Governance Matters: The Backstage Politics of Climate Assemblies from Commissioning to Impact

The outcomes of Climate Assemblies (CAs) differ from policy recommendations proposed by other actors (e.g. interest groups) in that they are the result of deliberation by ordinary citizens and are thus perceived as legitimized by a democratic process (deliberation). This form of perceived legitimacy is key to the CAs ability to unfold an impact on public opinion and policies. When analyzing (the characteristic of) perceived legitimacy of CAs, the focus primarily lies on its process design (e.g. agenda setting, participant selection, expert selection or event design) and on the effects of the chosen design on the CAs legitimacy and thereby its potential to influence public opinion and impact policies. Important as these are, the spotlight on the apparent process design often casts shade on the backstage governance of making these design-decisions. As a standard practice in governing these decision-making processes does not exist, they often involve a conglomeration of actors working within various structural arrangements. However, these actors each have their own – sometimes conflicting – interests as well as different roles and competencies when governing the CA, setting up a political arena besides the CA itself. In this arena, objects of governance like e.g. the expert selection are likely to be political decisions. When lacking a clear and comprehensible rationale, the backstage politics of CAs might fuel external criticism of the process and thus potentially question its legitimacy and minimize its impact. Drawing evidence from four European Climate Assemblies (Citizen Convention for the Climate in France, Climate Assembly UK, Klima-Biergerrot Luxembourg and German Bürgerrat Klima) this paper highlights the backstage governance of CAs and explores its linkage to the CAs potential impact. It relies on comprehensive document analyses as well as interviews with researchers who had studied the process and/or those who governed the process. Both helped us gain an understanding of the different actors involved in the governance structure of the CAs, the decision-making processes leading to a specific process design and the principles guiding the decision-making. By comparing their different governance arrangements against the backdrop of their impact, the paper draws lessons on the importance of governance for the impact of CAs.