Transcript Absorptive capacity?

October 26, 2016
34th US AEE / IAEE North American Conference
Absorptive capacity for energy
policymaking:
A case of energy-economic modeling
Masa Sugiyama
Assistant Professor
Policy Alternatives Research Institute
The University of Tokyo
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Some backgrounds
• Situation of economics in Japan in general
• Educational background of policymakers
• Regulatory impact analysis in Japan
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How to bridge the policy-science gap in the face of
uncertainty in scenarios?
Many scholars developed various methods to communicate scenarios from
energy-economic models and integrated assessment models
• IPCC uncertainty guideline
• United States CCSP report
• Netherlands’ PBL uncertainty guideline
Certainly a number of things should be improved on the part of science but does
the absorptive capacity of a policymaking body matter too?
Science
(energy/emissions/
climate scenarios)
Model
intercomparison
Uncertainty guidelines
Policymakers
Absorptive
capacity?
as users
Probabilistic
analysis
as funders
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How might “absorptive capacity” play a role in
bridging the science-policy gap?
In management, absorptive capacity denotes
the capacity of a firm to acquire, assimilate,
and exploit external knowledge
(Cohen and Levinthal 1990).
Companies must invest in R&D and develop
internal expertise to utilize external knowledge
in a complex, rapidly-changing market and
technology environment
In the public management literature, there has
been an attempt to apply it to a non-market
environment from the perspective of service
provision (not regulation making) (Harvey et al.
2010); the environment for policymakers may
not be dynamic but certainly complex and
contested
External
knowledge
Absorptive
capacity of
organization
Prior
knowledge/
expertise
Investment
in research
Professional
networking
Output/
outcome
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Method: literature review &
semi-structured interviews
Questions for Skype/face-to-face interview (both researchers and policymakers)
(focused mostly on the process before COP15)
(1) number of researchers/policymakers, (2) professional backgrounds, (3)
funding, (4) relationship between researchers and funders/policymakers, and (5)
typical career path.
Interviewees
Japan: Ministry of Economy, Trade, and Industry (METI), Ministry of the
Environment (MOE), Research Institute of the Innovative Technology for the Earth
(RITE), National Institute of Environmental Studies (NIES), Institute of Energy
Economics, Japan, Keio University, Japan Center for Economic Research
USA :Department of Energy (DOE), Environmental Protection Agency (EPA),
Stanford University, Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI)
EU: European Commission Directorate-General for Climate Action, Deutsche
Gesellschaft für Internationale Zusammenarbeit (GIZ), European Commission
Joint Research Centre, Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK),
Mercator Research Institute on Global Commons and Climate Change,
International Institute for Applied Systems Analysis
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Major modeling exercises
Policy
events
Study
Country/
region
Type of work
Outcome and note
COP15
(2009)
Committee on
mid-term target
Japan
Documents for expert committee
Book (Fukui 2009 (ed.)) (in Japanese)
Individual papers
EMF 22 (US)
USA
Part of
policymaking
process (with
townhall
meetings and
surveys)
Academic
EMF 22 (EU)
Europe
Academic
Energy Economics special issue
(Böhringer et al. 2009)
N/A
Japan
(no MIP)
Analysis by individual modeling groups
EMF 24
USA
Academic
Energy Journal special issue
(Fawcett et al. 2014; Clarke et al. 2014)
EMF 28
Europe
Academic
Climate Change Economics special issue
(Weyant et al. 2013; Knopf et al. 2013)
COP21
(2015)
Energy Economics special issue
(Fawcett et al. 2009)
No academic work from Japan (aside from some individual contributions)
=> Not reference to Japan’s modeling effort from abroad or IPCC
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Findings from the absorptive capacity perspective (1)
• Weak backgrounds in energy economics
In Japan, a vast majority of civil servants hold either a bachelor’s or master’s
degree, not a Ph.D., even in the sections of ministries responsible for domestic
climate policy. In contrast, about half of the officials at the US and Europe
counterpart sections do have Ph.D. degrees, especially in economics. In
addition, Japanese bureaucrats have a regular (usually two-year) rotation
system, whereas many in America and Europe work on a single issue for a long
time, accumulating expertise and building a network.
• Low level of networking between communities of policymakers and researchers
While it is true that some researchers interact with policymakers very
frequently, there is only a low level of interaction between civil servants and
scientists at the community level in Japan. Unlike the USA and Europe,
Japanese governmental officials rarely attend EMF and IAMC meetings, for
example.
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Findings from the absorptive capacity perspective (2)
• Lack of studies on the effective use of energy scenarios in policymaking.
There are studies and guidelines on the best practices of using scenarios in a
policy setting in the USA and Europe, but such studies are almost non-existent
in Japan.
• Performance and absorptive capacity
These combine to show that the absorptive capacity of the Japanese
government is likely to be weak compared to those of the United States.
But it is difficult to evaluate the performance of policy (and relevant knowledge
acquisition). Perhaps the performance of “policymakers as funders” might be
low for Japan if the measures such as the first-author publications cited in IPCC.
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Discussion and conclusions
Usefulness of the “absorptive capacity” construct
• I demonstrated some usefulness of the theoretical lens of absorptive
capacity but linking absorptive capacity to performance in regulation
setting seems difficult.
• In spite of its difficulty in operationalization, absorptive capacity still
provides a useful way to look at the details of the receiving end of sciencepolicy interface.
Implications
• The concept of absorptive capacity could be useful in thinking about
capacity building in energy policy.
References
• Cohen, W. M., & Levinthal, D. A. (1990). Absorptive capacity: a new perspective on learning and
innovation. Administrative Science Quarterly, 35, 128-152.
• Harvey, G., Skelcher, C., Spencer, E., Jas, P., & Walshe, K. (2010). Absorptive capacity in a nonmarket environment: A knowledge-based approach to analyzing the performance of sector
organizations. Public Management Review, 12, 77-97.
• Fawcett, A., Clarke, L.E., & Weyant, J.P. (2014). Introduction to EMF 24. Energy Journal, 35(SI1), 1-7.
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