Climate Policy Integration on the National and Regional Level: A Case Study for Austria and Styria

Abstract

Many climate-relevant decisions are taken in other policy areas with only little regard to climate change impacts. In order for climate policy to be successful it has to be integrated in decision-making and legislative processes in basically all policy areas and all levels of government. We analyse the extent of climate policy integration (CPI) in Austrian policy-making via in-depth expert interviews, both on the federal level as well as on the regional level using Styria as case study. The results show a broad range of perceptions regarding the degree of CPI in Austria. The consideration of climate policy issues generally depends on the core competence of the respective institution. Moreover, we found widely diverging views on whether CPI in Austria is too ambitious or too weak. Especially, potential negative impacts of climate policy on competitiveness or employment are seen to hamper a more ambitious implementation of mitigation policies.Keywords: climate policy integration, Austria, surveyJEL Classifications: C83, Q48, Q54, Q58