Richard Hoggett

Historical institutionalism and the politics of sustainable energy transitions: A research agenda

Improving the understanding of the politics of sustainable energy transitions has become a major focus for research. This paper builds on recent interest in institutionalist approaches to consider in some depth the agenda arising from a historical institutionalist perspective on such transitions. It is argued that historical institutionalism is a valuable complement to socio-technical systems approaches, offering tools for the explicit analysis of institutional dynamics that are present but implicit in the latter framework, opening up new questions and providing useful empirical material relevant for the study of the wider political contexts within which transitions are emerging. Deploying a number of core concepts including veto players, power, unintended consequences, and positive and negative feedback in a variety of ways, the paper explores research agendas in two broad areas: understanding diversity in transition outcomes in terms of the effects of different institutional arrangements, and the understanding of transitions in terms of institutional development and change. A range of issues are explored, including: the roles of electoral and political institutions, regulatory agencies, the creation of politically credible commitment to transition policies, power and incumbency, institutional systems and varieties of capitalism, sources of regime stability and instability, policy feedback effects, and types of gradual institutional change. The paper concludes with some observations on the potential and limitations of historical institutionalism, and briefly considers the question of whether there may be specific institutional configurations that would facilitate more rapid sustainable energy transitions.

Supply Chains and Energy Security

The multidimensional nature of energy security, including the time and scale by which it is assessed, makes its measurement, definition and the assessment of risks and threats to it, problematic. This chapter argues that, regardless of these difficulties, an analysis of the role of current and future supply chains needs to be central to any assessment of energy security. This reflects the fact that, at a macro level, our energy system is essentially a supply chain, comprising multiple and inter-related sub-chains based on different infrastructures, actors, technologies and fuels. It is these that enable energy to be transformed and distributed to meet the demands for energy services such as thermal comfort, power and mobility. In a secure energy system, these supply chains need to operate effectively on an ongoing basis to ensure that the demand for energy services can be balanced with sufficient supply.

People and Communities in Energy Security

This book builds from a basic premise that energy security can be understood and approached in multiple different ways. In this chapter, the focus is on examining how people and communities reconfigure debates about energy security, in particular by bringing to light alternative, sometimes conflictive, understandings of both the problem and its potential solutions. Central to our approach is the concept of framing, which has been defined as, ‘the different ways of understanding or representing a social, technological or natural system and its relevant environment … this includes the ways system elements are bounded, characterized and prioritized, and meanings and normative values attached to each’ (Leach et al., 2010: xiii, emphasis in original).

Demand and Energy Security

As the opening chapter of this book sets out, the multi-dimensional and multi-temporal nature of energy security and the risks and threats to it, stand in the way of any simple assumptions about how to improve British energy security. The role that demand can play in improving energy security is also complex and there is currently a lack of clarity within policy discussions, with terms such as energy efficiency, demand reduction and energy conservation used interchangeably, and rarely applied with rigour. It is also apparent that the current British emphasis is on security of supply, and that demand side debates are generally characterised in terms of carbon, and therefore as if they have little to do with security. We argue that the role of demand should be central to analysis, modelling and policy to meet the goals of creating a secure, affordable and low carbon energy system.