Potential State Responses to Climate Change in Post-COVID World

Abstract

COVID-19 followed lockdown in countries have significantly reduced the level of global carbon emissions. However, this reduction in emissions is evaluated as a temporary phenomenon as emissions from countries are expecting to grow rapidly once the pandemic imposed restrictions are fully withdrawn. If emissions from countries are growing unabatedly in a post pandemic world that would adversely impact the implementation of the international climate change agreements, particularly the Paris Climate Agreement. Paris Climate Change Agreement which came into form in 2015 is the only international climate change agreement existing today to regulate global carbon emissions from all major economies. Majority of the nation-states have ratified the Paris Climate Agreement. However, the climate leadership vacuum that has created with the decision of the US to withdraw from the Paris Agreement and the current challenges that COVID-19 is posing to world multilateral order are adversely influencing the course of global climate change negotiations and thereby worsening the climate crisis.