Super wicked problems, practice and transition theory solutions
Creators: name: MEIKLEJOHN, David
Publisher: name: RMIT University
Year: 2024
Subjects: classificationCode: 330401
subject: Community planning
classificationCode: 4104
subject: Environmental management
classificationCode: 410404
subject: Environmental management

description: The activities of Australian local governments seeking to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from households within their municipalities, sit within a broader socio-technical response to climate change. This response is driven by the threats posed by a rapidly changing climate, including rising sea levels, increasing global average temperatures and an increasing incidence of extreme weather events (Stocker et al. 2013). Households account for approximately 18 percent of Australian greenhouse gas emissions, produced through everyday activities, such as heating and cooling space, washing, lighting, cooking and entertaining, and (Shove and Spurling 2013; Garnault 2011). 

To reduce household emissions, local governments perform a set of climate governance practices, including regulation, the provision of infrastructure, the delivery of services, community engagement and advocacy (Moloney and Strengers 2014a; Pucher et al. 2011; Hyder Consulting 2011a; Cuthill 2002; Aulich 2009). However, the climate governance space in which both local governments and households exist and operate is changing rapidly due to fluctuating policy from higher tiers of government and the rise of new energy-based technologies (particularly those associated with renewable energy) which have disrupted domestic energy provision market structures (Haines and McConnell 2013).
 
In this thesis, I explore how Australian local government climate change community engagement to reduce household-based greenhouse gas emissions has changed and how it might change further (and in which direction) to more effectively meet the challenge of climate change. I analyse what has been happening within both local governments and within households (with a particular focus on energy consumption and production), and how local governments might work with households to achieve more substantial emissions reductions. I frame climate change as a super wicked problem, which allows assessment of current and proposed policies and interventions against a framework designed to create effective, lasting policy solutions.

Climate change as a super wicked problem extends Rittel and Webber's (1973) wicked problem conception with the addition of four factors: there is a limited time to respond, the problem is caused by those seeking solutions, there is weak central governance and the value of future benefits are discounted (Levin et al. 2012). To overcome these, solutions need to be immediately popular and easy to integrate into everyday activities, embed themselves within target audiences and then spread quickly to broader populations. I have drawn upon both transition theory (Kemp and Loorbach 2006; Geels 2010; Kemp et al. 2007) and practice theory (Shove and Spurling 2013; Shove et al. 2012a; Schatzki 2015) to understand how the super wicked framing can be applied. Transition theory generates understanding of the place of local government within climate governance regimes, as well as related emissions-producing non-governance regimes, such as energy provision. Practice theory helps to identify complexities within household emissions-producing practices that may make them susceptible or resistant to change as well as governance practices performed by local governments that may help or hinder the achievement of desired changes.

Firstly, I apply these theories to local government community engagement designed to reduce household emissions and how meanings associated with this have shifted over time in Australia, in response to the rapid uptake of rooftop solar. I draw on a review of both academic and grey literature, including 106 Australian local government climate change strategies and a series of interviews with local government officers. I find that the widespread adoption of solar has been driven largely by financial motivations that clash with the sustainability meanings associated with local government community engagement. I suggest new roles for local governments as community-leading disruptors of the energy provision system in order to achieve their emissions reduction objectives. I then examine the uptake of air conditioning, rooftop solar and electric vehicles in terms of their effects upon the provision of residential electricity in Australia and how these new technologies have disrupted relationships between households and electricity distributors. I propose using Strengers' (2012) concept of 'co-management of practices' to help manage the advent of electric vehicles.
I then consider how current local government climate change community engagement methodologies, with their reliance upon behaviour change theories, might benefit from using practice theory to deliver more effective solutions. From in-depth interviews with local government officers, I find that applying a practice lens encourages councils to think about the specific everyday household practices that produce greenhouse gas emissions, how these might be reshaped to lower emissions and the relationship between these household practices and the climate governance practices performed by local governments. Finally, I consider an emerging climate governance trend amongst local governments - the declaration of a climate emergency to accelerate the pace and broaden the scope of governance responses to climate change. I review documents generated by the climate emergency movement, local government strategies, relevant academic literature and public statements by key actors. I find that there is limited guidance for local governments on precisely how to respond to a climate emergency, and that transition management offers a potential way forward by developing new transition arenas that extend beyond climate governance.

I conclude the thesis with a discussion on the theme of ongoing change within both local government and households, and the tension between a lack of clear national climate governance and the increasing adoption of technologies that have the potential to reduce emissions within the residential sector. I discuss the need for further research, with particular regard to the need for local governments to reflect upon their own governance practices and suggest new emphases within community engagement, shifting beyond reducing emissions to disrupting the regimes in which they are situated. Both practice theory and transition theory have the potential to be useful in helping local governments explore new these new roles.