Agency in international climate negotiations: the case of indigenous peoples and avoided deforestation

This article examines the agency of indigenous peoples in designing a mechanism for reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) under the emerging post-2012 agreement to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. It investigates whether indigenous peoples have agency in international negotiations and specifically the REDD design process and if so, how they have obtained it. Agency refers to the ability of actors to prescribe behaviour and to substantively participate in and/or set their own rules related to the interactions between humans and their natural environment. The aim of this study is to gain understanding of what role non-nation state actors, particularly indigenous peoples, play in shaping the REDD design process under the climate convention and what is shaping their agency. A special emphasis is placed on indigenous peoples as they may be highly vulnerable to the impacts from both climate change and certain policy responses. The article finds that, through REDD, indigenous peoples and forest community alliances are emerging in the climate regime but their agency in designing a mechanism on forest protection in a post-2012 climate regime remains indirect and weak. They are being consulted and invited to provide input, but they are not able to directly participate and ensure that their views and concerns are reflected in the outcome on REDD.     

The Climate Change Regime: An Enviro-Economic Problem and International Administrative Law in the Making

The climate change problem, or global warming, has gained a prominent place on the international political agenda, since the mid-1980s, when it first attracted political attention. The problem was initially perceived mainly as an environmental problem that could be resolved by technological solutions, its current perception, this essay argues, is best characterized as that of an enviro-economic problem. A perception that is exemplified by the ongoing negotiations for the development of economic mechanisms to tackle the problem. The climate change arena is a complex one, involving dichotomies between developed and developing countries, between fossil fuel producing and importing countries and between small island developing states and other states. This essay outlines the interests that play a role in the climate change negotiations and discusses the international climate change regime as contained in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and its Kyoto Protocol. It concludes that the climate change negotiations are complicated by the fact that the negotiators, in addition to developing new substantive rules for a complex problem, are involved in developing new systemic rules for the international legal system. These new systemic rules have more in common with rules of national systems of public or administrative law than with traditional rules of international law, which have many similarities with national systems of contract law.     

Green economy and carbon markets for conservation and development: a critical view

Green economy aims to use economic rationality and market mechanisms to mute the most ecologically damaging effects of globalized capitalism while reviving economic growth in the global North, fostering development in the South, and decoupling economic growth from environmental decline. An archetypal application of green economy is transnational trade in ecosystem services, including reduced emissions for deforestation and degradation (REDD+). By compensating developing countries for maintaining forests as carbon sinks, this approach is meant to transcend politics and circumvent conflicts over the responsibilities of industrialized and ‘less-developed’ countries that have stymied global climate policy. However, carbon-offset trading is unlikely to result in lower greenhouse gas emissions, much less combined conservation and development gains. The troubled record of payment for environmental services and other schemes or commodification of nature illustrates that living ecosocial systems do not fit the requirements of market contracts. Disputes over proto-REDD+ projects point to the dangers that REDD+ will disadvantage or dispossess rural communities and distract attention from underlying causes of forest and livelihood loss. Two decades of all-but-futile climate negotiations have shown that global warming cannot be managed by means of technocratic expertise nor dealt with separately from the politics of inequality and the paradox of economic growth. The deceptive promise of greening with growth can blind us to these realities. Counter-hegemonic discourses to growth-centered green economy under the headings of buen vivir, mainly in the global South, and degrowth, mainly in the global North, therefore merit attention.     

The Sustainable Development Goals and REDD+: assessing institutional interactions and the pursuit of synergies

This paper analyzes potential synergies between two recent sustainable development initiatives, namely the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+), a climate mitigation mechanism negotiated under the auspices of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The paper elaborates a conceptual framework based on institutional interactions and distinguishes core, complementary, and supplementary synergies that may be realized between the SDGs and REDD+. Potential synergies are analyzed at the global level, as well as within two national-level contexts: Indonesia, with its long-standing REDD+ programme, and Myanmar, which is in the early stages of implementing REDD+. Both are now also engaging nationally with the SDG implementation process. Our research draws on literature review and document analysis, direct observations of global policy processes relating to REDD+ and SDGs, as well as extensive engagement (of one author) at national level in Indonesia and Myanmar. Our analysis reveals that there are currently significant opportunities to pursue synergies in the implementation of these international initiatives at the national level, although pro-active interaction management is necessary, especially to achieve complementary synergies.     

