Accelerating city level climate action: engaging stakeholders to drive delivery

Develop an innovative approach to delivering impactful climate change policy at the city-region level, working with one of the UK’s biggest Combined Authorities. This project will contribute to urban climate governance, co-production and delivery of climate action plans.

Many local governments in the UK have set carbon emissions reduction targets that are more ambitious than national targets. However, there exists a substantial gap in delivery against these targets. Various ‘place based’ approaches have been proposed that bring together businesses, NGOs, community groups and citizens to identify and deliver specific climate actions in particular geographies. Greater Manchester Combined Authority (GMCA) adopted the ‘Mission Based Approach’ to help build a multi-partner coalition to tackle climate action challenges. This project will work with GMCA, its constituent Local Authorities, and other organisations within the city region that can be part of the wider collaborative, place-based climate action effort.

Project aims:

The project will review the implementation of the Mission Based Approach (MBA) and the 2019-2024 5 Year Environment Plan (5YEP). It will make recommendations to enhance the collaborative delivery of climate action in Greater Manchester and beyond, and identify barriers and enablers across GM stakeholders. It will draw on national and international examples, to learn from other places and share insights from GM that are transferable to other contexts of urban climate governance. As the project is co-funded by GMCA, there will be potential to implement specific recommendations and evaluate these changes within the timeframe of the PhD.

Research objectives:

• Co-design, implement and evaluate new approaches to accelerating city climate action that explicitly include delivery by stakeholders beyond local and combined authorities.

• Assess the effectiveness of approaches adopted by GMCA (including the MBA) to engage stakeholders on accelerating local climate action.

• A review of the processes and governance arrangements between local authorities, combined authorities and stakeholders that support engagement and delivery of local climate action (nationally and internationally).

• Identification of frameworks and metrics for measuring the success of collaborative actions to deliver climate action across the city region.

The candidate will more fully develop the approach and focus of the work, but we anticipate a number of research activities including:

• Analyse approaches to stakeholder engagement in delivery of local climate action nationally and internationally.

• Conversation and interviews with local and national policy-makers and other stakeholders to understand:

o How stakeholder engagement in local climate action has worked in practice, including and benefits and issues, and

o How the 2024-2029 5YEP has built on the experience of co-producing, planning, delivery and monitoring the 2019-2024 5YEP. 

• Organisational ethnography including participation in relevant meetings to identify emerging challenges and barriers to delivery and monitoring the 5YEP

• Stakeholder mapping, considering the different nature, depth and results of previous engagement activities and active co-production of future proposals.

The successful candidate will benefit from being part of two world-leading centres for interdisciplinary research groups; Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research and the Centre for Climate Change and Social Transformation. They will have access to unrivalled specialist expertise and opportunities to develop transferable skills for future employability. The University of Manchester offers an extensive training and development package to support the effective completion of a PhD. The successful candidate will spend some of their time working within the GMCA Environment Team both physically and virtually.

Eligibility

Candidates should have a good first degree (at least a 2.1 honours, or a masters – or international equivalents) in a relevant subject with good written and analytical skills. Candidates should have educational, project or work experience relating to city level climate action/interventions/projects. A demonstrable ability to integrate diverse forms of information is essential, evidenced knowledge of sub-national governance and/or energy system transitions also required.

Before you apply

Please send a CV and cover letter to [email protected] before making a full application through the University of Manchester.

How to apply

Apply online through our website: https://uom.link/pgr-apply-fap

When applying, you’ll need to specify the full name of this project, the name of your supervisor, if you already having funding or if you wish to be considered for available funding through the university, details of your previous study, and names and contact details of two referees.

Your application will not be processed without all of the required documents submitted at the time of application, and we cannot accept responsibility for late or missed deadlines. Incomplete applications will not be considered.

After you have applied you will be asked to upload the following supporting documents:

• Final Transcript and certificates of all awarded university level qualifications
• Interim Transcript of any university level qualifications in progress
• CV
• Supporting statement: A one or two page statement outlining your motivation to pursue postgraduate research and why you want to undertake postgraduate research at Manchester, any relevant research or work experience, the key findings of your previous research experience, and techniques and skills you’ve developed. (This is mandatory for all applicants and the application will be put on hold without it).
• Contact details for two referees (please make sure that the contact email you provide is an official university/work email address as we may need to verify the reference)
• English Language certificate (if applicable)

If you have any questions about making an application, please contact our admissions team by emailing [email protected].

Equality, diversity and inclusion is fundamental to the success of The University of Manchester, and is at the heart of all of our activities. We know that diversity strengthens our research community, leading to enhanced research creativity, productivity and quality, and societal and economic impact.

We actively encourage applicants from diverse career paths and backgrounds and from all sections of the community, regardless of age, disability, ethnicity, gender, gender expression, sexual orientation and transgender status.

We also support applications from those returning from a career break or other roles. We consider offering flexible study arrangements (including part-time: 50%, 60% or 80%, depending on the project/funder).