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Shaping the rules of the new climate regime: International cooperation should focus on meeting the objective of the Convention

  • 05/10/2012

The task for global governance in dealing with climate change is to focus on the interconnectedness between carbon dioxide emissions, standards of living and global ecological limits. The interdependence between countries makes the global commons, or carbon sinks, a shared economic resource as well as an unprecedented global environmental crisis, because economic growth worldwide increases the atmospheric concentration of energy-trapping gases, thereby amplifying the natural "greenhouse effect" that makes the Earth habitable. There are three political problems related to capacity, responsibility and effort in shaping the new global rules. First, with China and India beginning to influence the global agenda, a resolution of the differences has become more difficult because all the powerful countries recognize the strategic importance of access to limited global ecosystem services for economic growth. The issue is intensely complex because the way the global goal is defined and collective action shaped through a rule based approach will have differentiated implications for countries.

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