The Long Way to the Copenhagen Accord: Climate Change Negotiations in 2009

The Copenhagen Summit did not conclude the 2 years negotiation process initiated in Bali in 2007. Ten official meetings among parties were not sufficient to reach a conclusion on the future of the international climate change regime after 2012. This paper summarizes the main issues addressed by the parties under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Kyoto Protocol tracks in the course of 2009, the longest year ever for climate change negotiations, and tries to explain the reasons behind the Summit's failures. Furthermore, an overview of the main points of the Copenhagen Accord is provided together with its implications and relation with the UNFCCC process.     

Great Expectations: Understanding Bali and the Climate Change Negotiations Process

This article reviews the December 2007 United Nations Climate Change Conference in Bali. It considers expectations for the meeting and whether the event delivered on these expectations. It also evaluates the long-term context of the meeting and examines the discussions in Bali on the post-2012 period (when the Kyoto Protocol's first 'commitment period' expires). The article finds that the Bali meeting did not necessarily meet public expectations or respond directly to the latest scientific assessments calling for urgent action. However, the article also finds that Bali was successful in the context of the prevailing political and diplomatic realities and the immense complexity of the climate change challenge – a problem that does not lend itself to a 'quick fix' solution. The article concludes that Bali produced a solid outcome that gives direction to future talks and sets a clear deadline for their completion. Finally, it argues that, contrary to some experts' opinion, the lack of detail in the Bali outcome may prove to be a strength rather than a weakness, since it provides flexibility to negotiators as they try to craft a consensus by the end of 2009.     

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.     

Global Climate Change and the Fragmentation of International Law

Born into the wider body of international law, the climate regime needs to be understood in light of preexisting regimes. By drawing on the current debate about fragmentation in international law, this article highlights challenges for international lawyers and policymakers in navigating the relationship between the climate regime and the biodiversity regime, and the relationship between the climate regime and the multilateral trading system. This article concludes that a narrow focus on conflicts misrepresents the multifaceted nature of climate change and precludes an adequate jurisprudential understanding of the relationship between the climate regime and other regimes. An improved understanding, particularly with respect to interactions with the biodiversity regime, requires a broadening of the debate that takes account of the institutional aspects of these relationships that may allow enhanced political cooperation and coordination. Further, international law, and in particular the emerging concept of systemic integration, has the potential to make a positive contribution to the climate‐trade interplay.     

The Devilish Details: Key Legal Issues in the 2015 Climate Negotiations

The ongoing UN negotiations for a 2015 climate agreement have yet to resolve two fundamental legal issues on which its effectiveness will hinge. The first is the precise legal form this agreement will take. Parties had agreed to work towards a ‘protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force under the Convention applicable to all Parties’. This leaves scope for a range of possible legal forms, only some of which are legally binding. Second, they have yet to determine the legal nature of the ‘nationally determined contributions’ submitted by Parties. This article addresses these two critical issues: on ‘legal form’, it identifies the instruments that could form part of the Paris package, focussing on their legal status, significance and influence; and on the ‘legal nature’ of nationally determined contributions, it considers their nature and scope, the range of options for ‘housing’ these contributions as well as their relationship to the core 2015 agreement.     

Biotic Carbon Sequestration and the Kyoto Protocol: The Construction of Global Knowledge by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

This paper explores the dynamics of the production of global knowledge by an international knowledge organization, in this case the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Based on previous notions of international boundary organizations, the idea of international knowledge organizations emphasizes the knowledge generation function of such organizations rather than their convening function. Using the case of controversial Kyoto Protocol biotic carbon sequestration policies, I argue that boundary work and uncertainty management are the essential dynamics in the successful construction of global knowledge by international knowledge organizations. This uncertainty management occurs in a manner broadly, although not completely, in conformance with the institutional preferences of powerful policy actors. Global knowledge can legitimate and help refine global policies, but the process of its construction must be iterative and transparent if it is to be credible for global environmental governance over the long-term.     

The Future Climate Regime: A Regional Comparison of Proposals

This paper compares and clarifies differences revealed in proposals from different regions on a future multilateral climate regime, after the year 2012. More than 100 articles in English were collected, categorized according to the lead authors region, and then reviewed to identify the general tendencies of each region. Proposals on emission allocation rules were the most popular in Europe, while rules related to international emissions trading dominated proposals from the United States. Few articles came from other Annex I countries, but these generally provided only the most basic aspects of a future regime. Meanwhile, concerns for equity and the relevance of any new regime in terms of sustainable development were clear in proposals from non-Annex I countries. Differences among regions were considered to be a reflection of current circumstances in each authors region. The capacity and culture of authors in some regions were considered to be other possible factors in differences. The paper concludes that recognition of regional background that formulate respective preferences and concerns regarding a future climate regime will be important to help reach a multilateral agreement in future official negotiations.     

