Abstract
In the last five years, climate change has been established as a central civilizational driver of our time. As a result of this development, the most diversified social processes - as well as the fields of science which study them - have had their dynamics altered. In International Relations, this double challenge could be explained as follows: 1) in empirical terms, climate change imposes a deepening of cooperation levels on the international community, considering the global common character of the atmosphere; and 2) to International Relations as a discipline, climate change demands from the scientific community a conceptual review of the categories designed to approach the development of global climate governance. The goal of this article is to discuss in both conceptual and empirical terms the structure of global climate change governance, through an exploratory research, aiming at identifying the key elements that allow understanding its dynamics. To do so, we rely on the concept of climate powers. This discussion is grounded in the following framework: we now live in an international system under conservative hegemony that is unable to properly respond to the problems of interdependence, among which - and mainly -, the climate issue.
Highlights
In the last five years, a series of broad movements – in both physical and social terms – has led to the consolidation of climate change as a key civilizational driver[1] of our time
2 According to the notion of climate change being a key civilizational driver, in another work (Viola, Franchini and Ribeiro 2012) we argue that the concept of climate commitment should be used as part of the criteria to evaluate the quality of a democratic regime
Climate power refers to the level of influence of certain agents over the climate social outcome at systemic level
Summary
In the last five years, a series of broad movements – in both physical and social terms – has led to the consolidation of climate change as a key civilizational driver[1] of our time. Since the industrial revolution, our actions have been effectively pushing a series of key processes of the Earth system out of the stable variation range This shift signals the transition from the Holocene to the Anthropocene, which comprehends two processes: the anthropic factor as the leading driver of systemic climate change, and the deviation – which has profound potential consequences – from the stable patterns of the Holocene. Within this framework, the scientific community has advanced in the identification of nine planetary boundaries within which humankind could safely operate. These great state actors are considered leading agents in this specific area of governance, at the same time the formal regime – the United Nations
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