Still committed to beating the heat? Analyzing the implications of the EU crisis strategy for its ‘sustainable growth’ agenda

The ongoing economic-financial crisis has prompted a reaction in the form of increased budgetary austerity in the EU, both on the EU and the member state level. Against this backdrop, one may question how seriously the pressure of climate change is still taken by the EU despite the inclusion of environmental sustainability objectives in its EU2020 strategy next to economic and social ones. This paper focuses on the impact of climate change on EU policy-making, assessing how climate policies and governance arrangements within the EU have fared alongside the other two objectives. Here, a shift from plans to employ a ‘green transition’ approach to promote economic recovery to a more uncertain market-based approach has been visible. As to explaining this process, the paper hypothesizes that climate change policies are at risk of losing the fight for scarce financial resources as the crisis severely tests the financial and institutional viability of advanced welfare states which are also under threat by demography and socio-economic changes. The paper then sets out to sketch possible scenarios for the future of climate change policies in current EU governance arrangements related to EU2020 and other forms of EU engagement.