Policy Indexes as Tools for Decision Makers: The Case of Climate Policy
| DOI | http://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12121 |
| Date | 01 September 2014 |
| Author | Swenja Surminski,Andrew Williamson |
| Published date | 01 September 2014 |
Policy Indexes as Tools for Decision Makers:
The Case of Climate Policy
Swenja Surminski and Andrew Williamson
Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy/Grantham Research Institute on
Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economic and Political
Science
Abstract
The last two decades have witnessed an explosion in the publication of country indexes that measure and rank the rel-
ative national policy performances of governments. To illustrate the challenges of using and applying these tools we
focus on those four indexes that have been specifically designed in response to the emergence of the relatively new
policy area of climate change. We investigate if and how these tools provide information about the evolving landscape
of climate policy in the BRIC (Brazil, Russia, India and China) countries, widely considered the future battleground of
climate policy. We find that even for this relatively narrow area different methodologies exist. Interpreting and applying
climate policy indexes across countries therefore requires a solid understanding of underlying objectives and data used
for each index. A clear gap is the underrepresentation of adaptation policy in all four indexes. Our investigation
concludes with a reflection on how climate policy indexes are currently applied, including business planning. These
tools provide informative pointers that can be of use for stakeholders, nevertheless they should not be considered in
isolation, but need to be complemented by a broader view on what is driving particular responses to climate change
in a country.
Policy Implications
•Those stakeholders who consult and use climate policy indexes need to be aware of underlying technical
challenges that get easily overlooked in the quest for benchmarking policies in a simple, quantitative way.
•Climate adaptation policy is clearly underrepresented in the current climate policy indexes. This is an important
gap and may be addressed by specific‘adaptation policy indexes’in the future.
•These tools provide informative pointers that can be of use for stakeholders, but they should be complemented by
a broader view on what is driving particular responses to climate change in a country.
•Assessing and comparing national public policies certainly has value, but particularly in the area of climate change
it is important to also reflect on other forms of governance, beyond the traditional national level, that could drive
climate change action. Examples are private sector NGO agreements or city networks.
•Climate policy indexes can provide input to strategic planning tools. As climate policy is of growing interest to
some investors and businesses these tools can assist them in their strategic planning as well as their engagement
efforts with governments, particularly when assessing the potential of new or emerging markets.
•Those stakeholders wishing to influence and shape climate policy in these countries need to look beyond these-
indexes, to be able to engage at the earliest stages of the policy cycle. Indexes cannot reflect on the dynamics of
thepolicy process.
The compulsion to measure
We seem to live in a world where everything is being
measured, compared, benchmarked and mapped. Deci-
sion makers demand numbers, league tables and rank-
ings to argue their case, to justify their strategies, or to
monitor their peers. This ‘compulsion to measure’is evi-
dent across governments, businesses and wider society.
One area where this trend is particularly noticeable is in
the field of public policy monitoring and evaluation. We
have witnessed increasing efforts in recent years to
quantify certain aspects of public policy performance
and to compare it against a set of goals or against other
governments, across countries and policy areas. This has
resulted in an explosion of country rankings that include
a wide range of policy indexes (Bandura, 2008). These
analytical tools facilitate the assessment of a multitude of
dimensions relating to a specific policy issue within a sin-
gle, comparable measure across agents. A well-known
example is the UN’s Human Development Index, which
Global Policy (2014) 5:3 doi: 10.1111/1758-5899.12121 ©2014 University of Durham and John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.
Global Policy Volume 5 . Issue 3 . September 2014 275
Research Article
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