Collaborative Governance Is Key to Climate Justice

Who gets to decide how we confront the climate crisis – and reshape the systems that drive it? This article explores why inclusive, collaborative governance is essential for climate justice and how you can help shape the path forward. 

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By Tracy Jooste and Morag Mwenya Neill-Johnson

Across the world, communities are engaging with the climate crisis in the most diverse and meaningful ways, from local sustainability initiatives to regionally coordinated conservation efforts. At the same time, however, decision-making structures at the national and global levels do not always reflect this breadth of engagement nor develop pathways to include other non-traditional actors for a more coordinated, equitable response to the climate crisis. 

Often, the structures and systems that shape climate governance, like policy frameworks, funding mechanisms, institutional norms, and coordination processes, remain centralized or siloed. This limits meaningful participation from communities and stakeholders directly affected by the climate crisis. At the same time, elite voices and corporate interests dominate the decision-making process. 

The outcomes of last November’s COP29 clearly underscored these gaps, fueling a growing demand to democratize climate governance to ensure marginalized voices can help shape future climate negotiations, including at the upcoming COP30 summit in Brazil. 

Historically, women, Indigenous peoples, people with disabilities, and low-income populations have had fewer resources to adapt to climate change; at the same time, youth and future generations bear risks they did not create. These realities highlight the urgent need for climate policies that amplify the voices of those most affected. 

Top-down solutions alone will not deliver climate justice. Rebuilding legitimacy requires shifting power toward people, especially those already leading locally rooted climate action. 

Collaborative Governance and Climate Justice 

Climate justice is inseparable from broader struggles for human rights. The right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment sits alongside rights to housing, food, water, and health. 

Realizing these rights in the context of a changing global climate requires more than policy pledges; it calls for grounded, inclusive approaches that reflect the realities of people on the frontlines. That is where collaborative governance comes in.  

More fit-to-purpose collaborative governance – where governments, communities, and other groups work together to solve problems – is needed to address these challenges. If done well, it helps build trust, share power, and make sure that those most affected are included in the solution-shaping process. By bringing together public officials, researchers, activists, and citizens, this approach creates fairer, more practical, and lasting responses to today’s biggest climate challenges. It yields solutions that no single actor could achieve alone, and ensures that policies are more just and responsive to lived experiences.  

Across the globe, people-centered climate innovations led by local coalitions are showing what is possible. We do not need to start from scratch. We need to amplify, connect, and learn from the action already underway. 

In the South African City of Tshwane, for example, informal settlement residents helped co-design the city’s solid waste strategy through a collaborative governance process led by the Asivikelane coalition. Working alongside government officials, waste managers, and private companies, residents contributed ideas and local knowledge to shape sustainable waste management solutions. The resulting strategy was formally adopted by the municipality in November last year. It prioritizes recycling, composting, and community-led collection, addressing environmental injustice while advancing circular economy goals. 

More than a policy achievement, the process laid a foundation for more inclusive, responsive governance across the city. 

Reshaping Governance

Despite decades of climate negotiations, those most impacted by the climate crisis continue to be sidelined in decision-making spaces. The shortcomings of COP29 have sparked a growing call to democratize climate governance and ensure that voices from the Global South meaningfully shape future negotiations. Solving global problems requires local intelligence and inclusive leadership. 

To this end, the Centre for Public Impact (CPI) and the Governance Action Hub at Results for Development (R4D) are scoping a Climate Justice working group, a cross-regional community of practitioners, policymakers, funders, researchers, and organizers who are testing new models of climate governance rooted in equity, collective action, and justice. 

First, we have launched a Climate Justice Scoping Survey to gather insights from those working on the frontlines of climate action. It is an invitation to critically reflect on what works and what doesn’t, and how collaborative governance can be strengthened to effectively deliver on the promise of climate justice. 

From participatory budgeting to community-led climate adaptation, many efforts have expanded participation, but they also face risks of capture, exclusion, or limited impact. This survey is a chance to learn from that complexity. Whether you are part of a local initiative or shaping national policy, your experiences, challenges, and successes can help inform a global dialogue. 

Insights from the survey will help us organize a cross-regional Climate Justice Working Group, which will convene practitioners, policymakers, funders, and researchers to develop strategies for a more inclusive and accountable climate governance together. This group will serve as a platform for shared learnings, pilot new governance approaches, and help amplify local leadership in global decision-making spaces.

The Need for Collective Leadership

With COP30 approaching and the impact of global warming that continues to increase exponentially, the need to reimagine climate governance has never been more urgent. Collaborative governance is not a silver bullet, but if it’s done well, it leads to real change and empowers those most affected by the climate crisis. Across the globe, communities are already demonstrating the change we need by developing inclusive solutions grounded in justice, local knowledge, and lived experience.

Policymakers, funders, researchers, and civil society need to listen, learn, and work together to elevate frontline leadership, dismantle barriers to participation, and build decision-making systems that reflect the world we hope to create. Let’s not miss this moment.

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About the authors:

Tracy Jooste is the Associate Director of the Governance Action Hub at R4D. She collaborates with global and local partners to co-create and test innovative governance solutions and plays a cross-cutting strategy and management role.  

Morag Mwenya Neill-Johnson is a Senior Programme Manager at the Centre for Public Impact. Committed to advancing intersectional justice and systems-focused development practice, her cross-sectoral experience spans grassroots grantmaking, WASH innovation, and the design of collaborative learning networks.