Abstract: Multilateral efforts are essential to an effective response to climate change, but individual nations define climate action policy by translating local and global objectives into adaptation and mitigation actions. We propose a conceptual framework to explore opportunities for polycentric climate governance, understanding polycentricity as a property that encompasses the potential for coordinating multiple centers of semiautonomous decision-making. We assert that polycentrism engages a diverse array of public and private actors for a more effective approach to reducing the threat of climate change. In this way, polycentrism may provide an appropriate strategy for addressing the many challenges of climate governance in the Anthropocene. We review two Chilean case studies: Chile's Nationally Determined Contribution on Climate Change and the Chilean National Climate Change Action Plan. Our examination demonstrates that Chile has included a diversity of actors and directed significant financial resources to both processes. The central government coordinated both of these processes, showing the key role of interventions at higher jurisdictional levels in orienting institutional change to improve strategic planning and better address climate change. Both processes also provide some evidence of knowledge co-production, while at the same time remaining primarily driven by state agencies and directed by technical experts. Efforts to overcome governance weaknesses should focus on further strengthening existing practices for climate change responses, establishing new institutions, and promoting decision-making that incorporates diverse social actors and multiple levels of governance. In particular, stronger inclusion of local level actors provides an opportunity to enhance polycentric modes of governance and improve climate change responses. Fully capitalizing on this opportunity requires establishing durable communication channels between different levels of governance.

Abstract: The importance of science for climate governance has strengthened over time and the topic inspires prolific academic writing on the influence of scientists and scientific knowledge on policy decisions. One of the streams of research in the field is inspired by Cash ' s (2003) seminal work highlighting how the role of scientists depends on perceptions of salience, credibility and legitimacy. Other views call for attention to the politics involved in scientific performance while influencing policy and on the local circumstances, considering the many ways in which societies relate to science and expertise. The role of scientists in climate governance is a contested issue, relevant for many research centres aiming to influence policy decisions given the urgency of the climate crisis. To better understand this role, we reviewed mainstream international literature and identified four main ap-proaches, which we label: scientific usable knowledge, politics of science, critical approaches and hybrid ap-proaches. We contrasted the results with the experience of scientists from a Chilean climate research centre, to provide a view from the South on the role of scientists in climate governance. Our results show that Cash ' s approach was a common ground for Chilean climate scientists, upon which they build ideas on the importance of building long-term relationships between scientists and policy makers. However, they also acknowledged the need to take into consideration the role of politics in climate-related decisions and the power relations and actor ' s interests.

Abstract: Non-technical summaryThe significant outlays by countries in the Global South to recover from the COVID-19 crisis could have been an opportunity to build back better, advancing both a green recovery and addressing pressing social problems, thus advancing sustainability. To examine if this was the case, in this paper we analyze the expected impacts of recovery initiatives in five Latin American countries. Our results show that these programs do not support the possibility of building back better, weakly impacting 12 dimensions related to sustainability. We also propose a methodology to improve how sustainability concerns can be included in future choice of projects. Technical summaryIt has been argued that the significant outlays by governments across the world required to recover from the COVID-19 crisis can be an opportunity to build back better, that is, advance toward greener societies. In the Global South, which suffered acute social, economic and environmental problems prior to this health crisis, recovery initiatives would be best suited to focus on sustainable economic recovery which – along with the environmental concerns of a green recovery – could address pressing local problems. To this end, we analyzed the expected impacts of recovery initiatives in five Latin American countries on each of 71 sustainability criteria. These criteria are based on the UN sustainable development goals and other relevant literature related to sustainable development. Using principal component analysis, criteria are grouped into 12 dimensions. Our results show that recovery programs examined do not take advantage of the possibility of building back better, and many relevant dimensions related to a sustainable recovery are only weakly considered. Our methodology provides a step forward toward supporting governments in their efforts to identify better policies and investment projects and consequently put together packages of initiatives that advance on sustainability, green recovery or other long-term goals they may have. Social media summaryMethodology to analyze COVID-19 recovery packages shows small impact on sustainability in five Latin American countries.