New Books In Environmental Studies

Why do even successful clean energy policies fail to create momentum for more renewable energy? In her new book Short Circuiting Policy: Interest Groups and the Battle Over Clean Energy and Climate Policy in the American States (Oxford University Press, 2020), Leah Stokes analyzes policy-making in Texas, Kansas, Arizona, and Ohio to understand the dynamics of clean energy policy. This remarkably ambitious work urges political scientists to refocus on the manner in which interest groups prevent or reverse clean energy policies. Her case studies reveal the particular conditions and mechanisms through which interest groups “short circuit” policy by undermining and obscuring policy feedback. This rich and nuanced qualitative study of several cases yields insights on the role that ambiguity plays in policy change. The “fog of enactment” (the gap between actors expectations and the policy’s actual outcome) helps explain why it is so difficult to implement clean energy policy. Because ambiguity shrinks after impleme