Promoting Urban Net Zero Transitions Through Multi-Level Governance: The Intermediary Role of Systemic Collaborative Platforms

In the fields of partnership research and social innovation, there has been an increasing number of calls for evidence regarding the kind of collaborative multi-level governance structures that might support large-scale transformation processes, especially in regard to climate-neutral cities. This paper conceptualizes a new type of intermediary actor, the Systemic Collaborative Platform (SCP). Using the example of a multi-stakeholder arrangement set up to design and implement Madrid’s Climate Neutrality Roadmap, the key features of an SCP include a focus on multi-stakeholder and cross-sectoral collaboration for public policy development, in this case operating at both a systemic level and a city scale, and a strong link to a key actor within this regime (a city council). Our study reveals how an SCP can contribute to articulation of a shared mandate among city actors and enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of a targeted transition by attracting, aligning and managing a wide and diverse organizational ecosystem through distributed facilitation, collaborative leadership, and continuous learning.