Large-scale climate progress through coordinated community action
Transitioning society to be more climate-compatible is a great idea—one of the best ever. The technologies to drive deep decarbonization exist and are mature. The evidence base for equitable, effective policy is robust. Decades of research and practice have yielded turnkey approaches to cut emissions, build resilience, and improve quality of life, often simultaneously. There has been real progress.
But despite the fact that solid evidence which shows investing in climate transitions is in our collective best interest has been around for more than two decades, speed and scale remain badly inadequate.
What gives?
Bottom line is the gap between what is possible and what is happening is not a knowledge problem. It is a structural one, rooted in four compounding challenges:
Power. Policy incentives and market structures continue to reward activities that work against climate progress. And at the federal level and in many states, climate is not just deprioritized — it is actively undermined. The levers of power are frequently pointed in the wrong direction.
Information. Americans are broadly supportive of climate action but widely uncertain about what meaningful action to support. Low public literacy on climate solutions, combined with decades of deliberate disinformation campaigns, has made it difficult to build durable coalitions around specific changes.
Trust. Trust in government is at historic lows. Partisan narratives rooted in the Reagan era have reinforced the false idea that government is the problem rather than a vehicle for collective solutions, making it hard to build public support for the coordinated action climate progress requires.
Inertia. Change is hard. Economic lock-in is real. Breaking from the status quo requires sophisticated strategy, shrewdness, and patience. Even when the will exists, the path from intention to transformation is long.
Way Forward
One of the most promising and underutilized paths around these barriers is innovation in local community action, coordinated for scale.
The core idea: to accelerate climate progress, lead local communities to make transformative changes that make life better. That means liberating local governments from the political and practical constraints that keep them taking half-steps, and building bridges that allow communities to drive coordinated action that adds up to something large.
This is not a workaround. It is a strategy, one that turns community wellbeing into a vehicle for climate progress and local momentum into national change.
There are four pillars:
#1. Communities have unique power to drive large-scale climate progress while making life better
A focus on community wellbeing enables climate progress rather than competing with it. Investments that make neighborhoods more livable, more connected, and more resilient are frequently the same investments that reduce emissions and build adaptive capacity. Communities are not just a delivery mechanism. They are where climate action becomes tangible and real for people.
Climate advocates often underestimate what communities can accomplish. Local governments shape land use, transportation, building standards, and energy systems. They are close to residents’ lived experience and responsive to local organizing in ways that state and federal institutions often are not.
#2. There are specific transitions worth prioritizing, and advocates should make those main things the main things
Not all climate interventions are equal in their potential for transformative, community-level impact. The transitions most worth concentrating on include:
- People-centered urbanism: designing communities around human needs rather than vehicle throughput, with land use and public space that supports density, walkability, and belonging
- Transportation for access: shifting the goal of transportation systems from moving vehicles to connecting people equitably with destinations, jobs, services, and each other
- Widespread beneficial electrification: accelerating the shift to clean electric energy across buildings, transportation, and equipment, with equity at the center
- Adaptation to heat: preparing communities for the climate that is already here, with particular attention to populations most at risk
#3. Communities are stuck taking baby steps and need new ways to break free from inertia
Good ideas are not enough. Even communities that want to move faster face real constraints: limited staff capacity, fragmented political will, unclear priorities, and change processes that favor incrementalism. Breaking free requires deliberate capacity-building in three areas:
- Turnkey policy blueprints that make proven approaches easy to adopt and adapt
- Organizational process improvements that help local governments act with greater speed and alignment
- Enabling conditions built on political support and alignment among elected officials, executive leadership, and expert staff. When these three work together, transformative change becomes possible. When they do not, even the best ideas stall.
#4. Local community action can become large-scale change
The goal is not a better-functioning single city. The goal is a country that changes fast enough to matter. Local action, at sufficient scale and with sufficient coordination, can drive that kind of change.
Community-led efforts go further and faster when supported by higher jurisdictions and mission-driven partners who can provide financing, technical assistance, and connective tissue between communities working toward shared goals. Local is the entry point. Large-scale is the destination.
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