Managing fragmentation in global environmental governance: the REDD+ Partnership as bridge organization

This article analyzes the increasing institutional and organizational complexity and fragmentation surrounding the international financing mechanism REDD+ (reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation in developing countries and related forest activities), now being negotiated within the UNFCCC. We focus, in particular, on critically assessing the prospects of managing such fragmentation. We do so by analyzing whether and how (what we conceptualize here as) a “bridge organization”—the voluntary, multi-stakeholder REDD+ Partnership bringing together state and non-state actors from global to local scales—has aided in managing fragmentation in this realm, through exercising four enabling functions (enhancing transparency, participation, knowledge sharing, and coordination). Our analysis shows that the REDD+ Partnership has partially succeeded in furthering such procedural aims, but that this has not resulted in a “scaling up of REDD+ action and finance,” its overarching substantive aim. In contrast to dominant views of a bridge organization’s modus operandi, we conclude, based on our analysis, that its value lies not in overcoming persisting geopolitical conflicts around climate mitigation and providing a “depoliticized” context within which to manage fragmentation. Instead, its success lies in permitting dialogue and exchange even in the face of persisting political conflicts over its raison d’être and functions. In making these arguments, the article extends recent debates on the prospects to manage fragmentation in global environmental governance and provides a critical assessment of the role therein for bridge organizations.     

The role of discourses in governing forests to combat climate change

Reducing emissions from forest degradation and deforestation, conserving and enhancing forest carbon stocks, and sustainably managing forests (REDD+) has emerged as one of the most anticipated climate change mitigation tools. This paper aims to understand and identify the underlying discourses that have dominated the emergence of REDD+, by identifying the key story lines in the policy and academic debates on REDD+. As such, this paper takes a step away from the “fine-tuning” of policy recommendations and instead studies REDD+ from a more theoretical approach with the intent to provide a critical analysis of the ideational structures that shape the policies that have emerged around REDD+. The analysis shows that ecological modernization and its accompanying story lines constitute a dominant notion of REDD+ as being able to manage the complexities of forest in a synergetic way, combining cost-efficient and effective mitigation with sustainable development. The paper also identifies the critical counter discourse of civic environmentalism, which criticizes this notion of REDD+ and instead promotes issues such as equity, the importance of local knowledge, and the participatory process. It argues that reducing deforestation involves trade-offs between economic, ecological, and social dimensions, also arguing that REDD+ fits overwhelmingly with the interest of the global North.     

The role of the G20 in governing the climate change regime

A wide array of institutions governing climate change has proliferated over the past years, influencing the rule-makings of the regime. One of them is the G20. When G20 leaders around the world convened in London to restore global economies, they stressed the importance of a ‘resilient, sustainable, and green recovery’ and reaffirmed their commitments to address climate change. This was followed by their agreement on phasing out inefficient fossil fuel energy subsidies over the medium term in Pittsburgh. The ‘coexistence of narrow regimes in the same issue-area’ could be described as ‘regime complexes’, which enable countries to adapt more readily, particularly when adaptation requires complex changes in norms and behavior. Given that responses to climate change would require changes in the domestic politics of different countries at different levels, loosely integrated institutions of regime complexes could be more advantageous for countries to adapt and in engaging with developing countries. This paper demonstrates that the G20’s highly informal institutional setup as well as its flexible cooperation tools could enable its members to customize their policies and better engage with third-party countries. In addition, the G20 group could collectively influence other key countries to reach an agreement on some of the key climate change–related issues, thereby facilitating the United Nations process of climate change.     

