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DR Jon Phillips' Outputs (23)

The ‘capability’ of South African energy governance to deliver urban sustainable transitions (2023)
Journal Article
Essex, S., Caprotti, F., de Groot, J., Phillips, J., Baker, L., Wolpe, P., & Reddy, Y. (2024). The ‘capability’ of South African energy governance to deliver urban sustainable transitions. Urban Research & Practice, 14(4), 515-542. https://doi.org/10.1080/17535069.2023.2261899

Critical to the trajectory and outcome of urban sustainable energy transitions is the ability of government institutions to foster conditions for change and innovation. In this paper, a theoretical perspective combining state power and local governan... Read More about The ‘capability’ of South African energy governance to deliver urban sustainable transitions.

Charcoal politics in Africa: Value chains, resource complexes, and energopolitics (2023)
Journal Article
Branch, A., Phillips, J., & Agyei, F. K. (2023). Charcoal politics in Africa: Value chains, resource complexes, and energopolitics. Progress in Environmental Geography, 2(1/2), 77-96. https://doi.org/10.1177/27539687231165798

Charcoal is a primary urban energy source throughout Africa; it is also blamed for massive environmental harm, in particular deforestation and forest degradation. Despite its centrality to urbanization, rural economies, and contemporary environmental... Read More about Charcoal politics in Africa: Value chains, resource complexes, and energopolitics.

Just transitions in cities and regions: a global agenda (2022)
Preprint / Working Paper
Phillips, J., Bouzarovski, S., Boamah, F., Fuller, S., Furlong, K., Knuth, S., Mould, I., Thomson, H., & Zheng, W. Just transitions in cities and regions: a global agenda. London

This report provides a global synthesis of evidence on justice in transitions to low-carbon energy systems and processes of urbanization. While cities are important sites of energy consumption, analysis of urbanisation offers explanations of how soci... Read More about Just transitions in cities and regions: a global agenda.

From crisis to context: Reviewing the future of sustainable charcoal in Africa (2022)
Journal Article
Branch, A., Agyei, F. K., Anai, J. G., Apecu, S. L., Bartlett, A., Brownell, E., Caravani, M., Cavanagh, C. J., Fennell, S., Langole, S., Mabele, M. B., Mwampamba, T. H., Njenga, M., Owor, A., Phillips, J., & Tiitmamer, N. (2022). From crisis to context: Reviewing the future of sustainable charcoal in Africa. Energy Research & Social Science, 87, Article 102457. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.erss.2021.102457

Is charcoal a sustainable energy source in Africa? This is a crucial question, given charcoal's key importance to urban energy. In today's dominant policy narrative – the charcoal-crisis narrative – charcoal is deemed incompatible with sustainable an... Read More about From crisis to context: Reviewing the future of sustainable charcoal in Africa.

'Candles are not bright enough': Inclusive urban energy transformations in spaces of urban inequality (2021)
Book Chapter
Caprotti, F., Phillips, J., Petrova, S., Bouzarovski, S., Essex, S., de Groot, J., Baker, L., Reddy, Y., & Wolpe, P. (2021). 'Candles are not bright enough': Inclusive urban energy transformations in spaces of urban inequality. In M. Keith, & A. de Souza Santos (Eds.), African Cities and Collaborative Futures: Urban Platforms and Metropolitan Logistics (121-142). Manchester University Press. https://doi.org/10.7765/9781526155351.00012

In this chapter, we discuss the key issue of how to envisage a just, fair and equitable energy transformation in the South African context. We argue that the move towards a new energy landscape cannot simply be described as a transition, but more acc... Read More about 'Candles are not bright enough': Inclusive urban energy transformations in spaces of urban inequality.

The materiality of precarity: Gender, race and energy infrastructure in urban South Africa (2021)
Journal Article
Phillips, J., & Petrova, S. (2021). The materiality of precarity: Gender, race and energy infrastructure in urban South Africa. Environment and Planning A: Economy and Space, 53(5), 1031-1050. https://doi.org/10.1177/0308518X20986807

Analysis of precarity has offered a critique of labour market experiences and politically induced conditions of work, housing, migration, or essential services. This paper develops an infrastructural politics of precarity by analysing energy as a cri... Read More about The materiality of precarity: Gender, race and energy infrastructure in urban South Africa.

Scales of governance: Translating multiscalar transitional pathways in South Africa’s energy landscape (2020)
Journal Article
Caprotti, F., Essex, S., Phillips, J., de Groot, J., & Baker, L. (2020). Scales of governance: Translating multiscalar transitional pathways in South Africa’s energy landscape. Energy Research & Social Science, 70, Article 101700. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.erss.2020.101700

In this paper, we argue for a multiscalar focus on the governance of energy policy and practice. This perspective reveals the translation of agendas and policies across scales stretching from the global to the local. We analyse South Africa’s energy... Read More about Scales of governance: Translating multiscalar transitional pathways in South Africa’s energy landscape.

Who’s in charge of Sino-African resource politics? Situating African state agency in Ghana (2019)
Journal Article
Phillips, J. (2019). Who’s in charge of Sino-African resource politics? Situating African state agency in Ghana. African Affairs, 118(470), 101-124. https://doi.org/10.1093/afraf/ady041

Recent literature on Sino-African resource politics emphasizes the agency of African elites in relation to Chinese capital and state agencies, yet whether African elites have gained agency over the structure of African economies remains debatable. Th... Read More about Who’s in charge of Sino-African resource politics? Situating African state agency in Ghana.

