Maurice Strong, the Secretary General of the 1992 Rio Earth Summit, thought some international agreements could represent success. He also believed certain agreements could be what he deemed “real success.” Many regard the 2015 Paris Agreement resulting from the United Nations Climate Change Conference, COP 21 as a “real success.” While I cannot dispute that the Paris Agreement has outshone its predecessors, I am hesitant to comply with the notion that the agreement is a “real success.” While the 2015 Paris Agreement succeeded in bringing 190 nations together for the first time and creating what is referred to as the “spirit of Paris,” complete with investor backing, I argue that it will fail to persist as “real success” in the international context; as it is a voluntary agreement, an issue of enforcement continues from agreements past, and the Paris Agreement is unfortunately still bound to the partisan United States government and its slow-moving bureaucracy.
Negotiations are necessary to reduce the spillover of harm from any one country to the rest of the world. No real global government exists, and national governments are sovereign. An inherent problem facing international negotiations is a lack of enforcement mechanisms. No punishment exists for those who choose not to comply; negotiators are left with only trade measures or “naming and shaming” as a way to persuade nations to fulfill their part of the agreement. An international court of justice does exist in The Hague, Netherlands, but might as well be invisible because governments must consent to jurisdiction to any particular event to be held accountable in the justice court. It is therefore understandable, as we examine agreements preceding the 2015 Paris Agreement, why so many have failed and why COP 21 could be seen as a new, lasting achievement.
The global climate community has arguably seen more progress in Paris at COP 21 than they have seen in the 20 years of negotiations preceding it. The original Framework Convention on Climate Change was signed at the famous Rio Earth Summit in 1992. Its largest mistake was to allow the world to be divided into Annex-I and non-Annex-I countries, a strategy that resulted in a small number of countries taking action and the remaining approximately 150 countries failing to act under no sense of urgency. As with all international agreements, the original Framework Convention on Climate Change was voluntary to participating countries; there was no enforcement mechanism.
The next major climate agreement following the 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change was the Kyoto Protocol, a treaty the United States did not ratify and therefore was not bound to. Without the United States (and China as well, for that matter), the treaty was doomed. The Kyoto Protocol was so unsuccessful that it was hardly mentioned at the Paris negotiations in December—this makes Kyoto uncharacteristic of other treaties, as usually negotiations reference and build upon past treaties to reach new agreements. Negotiations at Copenhagen in 2009 were another failure.
Each of these agreements fell short because negotiators were too optimistic and did not work with the realities of the United States Congress (that is, passing legislation of any kind in the United States is an extremely difficult task, let alone a controversial treaty). The United States is critical for a successful climate deal, as the powerhouse nation is responsible for a large proportion of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions. The Paris Agreement signed at COP 21 offered hope: finally, it presented a new multilateral framework for dealing with climate change.
In the 2015 Paris Agreement the United States and China, the two most influential countries, stepped up and committed to climate action. China in particular was important to the effectiveness of the agreement, as its rapid growth has led to the largest increase in greenhouse gas emissions in recent years—China is desperate for more energy, every day, in every province. With the leading polluters committing to detailed Intended Nationally Determined Contributions (INDCs), the precedent was set for other countries to also take action. India too, another major polluter facing increasing energy demand, followed China’s lead and produced a thorough INDC that promised a record peak in emissions. Brazil pledged to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 43% by 2030 , and South Africa pledged to peak its greenhouse gas emissions by 2025 (even more aggressive than China and India). The momentum had begun.
The Paris Agreement succeeded in the simple fact that over 190 countries were able to come together, despite different energy policies and priorities, and agree to what needed to be done. It was a remarkable feat and required immense creativity to encourage the world community to work as one. The Paris Agreement is unprecedented in that it states all countries are going to take responsibility for climate action in some shape or form; this is a breakthrough and dramatic change from past negotiations. The total Intended Nationally Determined Contributions count was 188 countries.
Perhaps the most important result to arise from the Paris Agreement was what is referred to as the “spirit of Paris.” In addition to the physical Paris Agreement, so too arose an overarching Paris outcome. Paris was applauded for going beyond vision only and providing a real focus on action. The word of the year was “solutions,” and rather than talk, targets, and timetables, Paris committed to hard data.
The Local Government Leaders Climate Change Summit in the middle of COP 21 contributed to the spirit of Paris. Although not a part of the actual deal, emphasis on a city scale has proved to be critical (as evidenced by Mayor Anne Hidalgo’s work in Paris itself, or Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s C40 to help gather best practices). The state and city level is more direct than a national level, as it offers a hands-on capacity and greater accountability. Implementation is unlikely to be done by national governments; it needs to be taken to a more grounded level. Having local government leaders invested was exciting to many.
The “spirit” was also galvanized by a focus on how to finance investments required to produce a clean energy future. A breakthrough of the Paris Agreement was the creation of The Billionaires Club, of whom Bill Gates is a member. The Club has a pool of money almost equal to the Green Climate Fund, and they are dedicated to driving innovation forward. Another group from Paris is the Global Solar Alliance, which is aiming to raise hundreds of millions of dollars to promote solar energy. The investor community was nowhere to be seen at Rio in 1992; in Paris, negotiations were focused on the investor world.
Yet, despite the positivity and “real successes” of the 2015 Paris Agreement, I am disappointed to argue that I believe the Paris agreement, similar to its predecessors, will prove to represent only “success.” First, the problem of enforcement that plagued past agreements is still existent with the Paris Agreement. Regardless of countries’ INDCs and pledges, the Paris Agreement remains a voluntary agreement. The notion that everyone is going to follow through is unrealistic. There is no way to enforce it; all international law is nonbinding. Despite a focus on action, this agreement, like others, could result in only a lofty vision. The only international climate treaty that seems to have been met with any success is the Montreal Protocol, and this is because there was a clear, tangible pathway to take to avoid destruction of the ozone layer and reduce the emission of chlorofluorocarbons into the atmosphere. The Paris Agreement, on the other hand, does not have a specific mission. The goal is simply to curb emissions and reduce the impacts felt by climate change. The agreement even omits bunker fuels and airplane emissions (responsible for two percent of emissions worldwide!) and holds no one accountable for resolving this specific concern.
Unfortunately, similar to other climate agreements, the Paris Agreement is also still subject to the United States government. The United States has a history of undercutting climate change policies, as evidenced by the failure of the Kyoto Protocol along with the United States’ own Waxman Markey bill (which was never voted upon in the Senate). Shortly after COP 21 the United States Supreme Court issued an emergency stay on President Barack Obama’s Clean Power Plan. With the plan stalled, it is unlikely that the United States will be able to achieve what it committed to in Paris. And as we have seen, once the United States (or China) begins to falter, other nations lose confidence and no longer feel obligated to fulfill their own pledges. If the United States cannot go forward, no one else will feel like they need to. The “spirit” of Paris, the signal that the world was finally taking off in terms of action, has come to a sputtering stop. Investment decisions that were beginning to be made have been stalled.
According to the Stern Review, inaction has a price. In the instance of climate change, small island states and other vulnerable nations will pay the price for the inaction of emitting countries. This is a reality if the 2015 Paris Agreement falls through. It is my hope that the 188 nations who submitted INDCs, the United States included, prove me wrong and deliver on their commitments with tangible action. But because of a lack of enforcement mechanisms and the incompetence of the United States Congress, I am inclined to believe that realistically the Paris Agreement is a “success” rather than “real success.” Yes, the agreement succeeded in ways that prior agreements did not—however, there is still a long way to go.