Transcript Session 1 – Environment and International Politics

Climate change
as a political issue
Part 1
Environment
and international politics
From Stockholm to Copenhagen
Session 1
The rise of the environment
as a political issue

Since the 1970s, environmental concerns have
climbed their way to the top of the political agenda

1972: Meadows report of the Club of Rome

1972: Stockholm Conference on the
Human Environment


26 principles of environmental governance
Creation of UNEP
Catastrophes and accidents

1976: Seveso toxic dioxins leak

1979: Three-Mile Island incident

1982: Seveso directive

1984: Bhopal catastrophe

1986: Chernobyl
Scientific discoveries

Man lands on the Moon 1969

Hole in the ozone layer



Discovered in the 1980s
Montreal Protocol 1987
Climate change



First measurements in the 1950s
First models in the 1970s (Hansen)
Creation of the IPCC 1988
The rise of global governance

1987: ‘Our Common Future’ by the World Commission
on Environment and Development


‘Sustainable development’: ‘a development that meets the
needs of the present without compromising the ability of
future generations to meet their own needs’
Montreal Protocol 1987




Aimed at tackling the depletion of the ozone layer
One of the most successful international agreements
Develops the concept of ‘common but differentiated
responsibility’
Bears many resemblances with the Kyoto Protocol
Major UN Conferences


1972: Stockholm Conference
1992: Rio Earth Summit




Agenda 21
Three major conventions: UNFCCC (climate change), UNCBD
(biodiversity), UNCCCD (desrtification)
1997: Kyoto Protocol
2002: Johannesburg summit on sustainable development

First failure of international cooperation
Copenhagen 2009:
from cooperation to collaboration
Rio +20: The end of the road




The prospects for the Rio +20 conference looked grim
already.
The conference was indeed a disaster.
No more appetite for international cooperation.
2012 is the last year when GHG emissions are capped.

No one really knows what will happen on January 1st, 2013.
So why bother?

International cooperation remains necessary because
there’s no relationship between



the quantity of GHG that a region or a country emits and
the consequence for that area in terms of climate change
the quantity of GHG that we emit today and the changes in
the climate our generation will experience
Thus there’s a necessity of:


International cooperation
Long-term cooperation