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Chilvers, Jason 
ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9238-1653, Stephanides, Phedeas ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4201-936X, Pallett, Helen ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-5014-6356, Hargreaves, Tom ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3764-7364, Honeybun-Arnolda, Elliot ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0308-4348, Otto, Danny, Solbu, Gisle, Korsnes, Marius and Skjølsvold, Tomas Moe
(2026)
Ecologies of participation across cultures: Cross-national comparisons of public engagements with energy and climate change.
Energy Research & Social Science, 141.
p. 104951.
ISSN 2214-6296
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Abstract
This paper compares ecologies of participation with energy and climate change in the UK, Norway and Germany. Given the limitations of mainstream approaches that view public participation as highly specific and occurring in discrete one-off processes linked to particular decision moments, new theories, studies and methods are emerging that view participations as diverse, constructed and interrelating in wider systems. While these novel approaches have been explored in specific local, national and institutional settings, we present one of the first international comparative studies of participation systems across cultures. We applied the ecologies of participation framework and comparative case analysis method to map stabilities and diversities of public engagement with energy and climate change occurring between 2015 and 2023 in the UK, Norway and Germany. Our analysis shows how diverse public engagements are co-produced with distinct sociotechnical systems in each country. We empirically identify culturally specific ‘participation-ways’ in each country - i.e. collectively held criteria through which societies determine good or credible forms of participation - which emphasise representativeness of ‘the public’ in the UK, formal political processes and consumption in Norway, and interest group representation through invited consensual ‘dialog’ in Germany. Around these closures and dominant forms of participation exist diverse, emerging and excluded public engagements that overflow institutional framings, and translocal circulations of participations within, between and beyond the three countries. These findings suggest that improving understandings and qualities of public participation depends on attending and responding to these stabilities, diversities, interrelations and exclusions in systems and ecologies of participation.
| Item Type: | Article |
|---|---|
| Additional Information: | Data availability: Research data for this article are available in the supplementary material. |
| Uncontrolled Keywords: | ecologies of participation,energy and climate change,international comparison,participation-ways,public participation,renewable energy, sustainability and the environment,nuclear energy and engineering,fuel technology,energy engineering and power technology,social sciences (miscellaneous) ,/dk/atira/pure/subjectarea/asjc/2100/2105 |
| Faculty \ School: | Faculty of Science > School of Environmental Sciences University of East Anglia Research Groups/Centres > Theme - ClimateUEA |
| UEA Research Groups: | Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Environmental Social Sciences Faculty of Science > Research Groups > Science, Society and Sustainability |
| Related URLs: | |
| Depositing User: | LivePure Connector |
| Date Deposited: | 30 Sep 2026 23:03 |
| Last Modified: | 02 Oct 2026 15:26 |
| URI: | https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/104686 |
| DOI: | 10.1016/j.erss.2026.104951 |
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