Engagement and political space for policies on climate change

The Sustainable Development Commission has commissioned this report to investigate the role of public engagement in opening up greater 'political space' to allow action for sustainable development, and specifically in the field of climate change.

This report takes a closer look at the range of approaches used to open up political space, and makes recommendations both for the use of various forms of engagement, and for shaping the context in which that engagement happens. The report has the following aims:

• To review the evidence that political space (public, media and business opinion) plays a significant role in determining government's ability to act on sustainable development.
• To question what types of engagement are effective in opening political space.
• To recommend ways of using engagement to open up political space, and the challenges in implementing such an approach.