Global Journal of Science Frontier Research, H: Environment & Earth Science, Volume 23 Issue 5

providing standards, and schemes, and coming out with campaigns for buy-ins and attention to these. This, they may tend to act in concert with the public sector or act alone (p.87). This suggests that non-state actors tend to operate as entities on their own or in concert with the state in driving home their activities. According to Hoffman (2011), NSAs mostly advocate and advance their case for actions and efforts towards climate adaptation and mitigation which may include, inter alia, energy efficiency, carbon markets, local adaptation, and revolution of the built environment as well as transportation systems (p. 5). They are a varied group, full of different motivations, capacities of action, and routes taken – and have different types of presence at different levels of governance (Allan, 2020). c) Theoretical Framework i. Hybrid Multilateralism, Roles and Modus Operandi of NSAs The concept of ‘hybrid multilateralism’ has been discussed to denote the new landscape of international climate cooperation which became popular during the period after the Copenhagen Summit which has become well established via the Paris Agreement. The concept was coined by Bäckstrand et al (2017) to mean the various forces and actors including state and non-state actors involved and recognized in climate change governance. It suggests a bottom-up climate policy architecture that combines voluntary pledging by states with an international transparency framework for periodic review and ratcheting-up of ambition, in which non-state actors play important roles as implementers, experts, and watchdogs. Additionally, hybrid multilateralism refers to an increasingly dynamic interplay between multilateral and transnational climate action, where the UNFCCC Secretariat has taken a role as facilitator, or orchestrator, of a multitude of non-state climate initiatives and actions. Non-state actors tend to strappingly support climate change mitigation over people’s adaptation. For example, in an empirical study that sampled sixty (60), non-state actors, to assess their activities, it was observed that seventy-five percent (75%) of these NSAs mainly concentrated on mitigation alone, with twenty-two percent (22%) concentrating on both mitigation and adaptation, with 3% paying attention exclusively to adaptation (Bulkeley et al. (2014). As non-state actors neither do have sovereign powers nor command coercive powers as states, those NSAs who command a few resources and with no regulatory power resort to some subtle ways of influencing climate actions. Their main climate action activities essentially entail lobbying relevant stakeholders, orchestrating some actions, and consensus-building with parties. On the role of the NSA in climate governance, NSA participation can be grouped into two broad categories. First, there are instrumental claims, which hold that CSO participation in public governance provides knowledge to enhance problem-solving capacity, which in turn leads to more effective and efficient policy implementation (Baker & Chapin 2018). Engagement can also promote governance transparency, thus mitigating the risk of governments catering primarily to influential domestic interest groups (Dombrowski 2010). By pushing for monitoring and stakeholder consultation mechanisms, CSOs can also help foster the creation of formal accountability mechanisms in the system of governance, particularly within public administration (for further discussion, see Bernauer & Gampfer 2013).CSOs participate with the state as actors in international climate change negotiations (Lane & Morrison 2006, United Nations 1992), being recognized as an essential component of good governance (Banks et al. 2015). CSOs also participate as key agents in the implementation, monitoring, and evaluation of climate change policy (Haris et al . 2020). III. M ethod This paper synthesizes from extant theoretical and empirical readings, predominantly sorted from peer- reviewed journal sources and pertinent scholarly books intending to examine the role of non-state actors in addressing the security risk challenges associated with climate change. Whilst NSAs connote a broader concept, the scope of the study was on the role of NGOs in helping smallholder farmers deal with the food security risk which often comes as a result of unpredictable climate patterns caused by climate change. From the extant empirical literature, the study uses the experience of four international NGOs who operate in the Northern Regions of Ghana with a particular emphasis on how they help farmers navigate through the contours of mitigating and adapting to the challenges of climate change. This involves taking cues from the work of Yakubu et al. (2019) which discussed how international NGOs help farmers adapt to climate change adaptation. The literature search covered all terms and concepts related to non-state actors and climate change. The study combined words and © 2023 Global Journals 1 Year 2023 52 Global Journal of Science Frontier Research Volume XXIII Issue ersion I VV ( H ) Addressing Security Risk Caused by Climate Change Across Nations: The Role of Non-State Policy Actors The second group of arguments is normative in appeal, based on claims that participation supports democratic values by fostering a more inclusive and deliberative form of public policy decision-making. This in turn can enhance public support for policy and reduce policy conflict. For instance, non-state actors can give voice to under-represented groups, thereby legitimizing and validating policy decisions and improving the democratic quality of a polity (Bäckstrand & Kuyper 2017).