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Kennard and Schnakenberg (KS) raise three concerns regarding Aklin and Mildenberger ("Prisoners of the Wrong Dilemma: Why Distributive Conflict, Not Collective Action, Characterizes the Politics of Climate Change," Global Environmental Politics 20 (4): 4–27). In this response, we delineate where we agree and where we disagree with KS. We then consider whether the model presented by KS changes our assessment that free-riding concerns are not currently the binding constraint on global climate politics. We conclude with a refined statement of our original claim. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Central bank independence (CBI) solves the time inconsistency problem faced by policymakers with respect to monetary policy. However, it does not solve their underlying incentives to manipulate the economy for political gains. Unable to use monetary policy, and often limited in their ability to use fiscal spending, governments can resort to financial deregulation to generate short‐term political benefits. We show qualitatively and quantitatively that governments systematically weaken financial regulations in the aftermath of CBI, and that the effect of CBI is separate from an ideological shift toward liberalization. Our findings suggest that the growing financialization of the economy experienced by many countries over the last few decades is partly a by‐product of central bank independence. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Climate change policy is generally modeled as a global collective action problem structured by free-riding concerns. Drawing on quantitative data, archival work, and elite interviews, we review empirical support for this model and find that the evidence for its claims is weak relative to the theory's pervasive influence. We find, first, that the strongest collective action claims appear empirically unsubstantiated in many important climate politics cases. Second, collective action claims--whether in their strongest or in more nuanced versions--appear observationally equivalent to alternative theories focused on distributive conflict within countries. We argue that extant patterns of climate policy making can be explained without invoking free-riding. Governments implement climate policies regardless of what other countries do, and they do so whether a climate treaty dealing with freeriding has been in place or not. Without an empirically grounded model for global climate policy making, institutional and political responses to climate change may ineffectively target the wrong policy-making dilemma. We urge scholars to redouble their efforts to analyze the empirical linkages between domestic and international factors shaping climate policy making in an effort to empirically ground theories of global climate politics. Such analysis is, in turn, the topic of this issue's special section. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

International carbon markets are an appealing and increasingly popular tool to regulate carbon emissions. By putting a price on carbon, carbon markets reshape incentives faced by firms and reduce the value of emissions. How effective are carbon markets? Observers have tended to infer their effectiveness from market prices. The general belief is that a carbon market needs a high price in order to reduce emissions. As a result, many observers remain skeptical of initiatives such as the European Union Emissions Trading System (EU ETS), whose price remained low (compared to the social cost of carbon). In this paper, we assess whether the EU ETS reduced CO2 emissions despite low prices. We motivate our study by documenting that a carbon market can be effective if it is a credible institution that can plausibly become more stringent in the future. In such a case, firms might cut emissions even though market prices are low. In fact, low prices can be a signal that the demand for carbon permits weakens. Thus, low prices are compatible with successful carbon markets. To assess whether the EU ETS reduced carbon emissions even as permits were cheap, we estimate counterfactual carbon emissions using an original sectoral emissions dataset. We find that the EU ETS saved about 1.2 billion tons of CO2 between 2008 and 2016 (3.8%) relative to a world without carbon markets, or almost half of what EU governments promised to reduce under their Kyoto Protocol commitments. Emission reductions in sectors covered under the EU ETS were higher. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Do international lenders of last resort create financial instability by generating moral hazard? The evidence is thin and plagued with measurement error. We use the number of American troops hosted by third countries to measure the strength of American commitment to ensuring the countries' economic health. We test several hypotheses against a dataset covering about sixty-eight countries between 1960 and 2009. Using evidence from fixed-effects and instrumental-variable models, we find that increasing the number of US troops by one standard deviation above the mean raises the probability of a financial crisis in the host country by up to 13 percentage points. We also investigate the channels through which moral hazard materializes. Countries with more US troops conduct more expansionary fiscal and monetary policies, implement riskier financial regulations, and receive more capital, especially from US banks. While many scholars of international relations view the American overseas military presence as a source of stability, we identify an underexplored mechanism by which it generates instability. