5 constitutional mechanisms, representative institutions, federal structures, functional differentiation of ministries, professional bureaucracies, policy frameworks, and so on, emerged through complex and long term processes of institutional evolution, cross national imitation and learning, and iterative lesson drawing and design. Over the course of the twentieth century, government activities in the OECD states focused largely on ‘security’ (the maintenance of order, the administration of justice), ‘economy’ (promoting economic growth, monetary stability, competition and consumer protection), and ‘welfare’ (welfare state, public provision, ‘social safety net’). In less developed regions the focus of government attention over the past six decades has been accelerating ‘development’ – a multi dimensional process that involves economic, social and political advance. From the late 1960s modern institutions of environmental governance came into being across the developed world, spreading later to developing countries. But they remain weak compared to more established areas of government competence (Meadowcroft 2009). The emergence of climate change now requires a further phase of innovation and adjustment to governance practices.

There has been discussion in the literature about the difficulties democratic states encounter when dealing with climate change (and environmental problems more generally) (Lafferty and Meadowcroft 1996; Eckersley 2004). And some suggestion that democratic states do not perform better than non democratic states in reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Various factors that hinder decisive action in democratic states are cited, including: the tendency for politicians to hesitate to introduce reforms that may antagonize voters (imposing higher energy taxes for example); the incentives for political leaders to try to attract votes by opposing more vigorous measure that might be suggested by their opponents; the influence of powerful economic lobbies that can mobilize to protect their interests and resist change (as compared with the more diffuse concern for long term climate protection held by ordinary voters); the existence of multiple ‘veto points’ and ‘checks and balances’ that slow decision making; and the ambivalent role of the media in simplifying and polarizing debate.

Such mechanisms are real, and appreciating their operation is important in order to develop more effective governance around climate change. On the other hand, it is not clear that at this point comparisons between the climate performance of democratic and non democratic states are particularly meaningful or helpful. The sorts of mechanisms described above are always operative in democratic polities: perverse results often arise from the operation of political and administrative processes. But, of course, parallel processes are also at work in non‐democratic states – it is just that they are hidden from view. Over the long term, governments in non democratic states also have to pay attention to the impacts of policy on their citizens; and while political and policy competition are organized differently, they still take place.

The results of large‐n studies that compare climate policy performance between democratic and non democratic states must be treated with caution. A period of at least twenty years is generally regarded as the minimum over which meaningful studies of policy change should be conducted (Sabatier 1993), and in the case of major long term issues like climate change the period is probably longer. Moreover, the absence of non‐democratic advanced industrialized 5