Assessing the Dutch Energy Transition Policy: How Does it Deal with Dilemmas of Managing Transitions?

Abstract

In the Netherlands, the national government is committed towards altering the systems of energy, transport and agriculture in the name of sustainable development. A process of deliberation and change was started—aimed at achieving ‘transitions’—using a model of transition management. This paper examines how the new arrangements of governance for energy transition deal with six problems of steering: ambivalence about goals, uncertainty about cause–effect relations, distributed power of control, political myopia, determination of short-term steps for long-term change and the danger of lock-in to new systems. The Dutch experience shows that transition management is applied in ways different from the original model (established players play a too great role) but it appears a useful model of reflexive governance, combining advantages of incremental politics with those of planning. It helps to orientate innovation policy and sectoral policies to sustainable development goals and to exploit business interests in system innovations in a prudent manner.

Keywords:

• Energy transition
• sustainable development
• governance
• transition management

Acknowledgement

The authors would like to thank Jan-Peter Voß, John Grin, Jos Timmermans and two referees for extensive comments and suggestions.

Notes

1. This is analogous to road mapping, a business tool for exploring paths for development and identifying business steps towards long-term business change (Phaal et al., 2003).

2. It is impossible to establish whether something that ‘could have been’ is better than what we have. Non-optimality refers to a widely shared view that a practice or system is not the best possible thing.

3. So far 25 million euro has been spent: €10 million in 2005 and €15 million in 2006.

4. Biofuels are exempt from taxes but this was motivated very much by the EU Directive on biofuels.

5. In the Dutch energy transition, the ‘subpolitics’ consist of the delegation of transition choices to the transition platforms composed of private and public actors.