Climate decisions are often framed as a question of tools, targets and implementation. Yet some of their limits may lie elsewhere: in how climate risks are understood, prioritised and made actionable. Switzerland offers a revealing case of how political culture, institutional design and public legitimacy shape the scope of possible climate action.
Why technical governance is not enough
Climate governance is often approached through policies, targets, financial tools and implementation plans. Yet despite increasingly sophisticated frameworks, climate action still struggles to match the scale and urgency of the crisis. Some of these limits may lie elsewhere, in how problems are understood, framed and made actionable in the first place.
From an ecopsychological perspective, climate governance is also shaped by how people relate to risk, place and change. This means that institutions are not external actors acting upon ecological systems. They are part of ecological, social and institutional ecosystems already under pressure from climate change. They both shape these systems and are shaped by them. Their ability to act depends not only on formal mandates or policy tools. It also depends on how they perceive, interpret and relate to the systems they are part of.
What “narratives” mean in practice
How climate issues are framed matters because it shapes what institutions see as urgent, legitimate and possible. It influences what receives attention, what is prioritised and what kinds of responses become possible. Research in environmental humanities highlights how meaning is shaped through interpretation and experience. This raises a key question: where does responsibility lie? If institutions are embedded in these dynamics, it depends on their ability to recognise interdependencies and respond to them. As a result, climate action also relies on collective agency. In Switzerland, it is structured through coordination, expertise, and stability. For example, the Swiss CO₂ Act sets national targets while leaving implementation largely to the cantons. Responses usually follow existing systems and routines rather than changing them. This is not neutral. It limits what kind of actions are taken and how responsibility is shared in practice.
Federalism as a lens on climate governance
Switzerland’s federal system offers a particularly revealing entry point. It reflects how legitimacy, proximity and consensus shape what is seen as acceptable, feasible and politically credible in climate governance. Federalism is not only about dividing competences across different levels of governance. It also reflects a particular way of relating to authority, territory, and collective decision-making.
Here, legitimacy is closely tied to proximity and consensus. Decisions tend to gain acceptance when they are rooted in local realities and shaped through consultation and compromise. This can strengthen trust and local adaptability, but it also means that climate risks are often understood through immediate local concerns. In practice, this tends to favour negotiated and gradual solutions, making broader or faster climate responses harder to advance. This dynamic was visible in March 2026, when Swiss voters rejected a proposed climate fund, highlighting how difficult it can be to build support for more ambitious climate measures. By contrast, the 2023 Climate and Innovation Act was accepted, reflecting a preference for incentive-based and gradual approaches to climate action.
What this means for international positioning
These dynamics extend beyond domestic governance. Switzerland’s preference for coordination, stability and technical solutions also informs how it approaches climate action internationally. This is visible, for example, in its efforts to promote sustainable finance as a key lever for climate transition, through market incentives, technical standards and regulatory stability. This reflects the same emphasis on consensus and institutional credibility that underpins Switzerland’s reputation as a reliable actor. Its international role is closely linked to domestic governance, and vice versa.
So what?
Adopting a narrative lens on climate governance does not replace technical or institutional approaches. It shifts the focus. Rather than asking only whether policies are well designed or effectively implemented, it invites us to consider what makes certain climate responses possible, acceptable or not. From this perspective, responsibility is not only about reacting to climate impacts. It also depends on what institutions can perceive, prioritise and consider within the systems they are part of. This means asking a simple but often overlooked question: what aspects of climate change are institutions able to respond to and what remains outside their field of attention?
This shift in perspective does not provide ready-made solutions. But it can help explain why some climate responses gain traction while others struggle to emerge, and why, despite strong technical capacity, certain transformations remain difficult to advance.
In practice, this could mean creating more space within climate governance processes to reflect on underlying assumptions, making room for alternative ways of framing climate risks, and strengthening connections between institutional decision-making and lived, place-based realities.
