Sunny Side Up! From Climate Change Burden Sharing to Fair Global Warming Benefits Distribution: Groundwork on the Metaphysics of the Gains of Global Warming and the Climatorial Imperative

Abstract

Climate change has become reality. In the very many contemporary writings about global warming, the discussion has been centred around the negative impacts of climate change. The burden of climate change has been thematised and cost-sharing strategies heatedly debated. The need for fairness in sharing the burden of climate change has been argued to considering national economies, the world society but also balance inbetween generations. In the current frustration over the neglect of interest in ratifying intergovernmental climate agreements, the question arises whether the incentive structure of burden sharing models is appropriate to move the very many we need for climate stabilization. Only for these reasons, the following article sheds novel light on global warming from an almost unprecedentedly covered angle: The benefits of a warming earth! Considering climate change only as problematic is challenged as unidimensional. The article therefore pursues a more creative approach to overcome the obstacle of climate change. While the contemporary climate negotiations may be stuck in the one-sided grilling to share burden lowering participation motivation; unravelling the unprecedentedly described benefits arising from a warming earth may help build a more whole-rounded participatory incentive structure. State-of-the-art welfare function measurements and economic productivity parameters become the basis for conclusions about a fair spread of the gains and benefits from a warming earth. Contemporary Gross Domestic Product (GDP) measurements serve as basis for estimations about the productivity of the agriculture, industry and service sectors around the world in a changing temperature. Based on the cardinal temperatures for the agriculture, industry and service sectors productivity, the average temperature per country around the world as well as climate projections of the year 2100 under the business as usual path, this article reveals for the very first time climate winners and losers around the world. Overall and simply seen from a narrow-minded GDP perspective, the world will macroeconomically benefit more from climate change until 2100 than lose. Winning and losing from a warming earth is significantly positively correlated with the Paris COP 21 emissions country percentage of Greenhouse Gas (GHG) for ratification, leading to the conclusion that the countries that have the longest time horizon regarding a warming earth also lack motivation to mitigate global climate change. The paper concludes with introducing the climatorial imperative – advocating for the need for fairness in the distribution of the global earth benefits among nations based on Kant’s imperative to only engage in actions one wants to experience themselves being done to them. Passive neglect of action on climate mitigation is an active injustice to others. While the method to measure the gains from climate change can certainly be refined in future studies, this article is meant as very first preliminary step to open a gate to legal codifications and policy work to settle for a right, just and fair distribution of benefits from our common warming mother earth. The introduction of the gains from climate change is a novel approach that should solely be seen in connection to the imperative to distribute the gains in a fair manner among all world inhabitants. Focusing on gains may serve as means to hopefully draw attention to climate change of agnostic market actors or those who shy away from action given the overall negative connotation of climate change burden sharing and economic productivity loss aversion.