The European Union as a Bilateral ‘Norm Leader’ on Climate Change vis-à-vis China

Abstract

The Copenhagen climate summit was widely reported as ‘another failure for EU climate diplomacy’, focusing in particular on its failure to persuade China to commit to binding emission reduction targets. To balance this narrative, this article focuses on the bilateral dialogue between the EU and China on energy and environmental issues, in particular, their 2005 ‘Partnership on Climate Change’. Using constructivism as overall theoretical framework, it draws specifically on the literature on norms and the socialization processes leading to normative change in international politics. In particular, this article explores the EU’s contribution to the process of ‘social learning’ among Chinese policy makers on climate change. Its main finding is that the EU helped to overcome the traditional understanding in China of the environment and the economy as competing concerns and enabled the diffusion of the ‘business case’ for a low-carbon economy.