Decentring our appreciation of the association of factors and cities' mitigation patterns

Sombol Mokhles; Kathryn Davidson; Jason Thompson; Michele Acuto

doi:10.1016/j.uclim.2025.102543

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Decentring our appreciation of the association of factors and cities' mitigation patterns

Journal article

Open access

Peer reviewed

Decentring our appreciation of the association of factors and cities' mitigation patterns

Sombol Mokhles, Kathryn Davidson, Jason Thompson and Michele Acuto

Urban Climate, Vol.62, pp.1-22

2025

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.uclim.2025.102543

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Abstract

A ‘more global’ urban comparison

Factors

Global south cities

Mitigation actions

Patterns

Urban climate governance

Urban climate governance literature has advanced in understanding how cities address climate change, but most quantitative studies focus disproportionately on large, globally prominent cities in the north, overlooking smaller and Global South cities. This gap limits our understanding of how diverse factors shape cities' mitigation actions and whether Global North and Global South cities follow distinct pathways. This study investigates how networking, political economy, socio-cultural, and environmental factors are associated with cities' mitigation patterns—using sectoral and finance-implementation approaches as proxies for the advancement of climate governance. Drawing on a more representative dataset, we identify that cities with stronger environmental commitment (e.g., emission inventories, risk reporting) tend to implement cross-sectoral mitigation actions, particularly in building and energy systems. National-level wealth and institutional quality (GDP per capita, corruption) also influence sectoral priorities, while finance patterns remain less explained. We further find that C40 membership and globalisation are significantly associated with more ambitious actions in the Global South cities, but not in the Global North, underscoring asymmetric benefits of global networks. Our results reveal that no single factor explains urban climate governance patterns, highlighting how political, economic, and geographic co-dependencies produce divergent climate action pathways. By centering overlooked cities, this study contributes to a more inclusive and context-sensitive understanding of urban climate governance.

Details

Title: Decentring our appreciation of the association of factors and cities' mitigation patterns
Authors: Sombol Mokhles (Corresponding Author) - Australian National University
Kathryn Davidson - The University of Melbourne
Jason Thompson - The University of Melbourne
Michele Acuto - University of Bristol
Publication details: Urban Climate, Vol.62, pp.1-22
Publisher: Elsevier BV
Date published: 2025
DOI: 10.1016/j.uclim.2025.102543
ISSN: 2212-0955
Copyright note: © 2025 The Author(s). Published by Elsevier B.V. This is an open access article under the CC BY license (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/).
Data Availability: Data will be made available on request.
Grant note: This work was supported by the University of Melbourne's Graduate Research Scholarship.
Organisation Unit: Centre for Human Factors and Systems Science
Language: English
Record Identifier: 991184302502621
Output Type: Journal article

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Collaboration types: Domestic collaboration; International collaboration
Web Of Science research areas: Environmental Sciences; Meteorology & Atmospheric Sciences

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