Climate
and Climate Change: The issues
Climate is generally
defined as a measure of the average pattern of variation in temperature, humidity, atmospheric
pressure, wind, precipitation, atmospheric particle count and
other meteorological variables in a given region over long periods of
time. It is different from weather, which is the measure of these factors
over a short period of time.
Climate
Change is thus simply put, the change in the average weather but the UNFCCC
defines it as “a change of climate which is attributed directly or indirectly
to human activity that alters the composition of the global atmosphere and
which is in addition to natural climate variability observed over comparable
time periods.”
Closely
linked to climate change is global warming which is the alleged rise in global
temperatures due to the increase of gases in the atmosphere which create a blanket
that lets in solar energy and prevent it from leaving just like a greenhouse.
Rising
levels of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere have
warmed the Earth and are causing wide-ranging impacts, including rising sea
levels; melting snow and ice; more extreme heat events, fires and drought; and
more extreme storms, rainfall and floods.
Washington
State Department of Ecology says scientists project that these trends will
continue and in some cases accelerate, “posing significant risks to human
health, our forests, agriculture, freshwater supplies, coastlines, and other
natural resources that are vital to … economy, environment, and our quality of
life.”
Over
the past 10 decade, the world has emitted more CO2 than it did from the entire
period since the start of the Industrial Revolution up to about 1970. In 2011
alone, the world emitted more than it did in the 30 years between 1850 and 1880.
Fig
1: CO2 Trends near Hawaii, source: National Oceanic &
Atmospheric Administration
It
is figures like these that have catapulted climate change into the
international agenda and subsequently International Relations.
The
reversal of climate change takes the form of reducing emissions of greenhouse
gases and to reduce greenhouses means curbing industrial pollution (output) and
using cleaner technology among other measures all of which are undesirable by
the industrialized states since they mean reduced output/ money.
The
issue is also compounded by the fact that most of the emission is by the global
north, which are rich and industrialized countries while the effects of climate
change are being felt or will be felt more by the global south.
This
is what Joshua Goldstein would term a collective goods problem. The collective
goods problem, also known as “collective actions,” “free riding,” “burden
sharing,” “prisoners’ dilemma,” “mixed interest game” or “tragedy of the
commons” is the problem of how to provide something that benefits all members
of a group regardless of what each member contributes to it. The
collective goods problem occurs in all groups and societies, but is
particularly acute, as a world government to enforce on individual nations, the
necessary measures to provide for the common good (Goldstein 2012).
Several
efforts have been employed by states to curb climate change – efforts such as
the Kyoto Protocol, but as the Slate reported, emissions are actually
increasing and if climate change is real, it is coming to get the earth.
This
paper would like to argue that in the current international regime, in which
realism dominates, solving climate change is not easy if not impossible unless
realism itself is expanded to include climate change as a security issue.
False Hope: Ozone Layer
Gains
The
Ozone Layer is a layer of ozone gas in the atmosphere which traps harmful
ultraviolet rays that can cause cancers among other harmful effects. When the
world woke up to the realization that the Ozone Layer was being depleted by
chiefly chlorofluorocarbons
(CFCs) which were used in the refrigeration technology and aerosol sprays, it
sprung into action.
The
1987 Montreal Protocol 22 states agreed to stop producing CFCs by 2000 but with
more evidence of ozone layer depletion states went into urgent action and by
1995 major industrial nations phased out CFCs and as at now the Ozone Layer is
said to be healing and will completely heal in the next five decades. (Goldstein
2012).
Former
UN Secretary General Khofi Annan called the efforts to address the Ozone layer
depletion as ‘perhaps the single most successful international agreement to
date,’ and liberalist are likely going to use the this as an example of what
institutions can do in international relations and climate change activists
will cite it as the way to go in the fight against global warming, but they are
mistaken.
As
Goldstein put it, the costs of
replacing CFCs were much lower than those that need to be incurred to tackle
global warming. For CFCs cheap alternatives were available this was in addition
to the fact that the risks of ozone layer depletion were more immediate and
concretely understood.
What
would be of the Montreal Protocol if USA did not ratify it? And if the USA did not ratify it, would
smaller nations like Australia find it any meaningful to sign it?
The
above question needs an understanding of realism as an international relations
theory to be addressed.
Realism as a hurdle
Realism
is an international relations theory that can be traced back to Niccolo
Machiavelli and Thomas Hobbes. Among the core beliefs of Realism are the
following:
- The world is a harsh and
dangerous place. The only certainty in the world is power. A powerful
state will always be able to outdo—and outlast—weaker competitors. The
most important and reliable form of power is military power.
- A state’s primary interest is
self-preservation. Therefore, the state must seek power and must always
protect itself
- There is no overarching power
that can enforce global rules or punish bad behavior.
- Moral behavior is very risky
because it can undermine a state’s ability to protect itself.
