Why are policy innovations rare and so often negative? Blame avoidance and problem denial in climate change policy-making

While many studies have put forward prescriptions for action on climate change it is not clear under what conditions policy innovations are likely to be pursued or what form they will take. It is the purpose of this paper to bring some clarity to these subjects. The paper follows Hood in describing policy-makers in democratic polities as highly risk-averse and therefore unlikely to take policy action unless the circumstances and the nature of the problem they face are propitious. It also suggests that when actions are taken these are not always 'positive' - that is oriented towards dealing with the objective manifestations of a problem - but can also be 'negative' - that is, geared towards denial of a problem or its rejection. The paper examines the literature on policy failure and success in order to isolate several dimensions of failure which decision-makers would like to avoid. It then combines these elements to construct a two stage model of decision-making which identifies which types of problems and circumstances are likely to lead to innovative activity and which are not. This model is then applied to the case of activities for climate change mitigation and adaptation.