Fiddling while the planet burns? COP25 in perspective

ABSTRACT

With fires, storms, social protests, and climate strikes sweeping the world, 2019 should have been a tipping point in how the world responds to global heating. This was the backdrop to the COP25 climate change summit which took place in Madrid in December 2019. This paper assesses the outcomes of the meeting and the path towards the critically important meeting in Glasgow at the end of 2020. It analyses and explains the key points of contention over levels of ambition, the rules which should govern global carbon markets and sensitive issues such as loss and damage associated with the impacts of climate change. The analysis is situated within a broader geopolitical and economic context of right-wing populism, deepening forms of marketization and financialization of responses to climate change and against a background of a world increasingly feeling the effects of the climate crisis.

KEYWORDS:

• Climate change
• COP
• carbon markets
• loss and damage
• climate justice
• Paris agreement

Acknowledgements

We are grateful to the editor and reviewer of an earlier version of this article.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

ORCID

Peter Newell http://orcid.org/0000-0002-5371-7668

Notes

1 The technical term is additionality: whether the paid for emissions reductions are ‘additional’ to those which could have occurred without the project.

2 https://www.insuresilience.org/about/

3 https://www.ccrif.org/news/bahamas%E2%80%99-insurance-policy-ccrif-triggers-following-hurricane-dorian

4 https://reliefweb.int/report/world/mark-lowcock-under-secretary-general-humanitarian-affairs-and-emergency-relief

5 Action Aid – Harjeet Singh – https://www.thenewhumanitarian.org/news/2019/12/02/why-cop25-matters-emergency-aid-sector

6 https://www.theelders.org/news/multilateral-solutions-are-vital-tackling-global-challenges-we-face

7 https://climateaction.unfccc.int/

8 https://sciencebasedtargets.org/

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Peter Newell

Peter Newell is a Professor of International Relations at the University of Sussex. His recent research focuses on the political economy of low carbon energy transitions, but he has undertaken research, advocacy, and consultancy work on different aspects of climate change for over 25 years. He is co-founder and research director of the Rapid Transition Alliance and sits on the board of directors of Greenpeace UK. His single and co-authored books include Climate for change; The effectiveness of EU environmental policy; Governing climate change; Globalization and the environment: Capitalism, ecology and power; Climate capitalism; Transnational climate change governance and Global green politics.

Olivia Taylor

Olivia Taylor is a doctoral researcher at the School of Global Studies, University of Sussex. Her research focuses on the political economy of climate change adaptation, in particular disaster risk financing and insurance. She holds an MA in Geography from the University of Cambridge and an MA in Environment, Development and Policy from the University of Sussex.