Enforcing the Climate Regime: Game Theory and the Marrakesh Accords

This article reviews basic insights about compliance and "hard" enforcement that can be derived from various non-cooperative equilibrium concepts, and evaluates the Marrakesh Accords in light of these insights. Five different notions of equilibrium are considered – the Nash equilibrium, the subgame perfect equilibrium, the renegotiation proof equilibrium, the coalition proof equilibrium, and the perfect Bayesian equilibrium. These various types of equilibrium have a number of implications for effective enforcement: (1) Consequences of non-compliance should be more than proportionate. (2) Punishment needs to take place on the Pareto frontier, rather than by reversion to some suboptimal state. (3) An effective enforcement system must be able to curb collective as well as individual incentives to cheat. (4) A fully transparent enforcement regime is not unconditionally a good thing. It is concluded that constructing an effective system for "hard" enforcement of the Kyoto Protocol is a formidable task that has only partially been accomplished by the Marrakesh Accords. In practice, however, the design of the compliance system for the climate regime had to balance a desire to minimize non-compliance against other important goals, including the need for due process.     

在合作与发展之间:国际气候体制构建的难题

有效的国际气候体制安排是解决气候变化问题的最佳途径。气候变化与发展的冲突是国际气候体制构建中的核心"张力",负担的分配与公平、率先减排的利弊得失以及不确定的发展进程都会影响国家参与气候体制的意愿。国家制度惯性以及国家转制的代价则是制约国际气候体制构建的瓶颈。唯有通过发展中国家的发展、政府的"智能型"决策以及人类生活方式的改变,将发展融入气候变化问题之中,国际社会才可能逐渐走出气候治理方法和手段上的僵局,构建起有效的国际气候体制。     

‘US, China and the Economics of Climate Negotiations’

Despite the entry into force of the Kyoto Protocol, the US decision not to comply with its Kyoto commitments seems to drastically undermine the effectiveness of the Protocol in controlling GHG emissions. Therefore, it is important to explore whether there are economic incentives that might help the US to modify its current decision and move to a more environmentally effective climate policy. For example, can an increased participation of developing countries induce the US to effectively participate in the effort to reduce GHG emissions? Is a single emission trading market the appropriate policy framework to increase the signatories of the Kyoto Protocol? This paper addresses the above questions by analysing whether the participation of China in the cooperative effort to control GHG emissions can provide adequate incentives for the US to re-join the Kyoto process and eventually ratify the Kyoto Protocol. This paper analyses three different climate regimes in which China could be involved and assesses the economic incentives for the major world countries and regions to participate in these three regimes. The main conclusion is that the participation of the US in a climate regime is not likely, at least in the short run. The US is more likely to adopt unilateral policies than to join the present Kyoto coalition (even when it includes China). However, a two bloc regime would become the most preferred option if both China and the US, for some political or environmental reasons, decide to cooperate on GHG emission control. If the US decides to cooperate, the climate regime that provides the highest economic incentives to the cooperating countries is the one in which China and the US cooperate bilaterally, with the Annex B_?US countries remaining within the Kyoto framework.     

Divesting from Climate Change: The Road to Influence

Is fossil fuels divestment likely to achieve its aims? This article evaluates the rationales for divestment in terms of their capacity to give the campaign influence. It focuses on the direct effects of divestment on financial actors because divestment is a specific means of exerting influence outside of conventional political channels. In seeking to end fossil fuel industries in order to halt climate change, the campaign deploys a variety of arguments to win support and wield influence, namely, the legality of divestment and, indeed, the emerging duty to divest; investors’ moral responsibility to avoid complicity in the fossil fuel economy; investors’ moral responsibility to use their leverage against climate polluters; and the power of financial sanctions to create a business case for abandoning fossil fuels. Although in combination they may be effective, each of these asserted rationales has some limitations that may diminish the influence of the divestment movement. Moreover, the movement does not engage sufficiently with the systemic qualities of finance capitalism that must also be reckoned with in order to address broader patterns of environmental unsustainability. Although the divestment movement aspires to ultimately change government policies on climate change, it may achieve greater influence by also seeking better government regulation of the financial economy.