China and India’s participation in global climate negotiations

In this paper, we discuss a range of issues concerning developing country participation in current global climate change mitigation negotiations, especially India and China. We argue that the problem of redefining ‘common yet differentiated responsibilities’ in a way which allows developing countries room to pursue their individual development goals while still achieving the necessary level of carbon mitigation is central to the debate. The choice of negotiating instruments, effective technology transfer and financial support, and other related issues have been raised principally by China and India, and may also be raised by several other countries. Kyoto non-compliance by Annex 1 countries will also greatly impact the negotiating power of China and India and other developing countries. We conclude that, once basic principles are clearly defined, the greatest incentive for China and India to participate in climate change negotiations is the prospect of future negotiating rounds that can be linked to a large number of climate change related issues, such as intellectual property, the potential for financial transfers and trade/market access.     

Africa in the global climate change negotiations

The African Group of Negotiators (AGN) has become a much more significant bargaining coalition in the global climate change negotiations. It has been participating more proactively and on a much more significant scale, and, as a result, it has had a greater impact on bargaining outcomes, notably in Nairobi, Copenhagen and Durban. Yet, at present, the group remains poorly understood by both scholars and policymakers. Compared to other groups in the climate negotiations, such as the Group of 77 and Alliance of Small Island States, it has received relatively little attention. This paper fills this gap by tracking the evolution of the AGN over the course of the climate change negotiations. In the early years after the Earth Summit, it shows that the AGN faced tremendous difficulties pursing regional objectives effectively, largely due to a number of “internal” barriers to participation, which compounded the structural barriers that the continent faced by making it difficult to use “low-power” negotiating strategies such as coalition building, agenda-setting and persuasion. However, in recent years, the group has become much more proactive as a result of greater access to material, ideational and institutional resources. These have relieved, somewhat, the internal barriers that the group faced, making it possible for the AGN to negotiate much more confidently and effectively than before.     

The role of the Asia Pacific Partnership in discursive contestation of the international climate regime

After withdrawing from the Kyoto Protocol, the US Bush Administration and the Australian Howard Government pursued an international climate change policy focussed on voluntary international agreements outside the UN climate negotiations. This strategy included the formation of several climate agreements directed at technology development, including the 2005 Asia Pacific Partnership on Clean Development and Climate (APP). The APP provides a model for international climate change policy directed at voluntary national greenhouse gas intensity targets, technology development through sectoral public–private partnerships and technology diffusion through trade. This article situates the APP within these US and Australian inspired climate agreements formed outside the UN negotiations. Bäckstrand and Lövbrand’s (in M. Pettenger (ed.) The social construction of climate change: power knowledge norms discourses, 2007) discourse analysis in relation to the international climate negotiations is used to explore differences between the APP and UN climate treaties. We find the APP embodies a discourse of what we call ‘deregulatory ecological modernisation’ that promotes limited public funding to ease informational failures in markets for cleaner technologies and management practices. The deregulatory ecological modernisation discourse is a deeply intensive market liberal approach to international climate change policy, which contests binding emission reduction targets and the development of a global carbon market. The USA, Australia, Japan and Canada represented a core group of countries that used the APP to promote the deregulatory ecological modernisation discourse and thereby contest any deepening of developed nations' emission reduction targets for the post-2012 period. However, with changes of leadership and new parties in power in the USA and Australia, it appears that the deregulatory ecological modernisation discourse has lost ground compared to a reengagement with discourses supportive of developed country emission reduction targets and equity-based adaptation and technology transfer assistance for developing nations.     

Challenges and prospects of implementing the access and benefit sharing regime of the Convention on Biological Diversity in Africa: the case of Ethiopia

An analysis of the implementation of the access and benefit sharing (ABS) regime under the Convention on Biological Diversity and other related regimes in Africa and, in particular, Ethiopia, reveals the following challenges: (a) centralization of power in the hands of the federal government with little attention to regional and local governments; (b) lack of effective mechanism for the participation of communities in ABS; (c) generality and vagueness of the regulatory regime and lack of regulations and guidelines for the effective implementation of the regulatory regime, (c) poor drafting of ABS Agreements; and (d) lack of effective enforcement and follow-up mechanisms for ABS Agreements. Nonetheless, despite the shortcomings, the article suggests that Ethiopia’s experience provides an important lesson for other countries confronted with the challenge of designing fair genetic resource governance at the national level and, more importantly, shows the challenges poor countries face in developing and implementing ABS Laws and in negotiating, concluding and enforcing ABS Agreements.     