- The international system itself
drives states to use military force and to war. Leaders may be moral, but
they must not let moral concerns guide foreign policy.
- International organizations and
law have no power or force; they exist only as long as states accept them.
That
is to squeeze a whole body of theory into one paragraph because this paper is
about climate.
Many
states pursue realism, led by the USA
the only super power on earth as at now. To put it in a crude way, the USA relies on
its hard power to maintain its hegemony in the world.
To have hard power, the
USA has to have a viable economy that funds research and development or just
general maintenance of the military. As such, anything that affects the US
economy goes to the heart of the realist machinery this is why the USA did not
sign the Kyoto Protocol, one would argue.
The
US is only second to China in terms of Carbon Dioxide emissions,
Carbon Dioxide being the main greenhouse gas. This means that whatever the
other players in the Kyoto Protocol might have been doing, their efforts were
shadowed by the USA.
Kyoto
Protocol
The
Kyoto Protocol is an international agreement linked to the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change, (UNFCCC) which commits its parties by setting
internationally binding emission reduction targets.
It
seeks to curb climate change using three approaches that is the Joint
Initiative (JI), the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) and the Cap and Trade initiative.
Joint
Initiative is described in Article 6 of the Kyoto Protocol. Under Article
6, any developed country can invest in an emission reduction project in any
other developed country as an alternative to reducing emissions domestically.
In this way countries can lower the costs of complying with
their Kyoto targets by investing in projects that reduce greenhouse
gas emissions in a developed country where reducing emissions may be cheaper,
and then using the resulting Emission Reduction Units (ERUs) towards
their commitment goal.
The
CDM is defined in Article 12 of the Protocol, and is intended to meet two
objectives: (1) to assist parties not included in developed countries index in
achieving sustainable development and in contributing to the ultimate
objective of UNFCCC, which is to prevent dangerous climate change; and (2)
to assist parties included in developed world in achieving compliance with
their quantified emission limitation and reduction commitments greenhouse gas emission
caps.
The
CDM addresses the second objective by allowing developed countries to meet part
of their emission reduction commitments under the Kyoto Protocol by
buying Certified Emission Reduction units from CDM emission reduction
projects in developing countries (Carbon Trust, 2009, p. 14).
International Emissions Trading or cap and trade is a market-based
approach used to control pollution by providing economic incentives for
achieving reductions in the emissions of pollutants.
A
central authority (usually a governmental body) sets a limit or cap on
the amount of a pollutant that may be emitted. The limit or cap is allocated or
sold to firms in the form of emissions permits which represent the right to
emit or discharge a specific volume of the specified pollutant.
The
cap and trade was one of the most hailed of the three initiatives but critics
have slammed it saying it is ineffective.
In
its report called Designed to fail? – The
concepts, practices and controversies behind carbon trading, The NGO Fern unpacked the cap and trade and
concluded that ‘The fact remains that after more than a decade of carbon
trading, the level of CO2 in the atmosphere continues to rise by approximately
2 ppm each year.”
Fern
argued that the caps set before the trading was launched were plagued by
politics and that they were not designed to address the main issue of reducing
emissions by being set to high allowing for more pollution by heavy polluting
nations.
The
cap also only covers countries in the global North and as such allowed
countries in the North to move their production to the South and be seen as
reducing their pollution. As an example, Fern cited China whose emissions rose
up 25% because it was the dumping site for production from the global North.
This ‘carbon leakage’ gives the impression of national reductions in the industrialized
countries whilst global emissions stay the same or rise.
The
geographical split of quotas, argued Fern, also meant it was impossible to fit
international aviation and shipping into the cap (due to the difficulty in
apportioning emissions on a geographical basis) – a major failing given that
together these account for approximately five per cent (and rising) of
emissions world-wide. The cap has therefore failed to put a limit on
consumption of fossil-fuels.
As
if to quote from realism where there is no bigger boss above states, Fern also
decried the rampant inadequate and untrustworthy emission monitoring. Fern estimated
error rates of between 10 to 30 per cent in the calculation of emissions and
the high proportion of self-reporting, and low levels of independent
verification, exacerbated this risk.
Some
firms simply created more pollution in their production processes, Fern said,
so they could claim credits for destroying them at the end of the process.
The
pricing of carbon in the scheme was also said to be dubious …’In April 2006,
the price of carbon permits in the EU ETS plunged to just € 1 per tonne CO2e,
from a high of € 30. According to the market, the cost of pollution was
virtually nil, as was the reward for reducing your emissions. If demand for
permits were ever high enough to make prices spike, EU Member States have
agreed to meet to find ways of bringing the price of carbon down again. So,
there are structural checks in place to ensure supply and demand will not be
allowed to price polluters out of the market.’
The
fact that an important element in shaping the continent’s future was left in
the dry to the mercy of speculators and capitalists shows the lack of interest
from states, if it was an issue that was a direct threat to the realist hard
power machinery, the US itself would have led in ensuring the scheme worked.
