The Role of Non-state Actors in Climate Resilient Development Cooperation: How Do Local Development Cooperation Non-state Actors Leverage Technological Solution and contribute the Resilient Development of African States? The Case for the Region of Veneto

Abstract

Climate change is a wicked problem in nature and requires integrated actions. As such, State-led mitigation and adaptation measures often suffer from the inability to react appropriately and timely and call for new solutions and actors other than the State to intervene, a collaboration that has sparked the waters among scholars in the last three decades. Indeed, the involvement of Non-State Actors (NSAs) in the international arena is a triggering subject in many ways, yet it enjoys mainstream support within the Climate Change field. On the other hand, development cooperation and climate change actions share some of their objectives; indeed, although the narrower rationale differs for each, they might contribute to the overall objectives of Climate Resilient Development (CRD). Here, the role of local development cooperation NSAs might boost the capacity to engage with the community to improve bottom-up climate responses while enhancing the capacities of the most vulnerable to face the effects of climate change. Hence, the bulk of the analysis revolves around the case of the Region of Veneto, specifically analysing the projects co-funded by the Region over the period between 2016 and 2021. The work investigates how development cooperation NSAs contribute to CRD by leveraging technological solutions. Development cooperation projects and actors in the Region of Veneto targeting African states have leveraged technological innovations in more than half of the projects presented between 2016 and 2021, potentially opening space to address climate change in development cooperation. The results obtained from the analyzed data, however, suggest mixed interpretative patterns.