Achieving 100 climate neutral cities in Europe: Investigating climate city contracts in Sweden

The study addresses how Climate City Contracts (CCCs) function as instruments to drive cities toward climate neutrality within the European Commission’s mission to achieve 100 climate neutral cities by 2030. In Sweden, Viable Cities has pioneered CCCs at the national level, involving municipalities and national agencies. The paper examines Sweden’s first CCCs to understand both their content and the development process, assessing them against a best-practice framework for deep decarbonization (Linton et al., 2021). Using literature review, document analysis of nine municipal CCCs, and five interviews (Lund, Umeå, Stockholm, and Viable Cities), the study aims to generate insights for future CCCs across Europe and to situate CCCs within broader urban climate governance efforts.

The review situates cities as increasingly legitimate actors within a fragmented climate governance landscape that has evolved alongside limitations of nation-centric UNFCCC processes. It outlines the rise of transnational and multi-level initiatives (e.g., MP-GCA) and traces the evolution of climate urbanism: reactive, entrepreneurial, and transformative modalities (Castán Broto et al.), noting concerns about social justice and eco-gentrification. It distinguishes two waves in urban climate governance scholarship—urban optimism (post-Copenhagen) and urban pragmatism (post-Paris)—and summarizes the resulting consensus on “good governance”: participatory, bottom-up, integrated, holistic, and long time-framed approaches, while critiquing their instrumentalization. Bulkeley’s phases—municipal voluntarism, strategic urbanism, and climate-connected urbanism—highlight climate change as systemic and embedded in socio-technical and economic systems. The review connects this to experimentation as governance and to mission-oriented innovation policy (Mazzucato), emphasizing bold, time-bound, cross-sectoral, and outcome-driven missions—principles underpinning the EU Cities Mission and the CCC approach.

A triangulated approach combined: (1) five semi-structured interviews with officials from Lund, Umeå, Stockholm, and Viable Cities to understand the emergence and development process of CCCs; (2) document analysis of nine Swedish municipal CCCs (Enköping, Gothenburg, Järfälla, Lund, Malmö, Stockholm, Umeå, Uppsala, Växjö), benchmarking their content against Linton et al.’s (2021) best-practice framework for local deep decarbonization (four strategy and seven governance elements); and (3) a literature review on urban climate governance. Two CCCs were available in English; seven were translated from Swedish using an online tool. An evaluation matrix assessed the presence of the framework’s 11 components via keyword searches and qualitative appraisal. The analysis focused on municipal commitments; Viable Cities and national agency commitments were identical across contracts and excluded from comparative assessment.

• Strategy elements: • Engagement: Present in all CCCs (template requirement), frequently emphasizing digital tools and platforms for citizen and stakeholder involvement. • Green economy: Not explicitly referenced; several cities mention circular economy (e.g., Umeå strategy for Circular Economy, Stockholm’s resource-flow circularity work), suggesting partial alignment but limited social equity framing. • Financial tools: Cited by three cities with limited detail (e.g., Enköping mentions green loans; Lund has a green bonds framework; Uppsala plans to develop policy and financial instruments). • Policy tools: Explicitly referenced by two cities (Umeå’s model for policy instruments; Stockholm’s call for regulatory change and policy labs), with minimal specifics. - Governance elements: • Coordination structure: All describe internal coordination (e.g., decentralization with central coordination in Växjö; coordinating committee/company under Environment and Climate Committee in Gothenburg; company group structure in Lund; Malmö notes need for restructuring). • Oversight and reporting: All outline monitoring and evaluation (e.g., Malmö indicators and environmental reporting; Gothenburg environmental management system; Umeå’s digital monitoring) and external reporting (e.g., CDP, GCoM, ICLEI). • Communication: Weakly distinguished from engagement; only Stockholm cites a formal communication program (2017–2022). • Multi-level integration: Most describe some integration across city documents, regional networks, and scales (e.g., Järfälla’s regional innovation network; Enköping’s integration across plans; Malmö’s integration into company business planning). • Cross-sector collaboration: All report extensive collaboration across public, private, academic, and civil society actors; decision-making linkages are not always clear. • Funding: All commit to develop a Climate Investment Plan (CIP) with Viable Cities; details pending; Viable Cities links to national/EU funding, Kommuninvest, and EIB. • Mode of governing: Not explicitly stated; inferred emphasis on governing by enabling (facilitation and partnerships), with potential for mixed modes. - Cross-cutting themes: Prominent emphasis on digitalization to support engagement, monitoring, and collaboration, which is not fully captured in the Linton et al. framework.

The findings show Swedish CCCs largely align with contemporary urban climate governance principles—participatory processes, integrated planning, and iterative learning—positioning CCCs as a novel, contract-based instrument consistent with mission-oriented governance and urban experimentation. The EU Cities Mission and Viable Cities exemplify a shift toward transformative climate urbanism, using cities as platforms for systemic change. The analysis highlights gaps between best-practice expectations and contract content, particularly regarding explicit green economy strategies, detailed financial and policy toolkits, formal communication strategies, and explicit modes of governing. Process insights indicate CCCs were developed rapidly through a standardized, iterative “contracting” model that: (a) prioritizes continuous updates over a perfect first version; (b) foregrounds Climate Investment Plans and private capital mobilization; (c) introduces new patterns of engagement with national agencies; and (d) leverages digital tools. Trade-offs included reliance on existing municipal content and limited time for expansive stakeholder engagement in the first iteration. Lessons for EU cities include the value of a national coordinating program to ensure consistency and support, the need to allocate time and resources for deeper stakeholder participation, and the importance of aligning CCCs with existing city goals while ensuring political and stakeholder buy-in. The results suggest updating the assessment framework to incorporate digitalization, innovation, experimentation, social justice, SDGs, urban consumption, informality, and nature-based solutions, thereby aligning with the “climate-connected” paradigm and addressing normative concerns about equity and inclusion.

CCCs, embedded within the EU Cities Mission and catalyzed nationally by Viable Cities, offer an innovative, iterative mechanism to steer cities toward climate neutrality by 2030. Evaluating Sweden’s first nine CCCs against a deep decarbonization framework reveals strong alignment on engagement, coordination, monitoring, collaboration, and intent to develop Climate Investment Plans, while exposing limited articulation of green economy strategies, specific financial and policy tools, and formal communication approaches. The study recommends revising assessment frameworks and future CCC iterations to explicitly incorporate digitalization, innovation and experimentation, as well as broader societal dimensions—urban consumption, SDGs, social justice, informality, and nature-based solutions. Process-wise, contracting, accelerated timelines, and multi-level negotiation are promising but should be balanced with robust, inclusive stakeholder engagement and sufficient time to add new content. As CCCs evolve, their real-world impacts and equity implications warrant continued evaluation, with future research critically interrogating normative assumptions in both CCC design and governance frameworks.

• Early-stage, rapidly developed CCCs limited the depth of new content and comprehensive stakeholder engagement in the first iteration, affecting the breadth of evidence available for assessment. - Only five interviews (three municipalities and Viable Cities) were conducted; while processes were standardized, the interview sample is limited. - Seven of nine CCCs were translated from Swedish using an online tool, introducing potential translation inaccuracies. - Content assessment combined keyword searches with subjective interpretation, which may bias coding of framework elements. - The study focuses on municipal commitments and excludes identical national/Viable Cities sections from comparative analysis. - Given the nascent nature of CCCs, the study cannot yet assess on-the-ground impacts or long-term effectiveness.