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ESG-Agency scholarship most commonly focuses on the global arena as well as Asia and Europe, with critical geographic gaps in Africa and the Middle East.− Climate change is the dominant issue studied in ESG-Agency research, followed by forests and fresh water. − To address the geographic imbalance in ESG-Agency research, scholars need to develop research projects and collaborations in understudied regions while also recruiting and supporting scholars in those regions to engage with this research agenda.

Allocation & Access in ESG–Agency studies is broadly seen as the process of sharing resources among multiple users, where efficiency and equity are the analytical tools for allocation and access, respectively. − Within ESG–Agency scholarship, the allocation of and access to water, food, land, and forest systems is studied widely, but is especially focused on developing countries in Asia, Africa, and South America. − Opportunities for future research include furthering understanding the trade-offs and synergies in conservation policies and potential conflicts with ownership and livelihoods, the role of gender in resource management (especially water resources), evaluating the types of power wielded in this area, and understanding how people acquire it.

− Agency is one of five core analytical problems in the Earth System Governance (ESG) Project’s research framework, which offers a unique approach to the study of environmental governance. − Agency in Earth System Governance draws lessons from ESG–Agency research through a systematic review of 322 peer-reviewed journal articles published between 2008 and 2016 and contained in the ESG–Agency Harvesting Database.− ESG–Agency research draws on diverse disciplinary perspectives with distinct clusters of scholars rooted in the fields of global environmental politics, policy studies, and socio-ecological systems. − Collectively, the chapters in Agency in Earth System Governance provide an accessible synthesis of some of the field’s major questions and debates and a state-of-the-art understanding of how diverse actors engage with and exercise authority in environmental governance.

In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, governments have implemented policies to curb the spread of the novel virus. Little is known about how these policies impact various groups in society. This paper explores the relationship between social distancing policies, traffic volumes and air quality and how they impact various socioeconomic groups. This study aims to understand how disparate communities respond to Stay-at-Home Orders and other social distancing policies to understand how human behavior in response to policy may play a part in the prevalence of COVID-19 positive cases. We collected data on traffic density, air quality, socio-economic status, and positive cases rates of COVID-19 for each zip code of Salt Lake County, Utah (USA) between February 17 and June 12, 2020. We studied the impact of social distancing policies across three periods of policy implementation. We found that wealthier and whiter zip codes experienced a greater reduction in traffic and air pollution during the Stay-at-Home period. However, air quality did not necessarily follow traffic volumes in every case due to the complexity of interactions between emissions and meteorology. We also found a strong relationship between lower socioeconomic status and positive COVID-19 rates. This study provides initial evidence for social distancing's effectiveness in limiting the spread of COVID-19, while providing insight into how socioeconomic status has compounded vulnerability during this crisis. Behavior restrictions disproportionately benefit whiter and wealthier communities both through protection from spread of COVID-19 and reduction in air pollution. Such findings may be further compounded by the impacts of air pollution, which likely exacerbate COVID-19 transmission and mortality rates. Policy makers need to consider adapting social distancing policies to maximize equity in health protection., Comment: 34 pages, 7 figures, 2 tables

− The role of the state as an agent of earth system governance has become more complex, contingent, and interdependent. − Although participatory and collaborative processes have contributed to more effective, equitable, and legitimate environmental governance outcomes in some instances, analyses of these processes should be situated within a broader governance perspective, which recasts questions of policy change around questions of power and justice. −The complexity and normative aspects of agency in earth system governance requires new forms of policy evaluation that account for social impacts and the ability of governance systems to adapt. − Many of the core analytical concepts in ESG–Agency scholarship, such as agency, power, authority, and accountability, remain under-theorized. In addition, some types of actors, including women, labor, non-human agents, those who work against earth system governance, and many voices from the Global South, remain largely hidden. − ESG–Agency scholars need to develop research projects and collaborations in understudied regions while also recruiting and supporting scholars in those regions to engage with this research agenda.

− ESG–Agency scholars have embraced the notion that agent influence is complex, contingent, and context dependent, with the success of environmental governance depending considerably on propitious environmental and social conditions. − Scholars have shifted from an earlier focus on how agents influence behaviours and environmental quality in earth system governance to how they influence governance processes, with increasing focus on democracy, participation, legitimacy, transparency, and accountability. − ESG–Agency scholars employ increasingly diverse methods to integrate insights from case studies, interviews, surveys, statistical analyses, and other approaches leading to deeper and more nuanced understanding of agency in earth system governance. − Adopting more interdisciplinary, multidisciplinary, and transdisciplinary approaches to evaluating agency can foster future understandings of and contributions to earth system governance.

− ESG–Agency scholarship reveals that diverse forms of agency are crucial to cultivating adaptiveness of governance systems within complex and changing contexts. − ESG–Agency scholars are well-positioned to apply extensive insights to major emerging questions in the social sciences about adaptiveness and renewal of political and governance systems across many spheres of society. − Greater focus is required concerning the effects of agency on adaptiveness of environmental governance systems in several ways: materially, normatively, and temporally.

− ESG-Agency scholars are at the forefront of exploring novel forms of agency within changing global governance architectures, such as the emergence of transnational and private governance, over the last decade. − Agency and architecture influence each other in a range of ways, underpinning processes of change in institutions, governance, and politics.− Greater focus is required concerning causal mechanisms of agency-architecture interplay, and their role in producing reflexivity and transformations in governance systems under pressure.

− Agency is one of five core analytical problems in the Earth System Governance (ESG) Project’s research framework, which offers a unique approach to the study of environmental governance. − Agency in Earth System Governance draws lessons from ESG–Agency research through a systematic review of 322 peer-reviewed journal articles published between 2008 and 2016 and contained in the ESG–Agency Harvesting Database.− ESG–Agency research draws on diverse disciplinary perspectives with distinct clusters of scholars rooted in the fields of global environmental politics, policy studies, and socio-ecological systems. − Collectively, the chapters in Agency in Earth System Governance provide an accessible synthesis of some of the field’s major questions and debates and a state-of-the-art understanding of how diverse actors engage with and exercise authority in environmental governance.