The politics and geopolitics of the net-zero transition are entering a new phase. On the one hand, the core direction of travel is clearer than ever: the IPCC, IEA and UNEP all converge on the need for rapid emissions reductions and global net zero around mid-century to avoid the most dangerous climate impacts. A striking majority of states have now adopted some form of long-term climate, net-zero or fossil fuel phase-out target — even though many countries missed the 2025 deadline to submit updated NDCs — creating a landscape of headline ambition that is not yet matched by delivery. On the other hand, these formal commitments coexist with persistent gaps between declared ambition and actual implementation. Delivering on existing targets requires not only additional policy instruments, but also durable political coalitions, bureaucratic and fiscal capacity, and strategies to manage distributional conflict within and across societies. A green backlash is present in many countries, driven by actors including interest groups, political parties and a related shift in public opinion.
At the same time, the external context for climate action is becoming more contested. Decarbonization is no longer framed solely as a domain of international cooperation but is increasingly shaped by geoeconomic and security concerns. Governments deploy green industrial policies to strengthen domestic manufacturing, secure supply chains, and accelerate technology diffusion. These measures can speed up transitions but also trigger protectionist responses, trade disputes, or fragmentation of global climate governance. This geopolitical turn particularly affects the EU and other climate frontrunners, whose foreign economic policies now intersect more visibly with their climate ambitions.
This section invites papers that use political science and adjacent disciplines to explain how ambitious climate goals are formulated, negotiated, implemented, and contested across levels of governance, and how changing geopolitical conditions affect these processes. We welcome theoretical, empirical, and comparative contributions, including work focused on the EU, major emitters, and low- and middle-income countries, as well as research using qualitative, quantitative, or mixed methods.
We particularly welcome contributions for the following list of provisional panel topics, or related panel topics:
- Domestic Politics of Net Zero: Drivers, Veto Players, and Coalitions - examining how domestic actors, institutions, and coalitions enable or block implementation of net-zero and phase-out policies, including questions of climate policy ambition, feasibility, durability, and dismantling.
- Populists vs the Greens? Electoral Competition, Public Opinion, and Contestation - analyzing electoral competition, party politics, and public opinion in climate and energy policy, including the role of populist and radical parties, climate (dis)information, and local opposition or support for decarbonization.
- Justice and Democracy in Climate Action and Just Transitions – assessing normative and empirical questions of justice, democracy, and legitimacy in climate action and energy transitions, including fossil fuel phase-out, just transition frameworks, and distributive conflicts within and between the Global North and South.
- Climate Policy and Reindustrialization: Clash or Alignment? Exploring the interaction between decarbonization, reindustrialization, and security concerns, including green industrial strategies, climate–trade–security linkages, and their implications for competitiveness and climate leadership in the EU and beyond.
- Sectoral and Infrastructure Politics of Decarbonization – investigating sector-specific and infrastructure struggles in the transition (e.g. energy-intensive industry, mobility, buildings, agriculture, hydrogen, grids and interconnectors) as key arenas of political conflict, coalition-building, and policy innovation as well as comparative perspectives on private businesses and their distinct pathways to decarbonization.
- From Pledges to Pathways: Analysing the New Round of Paris Pledges- analyzing the new NDCs and other pledges under the Paris Agreement, asking how scenarios, transition pathways, advisory bodies, and indicators shape target-setting, and how ambition interacts with implementation capacity and political constraints.
- Climate Clubs and Emerging Governance Arrangements under the Paris Agreement - assessing emerging international, regional, and plurilateral governance arrangements—such as climate clubs—and their interaction with the UNFCCC regime, focusing on legitimacy, effectiveness, and their role in closing the ambition–implementation gap.
- The European Green Deal in Practice: Governance, Durability, and Contestation - investigating the European Green Deal’s implementation in and across EU member states, including policymaking and governance challenges, multilevel and corporatist coordination, and struggles over the durability or dismantling of key policies.
- North–South Dynamics, Climate Finance & Green Industrialization analyzing North–South dynamics in the transition, including climate finance, debt and fiscal constraints, technology access, value chain dynamics, technological upgrading and green industrialization
- Methods and Data Innovations in Climate and Energy Politics- studies using innovative methods, designs, and datasets to study climate and energy politics across countries and over time, including comparative, experimental, quantitative, qualitative, or mixed-methods approaches
The Section is proposed and endorsed by the ECPR Standing Group on Energy Politics, Policy, and Governance. The Group also proposes the ‘Energy Policy in Times of Reconfiguration’ section and a section on ‘Geoeconomics and Economic Statecraft along Clean Energy Supply Chains’. We suggest that contributions bordering the energy and climate fields be directed primarily there.