Global carbon pricing and the “Common But Differentiated Responsibilities”: the case of China

This paper analyzes whether using carbon pricing as the major mitigation policy instrument is compatible with the implementation of the “common but differentiated responsibility” principle in a global climate agreement. We focus more specifically on China, a key player in climate negotiations. This is done by adopting the Imaclim-R model to assess the economic effect of carbon pricing on the Chinese economy in different climate architectures which, despite aiming at the same stabilization target, differ in terms of the temporal profile of emission reductions and the regional distribution of efforts (different quota allocation schemes). Model outcomes prove that neither temporal nor regional flexibilities provides a satisfactory answer since the Chinese economy remains significantly hurt at certain time periods. This suggests the recourse to complementary measures to carbon pricing in order to help smoothing the necessary shift toward a low-carbon society. This means in particular that, to build a climate policy architecture that could be compatible with the “common but differentiated responsibility” principle, climate negotiations must go beyond global top-down systems relying on cap-and-trade to include bottom-up measures likely to complement the carbon price and make carbon mitigation acceptable in countries like China.     

Criteria for Evaluation of Burden-sharing Rules in International Climate Policy

This article presents nine criteria for assessing, comparing, and ranking burden-sharing rules and conceptual frameworks used in climate policy negotiations and agreements. Three of the criteria are concerned with fairness principles and six criteria are operational requirements. The application of these criteria is illustrated in the context of six different burden-sharing schemes. The Multi-sector Convergence approach and the Triptych approach received highest average score of the six schemes. The Brazilian proposal received a similar total score, but unevenly distributed with a high score on fairness principles and low score on operational requirements. The European Union member countries employed the Triptych approach when they differentiated their national abatement targets prior to the 1997 Kyoto meeting. The Multi-sector Convergence approach was developed in a joint ECN (Netherlands Energy Research Foundation) and CICERO (Center for International Climate and Environmental Research – Oslo) project. It is a sector-based, global approach that comprises convergence of per capita emissions at the same level in all countries. Sector-based approaches have a distinct advantage compared to other approaches because they reflect the economic structure of countries rather well. Such approaches could play a useful role in future climate policy negotiations, not the least in discussions on binding climate targets for developing countries.     

Challenges and Outcomes at the Ninth Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change

From 1 to 12 December 2003, the Ninth Session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention took place in Milan, Italy. This conference continued the laborious effort of developing an international climate regime by preparing for the Kyoto Protocol’s entry into force. Some two dozen decisions were adopted on a wide range of options for responding to climate change. This paper assesses the progress achieved at the conference on a number of issues. Among these were operational details for implementing forestry projects under the Convention’s Clean Development Mechanism, and guidelines for reporting on greenhouse gas emissions and removals from agriculture, forestry and land-use change. Parties also decided on rules with respect to two funds, the Special Climate Change Fund and the Least Developed Country Fund. With respect to developing countries, Parties continued discussions on rules for building response capacity in light of the expected adverse effects of climate change and transferring environmentally sound technology. They also discussed how to incorporate scientific advice from the Third Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change into the negotiations. Although Russia did not ratify the Kyoto Protocol prior to the conference, Milan demonstrated momentum and interest among Parties to support the climate regime. Nevertheless, it is doubtful whether the detailed discussions were able to contribute to preparing for the long term. To this end, this paper concludes that more discussion and leadership is required to bridge the North/South gap if a post-2012 climate regime is to stand.     

Burden Sharing and Fairness Principles in International Climate Policy

One of the major challenges facing participants in the global climate change negotiations is to find a scheme of burden sharing that can be accepted as "fair" by all or at least most governments. In this article we first explore which basic principles of fairness seem to be sufficiently widely recognized to serve as a normative basis for such a scheme. We then examine a set of proposals for differentiating obligations that have been submitted by governments in the negotiations leading up to the Kyoto Protocol to see which principles have been honored. In the concluding section we discuss the implications of our analysis for the design of more specific burden sharing rules.     

