Purpose – This paper aims to examine state adoption of climate action plans (CAPs) and investigates the factors driving the adoption of these climate policies in the states. Design/methodology/approach – The framework that is formulated to explain the state climate actions involves four dimensions: climate risks, climate politics, climate economic and climate policy diffusions. These hypotheses are tested with event history analysis on a panel data set on 48 US continental states from 1994 to 2008. Findings – This paper found empirical evidence to support climate politics, economics and policy diffusion explanations. It also found that climate risks are not taken into account in states’ climate actions. A comparison is conducted to compare the differences in state and local climate policymaking. Originality/value – The paper investigates the motivations of state governments in adopting CAPs, and makes comparisons with local climate strategies. It contributes to academic understanding of the multilevel governance of climate protection in the USA.
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Yi et al. (2015) studied this question.
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