Transitions through numbers? A critical inquiry into superior numeric targets in climate and energy policymaking

Abstract

Policy discourses regarding sustainability transitions intersect with a host of quantitative targets, articulated to guide efforts to achieve such transitions. This paper analyses ‘superior numeric targets’ in climate and energy policy; overarching, quantified articulations of missions for sustainability transitions. We use interviews and political documents to investigate how policymakers in Norway have established and enacted two superior numeric targets; one articulates the need to dramatically reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the second presents a quite ambitious measure to improve the energy efficiency of all buildings. Thus, we study cases of numeric governance of sustainability transitions, combining perspectives from sustainability transitions and quantification studies. We identify two distinct, but related, target biographies. The first target was successfully framed, consolidated, and accepted through a co-production of science and politics. However, the presumed final stage of target biographies – the embedding of the target – was only partially achieved. Relevant actors inside the government were mobilised but not so much actors on the outside, which may explain Norway's failure to substantially reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The second target met with resistance due to scepticism and a lack of enthusiasm from actors within the government administration who questioned its scientific basis. Thus, it and was neither accepted nor embedded. In this manner, the paper shows that numeric governance is less straightforward than quantification scholars suggest but also that such inquiries are needed to understand both the potential and the limitations of numeric governance of missions of sustainability transitions.