Climate Governance : A Polycentric Approach in Eastern Caribbean

Abstract: Natural disasters are on the rise in the Caribbean due to climate change that affects several OECS member states in the Eastern Caribbean region. However, OECS governments have developed structures for reducing vulnerability and building resilience. Climate change and disaster resilience projects were implemented, and regional, national, and local support is provided. A prominent voice in climate governance debate is late Elinor Ostrom, who argues that global climate agreements should be decentralized and taken place locally rather than centrally. According to Ostrom, a bottom-up approach creates a more multilevel governing system. This approach is described as a "polycentric approach" by Ostrom. A polycentric governance is argued to provide several benefits and is effective in combating climate change. Our study examines whether the existing regional and local climate projects and programmes of the OECS member states follow a polycentric approach to climate governance. In this study, the data were analysed by employing two frameworks that are related to the theory of polycentric approaches to climate governance, that have been used in previous studies. With this we aim to capture the multifaceted nature of polycentric climate governance.