Climate change is a 'wicked' problem--it is riven with scientific uncertainty, contending interests, and competing interpretations. For India, the challenges of addressing climate change are compounded by a sense of injustice - we did not cause the problem -- and immediate challenges of poverty and development. Yet, it is increasingly becoming clear that globally, climate change poses an existential challenge, and, in India, a pathway to development innocent of climate change is no longer possible.
How is India facing up to the climate challenge? This volume brings together leading researchers and practitioners - negotiators, activists and policymakers--to lay out the emergent debate on climate change in India. The book covers climate impacts, negotiations, politics, policy, and the integration of climate concerns into sectoral debates, such as on energy and water. Each chapter provides an accessible entry point and a framework for understanding an aspect of India's engagement with climate change.
A central theme of the book is that India has shifted from understanding the climate change problem as a diplomatic challenge to increasingly engaging with it as a developmental problem. To address this challenge requires integrating climate change and development, and doing so at multiple scales of governance - national, state, and local.
Navroz K. Dubash, Professor, Centre for Policy Research
Navroz K Dubash is a Professor at the Centre for Policy Research. He has been following and participating in the climate debate as a researcher, policy advisor and activist for over 25 years. In 1990 he was instrumental in establishing the global Climate Action Network and participated in the climate negotiations in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, and has since written widely about climate politics, policy and governance at international, national and local scales. He is currently co-leading a chapter on national climate policies for the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. He has been involved in informing Indian government policy-making on climate change over the last decade, and is also active in policy committees on energy, air and water policy. He serves on the editorial boards of several journals including Climate Policy (as Associate Editor), Global Environmental Politics, and Energy Research in Social Science. In 2015 he was conferred the 12th T N Khoshoo Memorial Award in recognition of the
impact of his work on Indian climate change policy and the international discourse on global climate governance. Dr. Dubash holds an MA and PhD in energy and resources from the University of California, Berkeley, and an AB in public and international affairs from Princeton University.
