Documents Traill, Helen 2 results

"Nowhere are the failings of the neoliberal political and economic order more evident than in its signature project of privatisation. As privatisation and marketised solutions continue to fail, state intervention and public ownership are coming back, in diverse ways, to the management and governance of the economy. This chapter critically appraises the return of public ownership and its wider significance for a more progressive political economy. It is particularly concerned with the potential to create democratic forms of economy out of the crisis of neoliberal governance, whilst avoiding the failings of older hierarchical forms of state management in the twentieth century. The wider arguments are illustrated through the lens of the energy sector and the failures there of faux market solutions compared with the potential for public ownership and planned responses to deal with the climate emergency. Alternative examples of more democratic, less hierarchical forms of public ownership are illustrated."

"There is increasing enthusiasm at urban and municipal scales for leading sustainability transitions, amid higher level endorsement and even expectation of such leadership. Yet this downscaling of responsibility for transition requires a greater critical focus. It raises questions of how evenly spread the capacity to lead on this is, and how it relates to the complex and differentiated multi-scalar governance structures and political landscapes within which municipal actors are situated. This article draws upon evidence from a mixed methods comparative and multi-scalar analysis across Europe exploring the different pressures and potential that exist for municipalities. Our central aim is to critically interrogate what municipalities are doing to achieve a post-carbon energy transition beyond lofty aspirations. Departing from the tendency to focus on paradigmatic success stories, our research on the different conditions affecting municipalities across the continent suggests that the focus so far on case studies and techno-social solutions is insufficient for considering the broader geographical patterns and multi-scalar tensions of transition. Our findings suggest that while municipalities are alive to the opportunities to lead on sustainability transitions, we need a clearer understanding of the ways that policy and politics at national and international scales shape political capacities for action. There are clear limits to independent municipal action, particularly without more supportive interventions at higher scales. The increased urgency for sustainability transitions requires far more multi-scalar and trans-local coordination than that exists at present, although the building blocks of such work may be beginning to emerge."