Governing Sustainable Energies in China

1. Front Matter

   Pages i-xiii

   PDF

2. Capacity Building for Sustainable Energy Development

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 1-1

      PDF

   2. How States Build Sustainable Energy Capacity

      • Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

      Pages 3-30

   3. Orthodoxies of Energy Governance

      • Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

      Pages 31-63

   4. Theoretical Approaches to the System of Governance of Renewable Energy in China

      • Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

      Pages 65-111

3. China’s Growing ‘Strategic’ Sustainable Energy Industry

   1. Front Matter

      Pages 113-113

      PDF

   2. The Chinese State, the Perceived Environmental Crisis, and the Mixed Paradigm for Diffusing Non-Hydro Renewable Energy

      • Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

      Pages 115-165

   3. Jiangsu: Regional Renewable Planning and Deployment

      • Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

      Pages 167-196

   4. Zhejiang: Regional Renewable Planning and Deployment

      • Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

      Pages 197-218

   5. Towards a New Model of Sustainable Energy Development?

      • Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

      Pages 219-255

4. Back Matter

   Pages 257-296

   PDF

This book examines sustainable energy development in China, a non-liberal state, as a counterexample to conventional wisdom that effective policy outcomes are premised on the basis of decentralized governance. The use of sustainable energies as part of the solution for stabilising global warming has been promoted in industrialised countries for the past three decades. In the last ten years, China has expanded its renewable energy capacity with unprecedented speed and breadth. This phenomenon seems to contradict the principle of orthodox environmental governance, in which stakeholder participation is deemed a necessary condition for effective policy outcomes. Based upon policy documents, news report and interviews with 32 policy makers, business leaders, and NGO practitioners in selected subnational governments, this book examines the politics of sustainable energy in China. It engages debates over the relationships among democratic prioritisation, environmental protection, and economicempowerment, arguing that China’s quasi-corporatist model in the sustainable energy field challenges Western scholars’ dominant assumptions about ecopolitics.

• development
• Ecological Modernisation
• Principal-Agent Problem Solution
• Central-Local Government Relations
• Wind Power
• Solar Power
• Environmental Governance
• Decentralisation
• Sustainability
• Stakeholder Participation
• Renewable Energy
• Local Governance
• Climate Politics
• Earth Policy
• Ecological Civilisation
• Institution
• China

• University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany, Inst Pol. Sci., Inst East Asian Stud., Duisburg, Germany

  Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen

Geoffrey Chun-fung Chen holds a Research Fellow post in the Institute of Political Science at the University of Duisburg-Essen, Germany. He is also a Research Associate at the German Institute of Global and Area Studies. Prior to this appointment, he was an Affiliated Scholar at the Hopkins-Nanjing Center for Chinese and American Studies, China. Chen’s work focuses on Chinese politics, environmental politics, and comparative political economy. He received his PhD from the University of Bath, UK.

Policies and ethics