Open AccessNavigating tensions between rapid and just low-carbon transitions
Author(s) -
Peter Newell,
Frank W. Geels,
Benjamin K. Sovacool
Publication year - 2022
Publication title -
environmental research letters
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 2.37
H-Index - 124
ISSN - 1748-9326
DOI - 10.1088/1748-9326/ac622a
Subject(s) - economic justice , transition (genetics) , perspective (graphical) , face (sociological concept) , action (physics) , citizen journalism , focus (optics) , political economy , sociology , political science , law and economics , economic system , economics , computer science , law , social science , biochemistry , chemistry , physics , optics , quantum mechanics , artificial intelligence , gene
In this Perspective, we suggest that research on just transitions and energy justice needs to better attend to the increasingly important trade-offs arising from issues related to speed and acceleration of low-carbon transitions. We identify and elaborate two important tensions that policymakers face when they want to simultaneously achieve both just and rapid low-carbon transitions. First, the way in which participatory processes may increase justice but slow the speed of action; and second the way in which incumbent mobilization can accelerate transitions but entrench injustices. Such an analysis shifts the focus from mapping justice dimensions to acknowledging the inevitable trade-offs and winners and losers produced by transition processes as a first step to better navigating them.