Purdon
(2011) argues that the carbon trading failure is not due to it being a failure
as a system but rather there being lack of political will to support it. This
is an indication that realism among the great powers might be at play in
dealing with climate change.
This
can be seen in China which is currently the biggest emitter of carbon dioxide
and yet has tried to avoid the Kyoto Protocol by insisting that it is a
developing nation and as such cannot be seen as the USA for example. China also
argues that the rest of the nations got developed by polluting heavily and that
trying to force it to curb pollution might be equal to trying to prevent it
from developing.
China
instead has invested heavily in clean technologies, but they will not erase the
fact that it is putting out some serious Carbon Dioxide quantities into the
atmosphere. Although this is just because the global North has moved production
there and all the emissions in China are actually due to the making of goods
that will be consumed in the global North.
Behind
China’s stance is the fact that there is, in the end no one who can force it to
curb pollution, itself being a nuclear power. What China needs is more
industrial output which in turn will mean more revenues which can be used to
get its blue water navy and get an army that is as advanced as the US to
effectively compete on the global stage as super power.
The
US and China are trapped in a prisoners dilemma. It is good for both of them to
get to the climate change table and reduce emissions, but they would rather
face the brutal effects of climate change than give in – all because of their
realist thinking where power is everything and there is no one above the state.
There is hope: Realism as
panacea
Mark
Purdon cites Ostrom 2010; Keohane and Victor 2011 in postitulating that a
consensus is emerging that a comprehensive international regime for cooperation
on climate change is not within reach.
Manuel-Navarrete (2010) agrees with Purdon and says:
“…the gloomy spectacle offered so far by
international climate negotiations suggests that any global response will be
hindered by traditional, twentieth century, politics as well as by global power
asymmetries.”
The
world has faced crises in the past and in the end, there seems to be always a
solution and the case of climate change, some scholars have suggested that the
very realism that is the current hurdle to progress now can be the panacea if
only climate change found a way into the definition of realism.
Habib
2011 argues that despite the general
assumption holding that the anarchic international system consists of competing
sovereign states who are unitary, rational actors the view disregards the fact
that this anarchic system is itself housed within the wider structure of the
Earth’s biosphere.
Gellers
(2010) therefore suggests that realism can take in environment as a security
issue and the whole issue of climate change will be on the agenda and
consequently on the course to being tackled with the urgency it needs.
Silburt
(2012) hinges in on this and writes a case study on Canada. As if to convince
the realist, he argues that climate change will destroy the environment which
may in turn affect the ability of a state to stay secure.
“For example,” writes Silburt, “changes in the environmental conditions
of terrain, such as coastal erosion, increased floods, desertification, and the
thawing of permafrost, affect states‟ access or control over strategic
territory, creating new opportunities for relative power enhancement as well as
vulnerabilities and challenges for maintaining security and existing power.
Changes in precipitation patterns, temperatures and stream flows affect the
ability of the terrain to support natural resource based industries.
“These changes can also
affect a state’s access to key natural resources that help sustain the domestic
populations of states and support its economic and war capacity. These changes can also affect the geographical
dimensions of its population, causing large-scale shifts in the size,
geographic and demographic configuration of the population from “environmental
refugees,” which have implications for the state’s labor force and create
destabilizing effects on the economy, living dynamics and internal stability of
the state. The increasing
frequency and severity of natural disasters and other adverse consequences
associated with climate change affect the key infrastructure and other dimensions
of state capacity. These effects of climate change on the geopolitical components
of power affect the relative power of states directly as well as their capacity
to respond to other existing or emerging issues.”
In
realism, states only want to amass more power and they trust no one, if they
can be convinced that climate change whether due to their actions or of other
states is going to weaken their standing, they will have a huge motive to do
something about it. And just like the cooperation between the US and Russia in
ensuring nonproliferation of nuclear weapons, the same type of relationships
can crop up to combat climate change proactively.
The
depletion of the Ozone layer is a success story today because great powers took
initiative, in the same vein, if the USA stepped forward and threw its weight
fully behind combating technology, many nations would likely follow. Both for
reciprocity, dominance or identity reasons as Goldstein would argue.
Summary
The
paper has argued that climate change is an agreed upon issue and that to combat
it means costs being paid, these costs however are too much for some realist
nations like China and USA who want to sustain hegemony using spoils of an
industry that is emitting gases into the atmosphere that might throw the earth
into serious climate crises.
Realism
has thus been seen as a block to achieving goals set to combat climate change.
Goals such as the Cap and trade initiative.
In
looking for the solution however, the paper did nominate the very realism as
the solutions. All that needs to be done is to convince realist states that
climate change is out to get them and to rob them of their ability to stay
secure.
In
that case the states would and will quickly address climate change.
Of course, this is all my thesis, what do I know, I am just a dreamer...
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Silburt A Realist Perspective on Climate
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