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Unreliable electricity supply is a major obstacle to economic development in countries such as India. While electricity problems in the rural areas are widely recognized, scholars have yet to analyze the situation in urban slums. Drawing on 2004–2005 survey data from the India Human Development Survey, we document the electricity situation in slums. We find that while households located in slums are less likely to have access to the electricity grid than other urban households, the situation is significantly better than in rural areas. Based on simulations, we find that a median household in a slum has 70% chance of having electricity. This number decreases to 50% for a household in a rural area and increases to 80% for households in urban areas. As to daily hours of electricity available for connected households, urban slums also fall between other urban and rural areas. Finally, we show that these conditions vary considerably by state. Slums located in states with low corruption and leftist governments have better electricity access on average than those in states suffering from corruption or that are ruled by rightist parties. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Environmental ministries have become increasingly common, but the determinants of their global spread remain only partially understood. We develop a theory of domestic-international interactions in the global adoption of environmental ministries. We argue that domestic factors can sensitize a country to different types of international influence: foreign pressure, external support for capacity building, and learning effects. Empirically, we examine the global spread of environmental ministries, 1960-2009. We find that countries have strong incentives to establish environmental ministries when they are undergoing a democratic transition and environmental problems are salient at the international level. In other words, the democratization of a country allows international factors to promote the formation of a national environmental ministry. The findings contribute to the study of domestic-international linkages and help understand global trends in environmental governance during a period of unprecedented environmental destruction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Who blames corruption for the poor enforcement of environmental laws? The answer to this question is important since corruption is an important reason why environmental policies are not properly enforced, but previous studies of environmental public opinion do not address the issue. We analyze data from a survey fielded in Brazil in June 2012, immediately preceding the Rio+20 environmental summit. We test hypotheses on income, education, and perception of corruption as a cause of poor enforcement of environmental policy. We find that wealthy individuals are more likely to associate corruption with enforcement failure than their poorer counterparts. However, education is not associated with the belief that corruption is a primary cause of enforcement failure. These results suggest that since wealthy Brazilians have a higher exposure to corruption because of their interaction with government officials, they understand the role of corruption in policy failure. Conversely, the kind of general information that education offers does not raise concern about the role of corruption in environmental policy. The results have important implications particularly in democratic societies, where governments have stronger incentives to address the problem if the concerned public associates corruption with enforcement failure. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

We examine the relationship between socio-economic factors and public opinion on environmental policies in Brazil, drawing on a survey conducted in June 2012. There are few systematic studies of the determinants of environmental preferences in emerging economies, and Brazil is a particularly interesting case because of its democratic political system, rapid economic growth, and importance for the global environment. In general, we find that the Brazilian public is highly supportive of environmental protection. To explain variation in environmental preferences, we focus on the effects of income and education. Many previous studies suggest that both should have positive effects, but the empirical evidence is mixed. Indeed, we find that income has no effect on environmental preferences. However, education is a strong predictor of environmental preferences. While college education is not necessary for environmental awareness, there is a large difference between Brazilians with primary and secondary education. For policy, the findings imply that investment in secondary education can raise environmental awareness, regardless of income levels. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Previous research emphasizes the importance of path dependence for sustainable energy transitions, but their strategic nature is frequently overlooked. We examine formally how exogenous shocks, such as changes in international energy prices, interact with positive reinforcement factors, such as the growing strength of the renewables advocacy coalition. We find that political competition modifies the effect of path dependence on policy and outcomes. Specifically, while 'green' governments can use positive reinforcement mechanisms to lock in policy commitments (by creating green constituencies), 'brown' governments strategically underprovide public support for renewable energy (to avoid creating green constituencies). The effect of positive reinforcement also decreases with international energy prices. Our empirical analysis shows that (1) political competition conditions the policy response to exogenous shocks and market failures, while (2) governments strategically exploit path dependence for political gain. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]