar manner, and that there is left-right ideological polarisation in how both politicians and citizens perceive the question of responsibility. Indeed, ideological orientation is a stronger predictor of responsibility attribution than whether respondents are MPs, councillors, or members of the public. The paper also makes a conceptual contribution, reflecting on the usefulness of the ‘governance trap’ thesis for understanding climate politics in light of the empirical research presented in previous research and this paper. The paper argues that there is reason to doubt the precise claim that ‘both the government and the governed seek to attribute primary responsibility to the other’ (Pidgeon, 2012 p.89). However, some of the fundamental issues raised by the original ‘governance trap’ argument remain important for understanding the politics of climate change, namely: citizens do expect leadership from governments on the issue, in practice in some subtle ways policymakers do shift responsibility for climate change onto individuals, and policymakers are fearful of voter backlashes again climate change mitigation policies. Falck, R. (2024). How politicians and the population attribute responsibility for climate change mitigation: no indication of a ‘governance trap’ in Norway. Environmental Politics, 33(4), 699–726. https://doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2023.2274721 Pidgeon, N. (2012). Public understanding of, and attitudes to, climate change: UK and international perspectives and policy. Climate Policy, 12(SUPPL. 1). https://doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2012.702982