How Governance Contexts Drive Divergent Feedback in Local Co-Creation: Evidence from Wind Power Development in China and Denmark

Wind power is central to global decarbonization, but its expansion depends not only on technological capacity but also on social embedding. Co-creation is often promoted as a way to enhance public participation and legitimacy, yet existing research does not explain why it develops in some contexts but remains limited in others. This paper examines how governance contexts shape the emergence of co-creation in energy transitions. It develops a framework that links co-creation to feedback processes, focusing on how interactions among governments, firms, and communities generate shared interpretations and legitimacy over time. The analysis compares wind power development in China and Denmark, two global leaders with contrasting governance structures. Using a comparative process-tracing approach, the study focuses on early-stage project development, including initial interaction, participation, and feedback formation. The findings show that structural governance conditions, especially patterns of state–society relations, participation, and trust, shape whether feedback can be articulated, shared, and influence decision-making. In Denmark, more open governance enables cumulative feedback and sustained co-creation. In China, hierarchical structures constrain feedback, resulting in fragmented interactions and limited co-creation. The paper reconceptualizes co-creation as a dynamic outcome of feedback processes and shows that rapid technological expansion alone does not ensure socially embedded transitions.