ABSTRACT

In order to explore the strengths and weaknesses of democracies in mitigating climate change, this article presents a review of more than two decades of research on the democracy-climate nexus. It studies 72 identified articles and book chapters in which correlation analyses between indicators of democracy and climate policy performances have been conducted. The review confirms that democracies tend to generate better climate policy outputs than autocracies, in terms of adoption of policies, laws and regulations. However, there is weak empirical evidence for an association between democratic development and CO₂ emission reductions. While empirical evidence shows that democracy can promote decarbonization, aspects such as economic growth, income distribution, energy mix, state capacity and corruption can influence the outcome of decarbonization policy or even counteract it. The research indicates that with deployment of renewable energy, economic activities are increasingly disconnected from fossil fuel dependence, and the political influence of the fossil fuel industry reduced. This process could also enhance the capacity of democracies to accelerate the energy transition and reduce emission levels. Investments in renewable energy, together with policies aiming at combating corruption and accomplishing a fairer wealth distribution, could help to unleash the transformative capacity of democracy towards a low-carbon future.

摘要

为了探讨民主国家在减缓气候变化方面的优势和劣势，本文回顾了二十多年来民主与气候关系的研究。它研究了 72 篇已确定的文章和书籍章节，其中对民主指标与气候政策绩效之间的相关性进行了分析。审查证实，在政策、法律和法规的采用方面，民主国家往往比独裁国家产生更好的气候政策成果。_{然而，民主发展与 CO 2}之间存在关联的经验证据很薄弱。减排。虽然经验证据表明民主可以促进脱碳，但经济增长、收入分配、能源结构、国家能力和腐败等方面可能会影响甚至抵消脱碳政策的结果。研究表明，随着可再生能源的部署，经济活动越来越脱离对化石燃料的依赖，化石燃料行业的政治影响力也随之降低。这一过程还可以增强民主国家加速能源转型和降低排放水平的能力。对可再生能源的投资，加上旨在打击腐败和实现更公平的财富分配的政策，可能有助于释放民主的变革能力，迈向低碳未来。