Tackling (Not Only) Air Pollution: Cross-sectional Tensions behind State-led Energy Retrofit Program in Poland

Abstract According to the World Health Organization, 36 out of the 50 most polluted cities in the EU in 2018 were in Poland. In response to public pressure and supranational obligations, the state-led, household-oriented energy retrofit Clean Air Priority Program (CAPP) was launched in 2018. We investigate how the Polish state, local actors, and market organizations within this program dynamically compete and cooperate to enforce their agendas. Using in-depth interviews, secondary sources, and applying the Policy Arrangements Approach (PAA), we explore discursive and institutional tensions between central and local, as well as public and private actors’ objectives which fostered and complemented the rationale of the program’s air quality with ‘low-carbon’ policy goals. We highlight that pressure from grassroots groups, external power, and leadership can overcome differences in priority agendas by borrowing elements of stakeholders’ norms and discourses.