Tensions in the transition: The politics of electricity distribution in South Africa (2019)
Journal Article
Baker, L., & Phillips, J. (2019). Tensions in the transition: The politics of electricity distribution in South Africa. Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space, 37(1), 177-196. https://doi.org/10.1177/2399654418778590

This paper argues that the distribution of electricity represents an important yet neglected aspect of the politics of energy transitions. In recent years, South Africa’s electricity sector has seen the introduction of new actors and technologies, in... Read More about Tensions in the transition: The politics of electricity distribution in South Africa.

Triple wins? Prospects for pro-poor, low carbon, climate resilient energy services in Kenya (2017)
Book Chapter
Phillips, J., Newell, P., & Pueyo, A. (2017). Triple wins? Prospects for pro-poor, low carbon, climate resilient energy services in Kenya. In F. Nunan (Ed.), Making Climate Compatible Development Happen (114-129). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315621579-6

This chapter describes political economy analysis to raise some unanswered and unasked questions about how energy systems might be redesigned to simultaneously meet climate, development and adaptation goals. Energy systems refer not only to the techn... Read More about Triple wins? Prospects for pro-poor, low carbon, climate resilient energy services in Kenya.

Sovereignty, the ‘resource curse’ and the limits of good governance: a political economy of oil in Ghana (2016)
Journal Article
Phillips, J., Hailwood, E., & Brooks, A. (2016). Sovereignty, the ‘resource curse’ and the limits of good governance: a political economy of oil in Ghana. Review of African political economy, 43(147), 26-42. https://doi.org/10.1080/03056244.2015.1049520

The idea of a resource curse has influenced policy makers and led to calls for good governance to avoid the pitfalls of oil sector development. Through discussion of Ghana's recent insertion into the global political economy of oil, this paper descri... Read More about Sovereignty, the ‘resource curse’ and the limits of good governance: a political economy of oil in Ghana.

Neoliberal energy transitions in the South: Kenyan experiences (2016)
Journal Article
Newell, P., & Phillips, J. (2016). Neoliberal energy transitions in the South: Kenyan experiences. Geoforum, 74, 39-48. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.geoforum.2016.05.009

What is the relationship between the direction and form of an energy transition and the political economy within which it is embedded? This paper explores how the nature of (low carbon) energy transitions is strongly influenced by the process of neol... Read More about Neoliberal energy transitions in the South: Kenyan experiences.

Climate policy meets national development contexts: Insights from Kenya and Mozambique (2015)
Journal Article
Naess, L. O., Newell, P., Newsham, A., Phillips, J., Quan, J., & Tanner, T. (2015). Climate policy meets national development contexts: Insights from Kenya and Mozambique. Global Environmental Change, 35, 534-544. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2015.08.015

Despite the growth in work linking climate change and national level development agendas, there has been limited attention to their political economy. These processes mediate the winners, losers and potential trade-offs between different goals, and t... Read More about Climate policy meets national development contexts: Insights from Kenya and Mozambique.

The political economy of low carbon energy in Kenya (2014)
Preprint / Working Paper
Newell, P., Phillips, J., & Pueyo, A. The political economy of low carbon energy in Kenya. Brighton

There is growing international focus on how to support more integrated approaches to addressing climate change in ways that capture synergies and minimise the trade-offs between climate change mitigation, adaptation and development. These aims are em... Read More about The political economy of low carbon energy in Kenya.

The political economy of energy transitions: The case of South Africa (2014)
Journal Article
Baker, L., Newell, P., & Phillips, J. (2014). The political economy of energy transitions: The case of South Africa. New Political Economy, 19(6), 791-818. https://doi.org/10.1080/13563467.2013.849674

This paper explores the political economy of energy transition in South Africa. An economic model based around a powerful ‘minerals-energy complex’ that has previously been able to provide domestic and foreign capital with cheap and plentiful coal-ge... Read More about The political economy of energy transitions: The case of South Africa.

The governance of clean energy in India: The clean development mechanism (CDM) and domestic energy politics (2013)
Journal Article
Phillips, J., & Newell, P. (2013). The governance of clean energy in India: The clean development mechanism (CDM) and domestic energy politics. Energy Policy, 59, 654-662. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.enpol.2013.04.019

This paper explores the ways in which clean energy is being governed in India. It does so in order to improve our understanding of the potential and limitations of carbon finance in supporting lower carbon energy transitions, and to strengthen our ap... Read More about The governance of clean energy in India: The clean development mechanism (CDM) and domestic energy politics.

Just conservation? On the fairness of sharing benefits (2013)
Book Chapter
Martin, A., Akol, A., & Phillips, J. (2013). Just conservation? On the fairness of sharing benefits. In T. Sikor (Ed.), The Justices and Injustices of Ecosystems Services (69-91). Routledge. https://doi.org/10.4324/9780203395288-20

Biodiversity conservation has become a global priority due to the unprecedented rate of species extinction, the associated threat to ecosystem services and the potential consequences for the welfare of current and future people. Addressing this prior... Read More about Just conservation? On the fairness of sharing benefits.

Governance and technology transfer in the clean development mechanism in India (2013)
Journal Article
Phillips, J., Das, K., & Newell, P. (2013). Governance and technology transfer in the clean development mechanism in India. Global Environmental Change, 23(6), 1594-1604. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.gloenvcha.2013.09.012

Despite significant technological advances in emerging economies, the further development of clean energy technologies in developing countries remains crucial to reducing the greenhouse gas emissions associated with economic development. In this pape... Read More about Governance and technology transfer in the clean development mechanism in India.