ABSTRACT
The United States is a centrally important actor in global climate change cooperation and efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but few countries have displayed more inconsistent behavior in climate change-related foreign policy positions or domestic climate change policy making. This chapter provides an overview of three decades of US changing foreign and domestic climate change politics and policy-making, focused on federalism, multilevel and polycentric governance, and leadership and pioneership. Shifts in US positions in multilateral climate change fora have been shaped by domestic struggles between advocates and opponents of climate change action. In parallel, a lack of federal climate change legislation has meant that most domestic initiatives developed at sub-national levels, with substantial variation among states, cities, and firms. Over time, highly contested federalist politics has led to an increasingly polycentric governance structure, but without engendering a more comprehensive federal response to climate change mitigation or resulting in particularly meaningful reduction in national greenhouse gas emissions.
