Throughout our surveys and interviews, a common theme emerges: people want jobs that go to workers who live in their communities. So what happens when clean energy jobs are not local jobs? Opposition from communities, unions, and elected officials can ensue. But what can we do? This chapter tells the story of unions in Minnesota – unions that represent both fossil and clean energy workers – that tried not a strategy of darkness and denial but instead a strategy of sunlight and support. They worked with state regulators to have clean energy project proposals commit to disclose to the public how many local workers they hire. We combine this episode with internal union surveys and our surveys of elected officials and the public to show both the promises of transparency but also its limits.

The world needs to transition to clean energy. But this massive transformation runs up against political obstacles. Local governments, national political parties, and corporations are obstructing the clean energy transition. And yet there is bipartisan support for communities on the front lines of the energy transition to receive compensation and investment. This chapter introduces the idea that these policies face credibility challenges and questions about local economic benefits. Next, we connect this discussion around the climate impasse with earlier economic transitions due to globalization, automation, national parks, and environmental protections. Finally, we argue that top-down approaches miss these credibility concerns. Instead, a bottom-up process of listening to impacted communities is crucial to unlock the climate impasse.

Chapter 8 examines the economic and fiscal dimensions of decentralization in the Islamic Republic of Iran. It presents a comprehensive empirical picture of fiscal decentralization and municipal finances under the IRI, which up till now has been a black box to Iran scholars. This chapter provides a look inside by describing the structure of subnational finance in Iran by analyzing a unique dataset I assembled covering the first phase of decentralization (1998–2006) covering almost 90 cities over an eight-year period – the result of the only comprehensive empirical study of municipal finances in Iran to date. This dataset provides a picture of the revenue and expenditure responsibilities of municipalities. The chapter explores the incentive structure of local government actors and the extent to which the political economy of fiscal decentralization in Iran supports or hinders the three projects for local government laid out throughout the book so far. It shows that local government’s lack of financial autonomy – explicitly constrained by tax, administrative, and local government laws – both distorts broad democratic participation and weakens the capacity of local governments to stimulate local economic development. The chapter highlights that the failure of the original decentralization reforms to put local economic development as a core priority has led to a failure in this regard, a major shortcoming of decentralization Iran to date.