Abstract
Climate change has the potential to pose serious challenges to economy, society and development process. It can cause water and food scarcity, affect the public health and increase the frequency of natural calamities. Scientists fear that it may jeopardise the prospects of sustainable development in the long term. Current trends reflect that threats of climate change may be aggravated in the future. The prospects for an effective global climate change regime for reducing greenhouse gases (GHG) emissions will depend upon future negotiations. Considering the severe nature and trans-boundary implications of climate change, multilateral cooperation based on differentiated responsibility is indispensable, but international negotiations for formulating effective measures have always been inconclusive so far. Uncertainty persists in the time of urgency. International community has not found effective mechanism to address the critical issues of climate change resource sharing, such as, climate financing, technology transfer, sovereignty and security, which are essential for mitigating and adapting to the climate change. In this backdrop, the book, Climate Change Negotiations: A Guide to Resolving Disputes and Facilitating Multilateral Cooperation, by Gunnar Sjostedt and Ariel Macaspac Penetrante (edited) is a timely academic endeavour to systemically examine climate change negotiations process, impediments and measures to facilitate the process for effective decision making at the international level. It aims to provide ‘useful methods to facilitate the UN negotiations on climate change to consider a strategic and forward-looking perspective’ (p. 3). Adopting multidisciplinary, the book combines scientific, political, legal and sociological perspectives and appears to be empathic on the practices. While critically analysing the negotiation process, it highlights the importance of knowledge and participatory method for effective and inclusive decision-making.
Thematically, the book attempts to analyse perspectives from professionals, stumbling blocks and strategic facilitation in negotiation process on climate change. It consists of four parts, which include as many as seventeen chapters in addition to an extended introduction and conclusion. The first part provides an overview of critical issues and major problems, and information and knowledge sharing for capacity building. It constructs the framework of the book and describes the process, means and its research method. Apart from discussing the contentious issues concerning resources, sovereignty and security among nations, it introduces the key argument of this research project, ‘strategic facilitation’, which calls for multilevel issue, actor and process-based facilitation, capacity and knowledge building to enhance the effectiveness of multilateral negotiations on climate change.
The second part gives a professional account of climate change negotiation process. Taking a macro level approach, this part discusses the various perspectives from politicians, diplomats, scientists, lawyers and sociologists; and makes germane references to the observations of people, who had participated in the negotiation process. From a diplomat’s perspective, Bo Kjellen describes changing dynamics of diplomacy on sustainable development. He notes that the ‘new diplomacy for sustainable development’ relies on science and research and involves non-governmental organisations and other stakeholders in its fold. To rationalise the policy and make development planning robust, he calls for skill enhancement of diplomats to understand the science. To bring compatibility in scientific knowledge and political decisions, Bert Bolin also observes that scientific findings must be the basis for discussion on important political issues and political solutions must be found and progress can be made ‘toward a more equitable world based on democratic values and institutions’ (p. 68).
Multidimensional aspects of climate change and diverse interests of stakeholders make its negotiation process more complicated. An international regime can be instrumental in synergising in countries’ policies; it is uncertain how international negotiation would shape in the future. The third part of the volume talks about stumbling blocks, which are intrinsic to issues, actors, strategies, process and outcome of the negotiation process. They have both external and internal dimensions and affect the process and outcome of negotiations. Chapters in this part discuss major contentious issues, such as, difference between the European Union and the United States, ‘Common but Differentiated Responsibility’ (CBDR), Russian perspective, North–South divide, adaptation and mitigation and so on. In the climate change negotiations, principles of CBDR remains contentious issue between developing and developed countries. This principle is always contested to redefine rights, justice, responsibility, etc. Developing countries are more vulnerable to differentiated impacts of climate change. Recent international negotiations in Durban (2011), Doha (2012) and Warsaw (2013) had not yielded long-term and adequate measures for global governance, reducing emissions, transfer of technology, finance, intellectual property rights (IPR). Divergence of national interests among countries hamper building common measures to cope with climate change. Some of the differences persist among nations because of lack of political will to accommodate their national interest in the global context. Developed countries have not committed necessary funds and technology to developing countries. Tora Skodvin examines how the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) can deliver on climate change adaptation and addresses the question of participation of developing countries. She notes that sustainable development can be reintegrated in the international climate regime through a stronger focus on vulnerability and adaptation (p. 244). Developing countries believe that the climate problem is not merely an environmental problem, it represents governance, development and economic challenges, which would be detrimental to the well-being of the people. Having reviewed the outcomes of climate change negotiations, Ariel Macaspac Penetrante rightly notes that ‘political preconditions affecting actors, structures, processes, issues, and outcomes’ determine the course of climate change negotiations (p. 249).
How to find the pathways for future climate change negotiations is the sum and substance of the fourth part. Gunnar Sjostedt and Ariel Macaspac Penetrante argue that there is a need to understand the science of climate change. They state that policy makers often do not understand scientific predictions and assessments about the climate change, thus, underestimate the potential challenges of the climate change. Since ‘problem solving’ requires necessary skill and adequate access to knowledge/information, this part describes the method of strategic facilitation and calls for enhancing the capacity and knowledge of negotiating parties to understand the climate issues properly, helping in climate change talks, suggesting effective measures to make the negotiation process smoother and enhance the capacity of negotiating institutions in climate change talks. It also emphasises to make climate change more inclusive, such as, the role of NGOs in lobbying government delegates, circulating information and position papers, working with media, holding side events and making interventions during debate and monitoring developments in the negotiations.
The book has selected relevant issues of climate change negotiations and has done their thorough analysis. It has assembled sufficient information in a logically structured framework. As it points out that a ‘coherent strategy’, which can be applied in the facilitation of multilateral negotiations on climate change has not been developed in the research project, but it suggests several measures to enhance the effectiveness of the negotiations process. The volume is relevant academic contribution to the knowledge on the climate change, which is essential for making an informed decision and policy.