One of the primary ways we encounter animals is as a food source. The dominant system of animal agriculture is “factory farming,” which is designed to produce the greatest amount of meat at the lowest possible cost. Factory farming is grossly inefficient from an ecological point of view, imposes enormous suffering on animals, and damages both humans and the environment. “Conscientious omnivores” reject factory farming but defend painlessly killing animals for food. Some defend hunting because they think it promotes other important values as well. These arguments are rejected by vegetarians and vegans, but they remind us that concerns about animals exist against the background of other values, including those that relate to the broader value of nature.

Collaborative climate governance has emerged as a promising approach to address the urgent need for decarbonization. Here, we summarize the book’s findings on the complex interplay between states and non-state actors in the pursuit of climate goals, using Sweden as a case study. Collaborative governance can effectively engage industry, cities, and other stakeholders in climate politics, yet it falls short in achieving transformative change. The success of collaborative climate governance is influenced by broader political, economic, and social context and calls for a critical examination of its applicability in diverse settings. Looking beyond Sweden, we identify three main research avenues. Firstly, we emphasize the need to engage with the challenge to institutionalize and sustain climate commitments. Secondly, we encourage scholars to explore democratic innovations to address contestation within collaborative governance. Finally, we call for a deeper exploration of how external shocks and crises serve as catalysts or barriers to decarbonization.

This chapter examines Sweden’s emissions trends and the evolution of climate policy in an international perspective by focusing on its role and interdependent relationship with climate action in the EU and with international climate coalitions. The chapter examines the assumption that Sweden is a front-runner and role model in setting and implementing ambitious climate policy. The emission trends across sectors suggest that Sweden has been able to swiftly reduce its emissions, in particular from industry and energy conversion, but that current reduction rates are insufficient to reach its decarbonization target. Reducing emissions in agriculture and transport poses perhaps the greatest challenges for the Swedish state. The chapter also discusses the limits and possibilities for the State to implement its decarbonization target while being dependent on the climate policies in the EU, notably the Emission Trading Scheme (ETS). It also looks at Sweden’s role in international climate governance by zooming in on its role in international climate collaborations and clubs. Finally, the chapter provides three reasons for caution when it comes to Sweden’s reputation as a role model. First, that the rate of GHG reduction has declined significantly. Second, that consumption-based approaches to counting GHG emissions demonstrates that Sweden remains a high-emitting country. Third, that Sweden’s consumption-levels are far above the global average and its current consumption patterns should not be emulated by other countries.

A new way of thinking about environmental problems has emerged since the 1980s. Environmental problems are increasingly seen as systematically entwined, with human action as their primary cause. We are in a new epoch in Earth’s history, the Anthropocene, and climate change is its most immediate and dramatic manifestation. The drivers of the Anthropocene can be seen through the lens of a simple equation: Environmental impact is the product of population, affluence, and technology. Nations and individuals vary greatly in their impacts, so questions of justice are unavoidable. Questions of justice extend across generations as well as among nations and individuals. Ultimately, we must ask what kind of world we want for ourselves and our children.

The COVID-19 pandemic unquestionably disrupted established norms and procedures. Climate networks in Sweden and the associated actors had to adapt to and navigate this dramatic and unpredictable situation. The chapter provides initial insights into how the pandemic affected a business network, a government-led multi-stakeholder platform and a social movement. Arguing that COVID-19 can constitute both an opportunity and a risk for non-state climate action, we investigate whether or not the pandemic created a window of opportunity for non-state actors to achieve their voluntary pledges or push the state to adopt more ambitious action, and whether or not the state has been able to mobilize non-state actors, or if it has made it harder for them for them to mobilize. Our findings indicate that thus far, the pandemic has not led to deeper changes, either in the climate debate in Sweden or in the climate work of individual actors. The members of climate networks have changed their working procedures and modified their communication strategies when it comes to climate action. However, the pandemic affected the ability of social movements to carry out their main activity, at least in the short term, that is, to go out on the streets and demonstrate.

The words ‘nature’ and ‘environment’ have different senses and referents. The idea of the environment is keyed to what surrounds us, and we can speak of natural and built environments as well as others. This book is concerned with ethical questions about the environment. Many of these concern problems that occur at different scales and cause harms of various types. Environmental problems can be viewed from technological, economic, religious, and aesthetic perspectives, among others. No single perspective provides the sole correct or exhaustive way of viewing environmental problems. There is an ethical dimension to most environmental problems and that is the focus of this book.

