Global justice and environmental governance: an analysis of the Paris Agreement

Marcelo Santos

doi:10.1590/0034-7329201600116

Abstract

Abstract Based on the major normative political theory contributions on global climate justice, the present paper analyzes the new international agreement on climate change, adopted at COP 21 in Paris (2015). Therefore, a literary review of the extensive normative theoretical discussion about global climate justice is made, with special attention to the two approaches that have permeated multilateral political negotiations - historical responsibility and equal per capita emissions. From this normative discussion, this paper recalls the global climate change negotiation process, focusing on the Kyoto Protocol. Next, the analysis emphasizes on the Paris Agreement in an effort to evaluate the normative questions on justice and equity within the environmental governance regime. Finally, the set of conclusions indicates that, although the flexibility of the Agreement has encompassed some dimensions of responsibility, necessity and ability to bear the costs, the most complex dimensions of justice and equity has not been completely solved, which may hinder the operation of environmental governance in a near future.

Highlights

Article three of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which was first open to signature in 1992, at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), and has already been ratified by 196 countries, acknowledged the problems related to climate change, and determined the need to implement policies to protect the climate system for the benefit of present and future generations of humankind, on the basis of cooperation and equity, and in accordance with the differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (UNFCCC 1992, 4-5)
Following decades of deadlocks in climate changes negotiations characterized by divergences and distrusts among the parties as to several normative questions which emphasized on principles of responsibility, capability, equality, among others, the Paris Conference managed to achieve more concrete diplomatic results
With a flexible and not much binding perspective, the Agreement set forth provisions on mitigation, adaptation, financing, technology and capacity-building, and created mechanisms dedicated to transparency, monitoring and evaluation of the actions taken by the countries, which were defined according to an ultimate global temperature objective

Summary

Introduction

Article three of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which was first open to signature in 1992, at the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), and has already been ratified by 196 countries, acknowledged the problems related to climate change, and determined the need to implement policies to protect the climate system for the benefit of present and future generations of humankind, on the basis of cooperation and equity, and in accordance with the differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (UNFCCC 1992, 4-5). Throughout the long pathway towards the Paris Conference (COP 21), in 2015, the establishment of global governance on climate change has faced lots of difficulties and inoperativeness which were mostly due to the different understandings on cooperation and equity legislation among countries Such differences resulted in normative deadlocks related to responsibilities to be undertaken, the definition of the efforts to be made, the sharing of the massive costs to address the problem, the distribution of rights to emit, and types of agents that should bear the burdens. A number of dimensions and variables make up the design of a global governance regime, but the analysis in this paper will be focused on normative dimensions of justice and equity This way, the third section will consist of a brief recollection of the historical negotiations about the normative dimensions and the multilateral process, with special attention to the Kyoto Protocol, the major milestone of these negotiations. Following almost 20 years of frustrations in post-Kyoto negotiations, countries managed to reach an agreement on universally accepted rules, an essential condition for any international governance regime

Historical responsibility

Equal per capita emissions

Global justice and environmental governance

The Paris Agreement

Conclusion

Bibliographic references