Costa Rica and Vietnam: Pioneers in green transformations

Abstract

This chapter compares the strategies and motives of green transformations for energy related industries in Vietnam and Costa Rica, analyses what role their different political systems have played on climate governance, what progress has been made and what the barriers are. Our main argument is that we witness stateled pioneership in both cases but of very different kinds. In both countries, multilevel governance arrangements provided important input into national energy policies but the main reason why both countries became ambitious pioneers had more to do with domestic politics and the role of public officials. The major difference is that in Costa Rica, the government has been much more open to bottom–up inputs as well as polycentric governance while taking up important initiatives from civil society actors of different kinds. In contrast, the government in Vietnam has adopted a much more top–down approach as can be seen from its energy policy which is almost completely dependent on government and party officials.