ABSTRACT
Polycentricity is an analytical approach that focuses on the multiple, layered, and overlapping centers of authority and decision-making that exists in many complex decentralized policy environments. It has become both a theoretical framework for unpacking and understanding the impact of polycentric systems on policy outcomes, as well as a normative call for both accepting the complexity of highly decentralized decision-making and their potential advantages over more centralized and hierarchical policy structures. The diversity of India's landscapes, ecologies, levels of development, and social heterogeneity suggests a need for highly localized responses to climate change. The scope of climate vulnerabilities is highly diverse. It ranges from sea-level rise affecting communities along low river deltas, changes to the seasonality and intensity of monsoons, melting glaciers, and their influence on the water supplies along the Himalayas, and increasingly intense extreme heat events, among others. While the structure of Indian bureaucracy has long favored centralized approaches, evidence suggests states and local jurisdictions are beginning to take climate actions separate from those of the national government. This chapter discusses the structure of Indian governance and how polycentricity provides a framework to analyze climate change in a complex policy environment. It reviews the current state of climate policies across federal, state, and local levels, giving specific examples of initiatives taken at state and local levels. It concludes by outlining how adopting a polycentricity approach offers directions for research and designing India's climate policy.