The question of how should I live has special resonance in the Anthropocene, which threatens virtually everything we care about. This chapter answers this question by saying that I should live in a way that expresses my values, and that these values should be directed towards making the world better. In practice this means living car-free if possible, avoiding airplane travel, eating a plant-based diet, and having few, if any, children. In addition to living this way, we should try to change law and policy, and support individuals in their efforts to live in this way. Yet, no matter how much we may succeed, we will inevitably live with change and perhaps even disaster. These present threats to living a meaningful life, but they are also the elements from which meaning and joy must be forged.

This chapter employs narrative analysis to examine how people who live in the shadow of carbon-intensive industries imagine a just transition to net-zero emissions. The analysis rests upon an interview study with local politicians, civil servants, union representatives, and citizen groups in the Swedish west-coast city of Lysekil, home to Scandinavia’s largest oil refinery. By mapping stories of climate (in)justice told in view of Sweden’s efforts to decarbonize, this chapter illustrates the cultural dimensions of carbon lock-ins and why some people resist transformative change. In the city of Lysekil, the refinery is not only an important source of local employment but also deeply entangled with community identity and sense of place. However, the chapter also points to the multiple interpretations of just transitions to climate neutrality and the power of narrative to open-up possibilities for decarbonized futures.

This chapter examines the role of the state in collaborative governance as well as the mix between hard (regulation) and soft modes of governance (orchestration) to achieve decarbonization in Sweden after the adoption of the 2017 Climate Policy Framework. The chapter focuses on state-led transformation and critically examines Sweden’s progress toward its overarching goal to become the first fossil-free welfare state by 2045. It investigates Sweden’s national strategies and governance modes to achieve decarbonization and overcome carbon lock-ins through institutional, economic, technological, and behavioral transformation. It concludes that Sweden’s path to decarbonization – like many other countries – resembles more of an incremental transition limited to certain sectors rather than the wholesale transformation toward achieving a fossil-free society.

This chapter provides an overview of the aims and research questions guiding this book. It introduces key terms and concepts and outlines the main contributions of the book. The chapter explains why the complex relations between state and non-state actors are crucial to understanding the implementation of the Paris Agreement. It provides a background to understanding the role of collaborative climate governance in the post-Paris governance landscape by highlighting the international context and describing Sweden’s climate policy framework. Finally, it provides a brief overview of each chapter in the book.

Normative ethics is divided between ethical theory and practical ethics. Three families of ethical theories are consequentialism, virtue ethics, and Kantianism. Consequentialism is the view that consequences determine what we ought to do. Virtue ethics is the view that right actions should be understood in terms of virtuous agents and their character. Kantianism’s central concern is with how rational agents ought to relate to themselves and to each other. Ethical theory is difficult to disentangle from practical ethics, which is concerned with what we ought to do in particular situations, which – along with the question “How should I live?” – is the most important topic in ethics and perhaps all of philosophy.

Understanding human morality is important in appreciating the ethical dimensions of environmental problems. As a first approximation, morality is a behavioral system, with an attendant psychology, that has evolved among some social animals for the purposes of regulating their interactions. This chapter discusses and rejects challenges to morality from amoralism, theism, and relativism, arguing instead that morality is ubiquitous and difficult to escape, does not need the support of God in order to have content or be motivating, and is not culture-bound. However, this does not imply that there is a single, true morality, that belief in God is inconsistent with morality, or that there is no conflict between morality and individual desire. Armed with this understanding of human morality, we are now prepared to discuss some substantive questions in moral philosophy.

This chapter explores net-zero emission targets in Swedish municipalities. Based on a detailed examination of over 300 local climate and environment plans, the chapter both maps and evaluates the quantity and quality of net-zero emissions targets in Swedish municipalities, as well as how they relate to the national climate mitigation goals. It identifies 39 municipalities with net-zero emission targets. The targets range from highly specific with intermediary goals and plans for how to deal with residual emissions, to lofty, one-sentence visions without any further specifications. The findings are subsequently discussed whether aspirational goals – such as net-zero emission targets – could have an impact on the climate policy of a municipality or whether more specific goals are more effective. The chapter concludes that net-zero emission targets are still in their infancy in Swedish municipalities with large heterogeneity and gaps in how the goals are defined, what they include in terms of GHGs and sectors, and whether they also include measures for dealing with residual emissions.