Climate City Contracts? Governing towards Climate Neutral Cities

Climate City Contracts or CCCs are being developed in the context of a larger mission, with many stakeholders, funding, and growing momentum, hopefully providing a new force, legitimacy, and inspiration to ongoing urban climate actions. CCCs differ from current strategies for tackling climate change in cities because they are being developed in the context of the mission approach to tackle some of the most pressing challenges facing humanity. CCCs are a mechanism to ensure that city-level work is not occurring in a vacuum but rather facilitates multi-level integration between cities, national agencies, and the European Union, but also collaboration across a diversity of stakeholders. The current focus of CCCs is mostly on process rather than outcomes. Ambitious Climate Investment Plans, which encompass private sector efforts, are necessary to underpin the goals and activities outlined in CCCs.