Policy mobilities, offshore renewables and the challenge of just transition in Nagasaki, Japan

Abstract Recent years have seen a proliferation of knowledge-sharing networks to support place-based just transitions among carbon-intensive regions. Yet, policy mobilities scholarship argues that policy knowledge from some places may be selectively promoted to propagate specific ideas about how regional planning ‘ought’ to happen. Exemplars of good practice circulated within such networks could therefore work against place-based just transitions, if they promote policies that perpetuate existing imbalances between industries and communities. In response, this study uses policy mobilities as an analytical framework to evaluate how the mobility of policy knowledge may enable or hinder a place-based just transition. This question is explored for offshore renewables in Nagasaki Prefecture, Japan. Nagasaki has up to 3400 power sector workers, including two municipalities where power sector workers are proportionally three to four times the Japanese average. An offshore wind capacity of ~440 MW over two sites is planned in Nagasaki. National governments, non-profit organisations and overseas regions all aim to influence offshore renewables policy in Nagasaki, whereas industry organisations promote the region’s success as an offshore renewables cluster. Document analysis, interviews and ethnographic observations are used to assess how circulation, localisation and resharing of policy knowledge may inform a just transition for Nagasaki’s workforce and communities. The study makes three contributions to place-based just transitions literature. First is the importance of listening to local government officials and community groups, who have a deep understanding of what is feasible in their own locality, when learning and adapting policy knowledge from elsewhere. Second is the need for careful scrutiny over who is promoting ‘success stories’—and the evidence for these claims—to avoid place-specific experiences and policy knowledge being co-opted to deflect criticism of delaying climate action. Third is acknowledging that a place-based just transition also encompasses fairness in recognition and centring members of affected communities when sharing policy knowledge about their locality.