City-networks, global climate governance, and the road to 1.5 °C

This article reviews existing scholarship on the ability of transnational city-networks to contribute to achieving a global 1.5 °C target. Its principal observation is that city-networks have become increasingly involved in pooling resources, setting agendas, sharing policies, and reporting emissions reductions, but more needs to be known about how precisely transnational city-networks are achieving verifiable emissions reductions at the urban scale. The article identifies a focus in contemporary research on direct and indirect pathways through which city-networks can potentially effect transformative change, and highlights four key issues in need of further research: burden-sharing within and across city-networks; the suite of possible policy options they are embracing and endorsing; the role and voice of marginal cities and vulnerable urban populations, and; the governance challenges related to moving from experimentation to collective global effect.