中国在国际气候谈判中面临的新挑战及其应对

德班平台建立后,国际气候谈判由“双轨制”变为单轨,发达国家和发展中国家自此将在一个共同的平台上就未来国际气候机制展开谈判,过去相对稳定的国际气候谈判格局发生演变.在这种情况下,中国面临着发展中国家身份的集体认同的变化,以及中国所一贯坚持的“共同但有区别的责任”原则的重新解读,这些变化将给中国的身份定位及国家利益带来影响.因此,中国一方面要把握在未来国际气候机制制定中的话语权,积极参与全球气候治理体系的改革与建构,使其适应中国国内中长期发展目标;另一方面也要承担相应的减排责任,做负责任的大国,为全球气候治理贡献力量.     

WTO《农业协定》及农产品贸易规则执行评价（下）

2008年7月29日在日内瓦持续9天的多哈回合部长会议谈判，由于未能在关键的农业问题上达成一致，无果而终。通过对十余年来《农业协定》及农产品贸易规则的执行情况进行回顾，全面分析发达国家及发展中国家执行协定的情况，找出各自的特点、存在的问题与不足，探讨谈判失败的原因和教训。第一部分分析发达国家的执行情况及农产品贸易特点；通过分析美国陆地棉案评价美国农产品补贴制度的实质以及专家组裁决的意义。第二部分分析发展中国家的执行情况及农产品贸易特点。第三部分分析中国《农业协定》的执行情况，农产品贸易特点以及中国的立场。     

Technology investment, bargaining, and international environmental agreements

If countries are to engage in international environmental cooperation, they must bargain over the distribution of gains. When future bargaining over pollution abatement is expected, how should a country decide on public technology investments to reduce the domestic cost of pollution abatement? I find that while countries tend to underinvest because they fail to internalize the global benefits of new technology, the magnitude of the problem depends on a country’s bargaining power. Powerful countries underinvest less frequently, because they expect to reap most of the global benefits from new technology in the international negotiations. I also investigate the effectiveness of a simple reciprocal technology agreement. I find that it can help solve the underinvestment problem, and this beneficial effect is particularly pronounced in the case of powerful countries. These findings imply that changing the bargaining protocol on climate change to the benefit of powerful countries may help secure the necessary technology investments.     

Reinforcement of multilevel governance dynamics: creating momentum for increasing ambitions in international climate negotiations

Compared to the disappointment of the 2009 climate summit in Copenhagen, the results of the recent Conferences of the Parties can be regarded as positive progress. This was made possible due to lesson drawing and learning among states. Recent evidence from the UNFCCC negotiations suggests that countries began to reflect on the “Copenhagen experience.” They are setting up domestic climate legislation in the form of low carbon development plans and share their knowledge and experiences in the international climate change negotiations. Country representatives engage in workshops and roundtables to showcase their mitigation plans and low carbon development initiatives, thereby raising ambitions and creating group pressure on other countries. This article examines how the diffusion of policies across countries is motivated and facilitated by knowledge transfer and learning within multilevel-reinforcing governance dynamics between the domestic level and international negotiations. It analyzes how changes in the negotiation setting from confrontational formal negotiations to a more open forum and bottom-up pledge-and-review process, in combination with a positively framed win–win low carbon economic development narrative resulted in the diffusion of climate policies across developed and developing countries. Communicating these climate initiatives on the national level has shifted the debate. Countries emphasize less the win–lose perspective of economic costs and sacrifice. Thus, they focus less on the question of who should reduce emissions’, but identify co-benefits instead. The institutionalized knowledge sharing within the UNFCCC is also creating positive competitive dynamics among countries to increase their ambition and to take on a leadership role. This shift in the negotiations carries potential for a more ambitious aggregate negotiation outcome and opens up a window of opportunity.