Changing the state of state-level energy programs: Policy diffusion, economic stimulus, and new federalism paradigms

This article will pose the question: What led to the climate and clean energy policies in Massachusetts, Minnesota, Texas, and Utah (four states for which current or former governors ran for president in the 2012 election) and around the country since 2001? It will highlight the role of governors and the $3.1 billion investment of federal resources into state-level clean energy activities through the Recovery Act as a foundation for assessment and will provide a framework for analyzing policy decision-making. Public policy theory, including the policy diffusion model, will provide background to understand the influences on state-level policy adoption. With the primary goal of the Recovery Act to improve a struggling economy, this article will explore the critical connection between economic development and clean energy resources that impacted these choices under expedited procedures. In addition, the approach to clean energy policy will show changes in American federalism and the potential of polycentric governance. While it is a unique confluence of events that led to the current policy environment, the results of further study will provide generalizable information on state-level learning, policy-motivations, economic decision-making, procedures in environmental policy, and the relationships of actors at multiple levels of governance. In a dissenting Supreme opinion in 1932, Justice Louis Brandies wrote, A single courageous state may, if its citizens choose, serve as a laboratory; and try novel social and economic experiments without risk to the rest of the country. This article and proposed research program will analyze the policy experiments in states across the country - often led through gubernatorial initiative - in tackling the interrelated challenges of climate change and energy security in the twenty-first century.