Twentieth International Conference on Environmental, Cultural, Economic & Social Sustainability

Abstract

This paper frames responsibility to act through the lens of a 2021 research study of the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) of the parties to the UNFCCC’s Paris Agreement. These formal documents express the policy intentions of 196 nations with ambitious sustainability and emissions-reductions goals. The purpose of the study was to develop a framework of multi-level climate actions across the parties to the Paris Agreement. A content analysis of the text of an influential sample of NDCs considered management theories that inform action, agency theory, stakeholder theory, institutional theory, and the resource-based view of organizations. The study found that policymakers responded to the existential threat of climate change by prioritizing two overarching strategies–transforming behavior and providing resources–to align government, civil society, and business. The paper explores the multi-level governance concepts of vertical coherence and horizontal cooperation, critical factors noted throughout the NDCs, through examples and illustrations drawn from policy documents and external sources. A sustainability innovation framework that integrates the concepts of management theory along with multi-level climate action will be described, suggesting the potential for collective action by policymakers, leaders, and negotiators to respond to the challenges of climate change. The discussion explores agency theory factors of leadership and negotiation, stakeholder theory factors of engagement and education, institutional theory factors of regulation and standards, and resource-based factors of financing and vulnerable resource protection, among others, aiming for positive impacts to the environment, economy, society, and culture.