https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6475-6849
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Abstract
The socioeconomic impacts of potential climate policies are unevenly distributed across the globe, and different countries take different leading positions in fulfilling carbon neutrality. We select two top-emitting emerging economies, China and India, as our case studies. Considering structural, entrepreneurial, ideational, and exemplary leadership based on the leadership theory, we analyze the two countries’ international and domestic positions in climate change mitigation after each became active climate action taker (i.e. during 2008–2021). We further rely on interest-based and norm-based approaches to explore the driving factors of their leading positions. We conclude that although China is generally more inclined to take the leading position, China and India currently both exert substantive leadership, especially prevalent in recent international climate negotiation rounds. China and India’s consistency of international and domestic leadership evolves via different paths. China initially focused more on international rather than domestic leadership positions (symbolic leader), while India initially took the opposite approach (pioneer). An alignment between international and domestic leadership is found in both countries in more recent years, making both countries substantive leaders. Compared with the interest-based approach, the norm-based approach has greater explanatory power for the two countries’ leading position.
Acknowledgement
We especially thank Daigee Shaw at Institute of Economics, Academia Sinica for insightful discussions.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 Millar et al. “Emission Budgets and Pathways Consistent with Limiting Warming to 1.5 °C,” 741–747; Tollefson, “IPCC Says Limiting Global Warming to 1.5 °C Will Require Drastic Action,” 172–173.
2 Rogelj et al., “Paris Agreement Climate Proposals Need a Boost to Keep Warming Well Below 2 °C,” 631–639.
3 Höhne et al., “Wave of Net Zero Emission Targets Opens Window to Meeting the Paris Agreement,” 820–822; Ou et al. “Can Updated Climate Pledges Limit Warming Well Below 2 °C?,” 693–695; Meinshausen et al. “Realization of Paris Agreement Pledges May Limit Warming Just Below 2 °C,” 304–309.
4 Duro and Padilla, “Analysis of the International Distribution of per Capita CO2 Emissions Using the Polarization Concept,” 456–466.
5 Klenert et al., “Making Carbon Pricing Work for Citizens,” 669–677.
6 Alizadeh et al., “Clean Development Mechanism in Iran,” 196–215; IEA, Outlook for Producer Economies.
7 Knill et al., “Really a Front-Runner, Really a Straggler?,” 36–45.
8 Vogel, “Trading up and Governing Across,” 556–571; Kern, “Cities as Leaders in EU Multilevel Climate Governance,” 125–145.
9 See note 4 above.
10 Liefferink and Andersen, “Strategies of the ‘Green’ Member States in EU Environmental Policy-Making,” 254–270; Jänicke, “Trend-Setters in Environmental Policy,” 129–142; Holzinger et al., Environmental Policy Convergence in Europe; Holzinger et al., “Environmental Policy Convergence,” 553–587; Liefferink et al., “Leaders and Laggards in Environmental Policy,” 677–700.
11 Falkner, “The Paris Agreement and the New Logic of International Climate Politics,” 1107–1125.
12 Wiering et al., “The Internal and External Face of Dutch Environmental Policy?”, 18–25; Wurzel et al., “The European Council, the Council and the Member States,” 248–270; Oberthür and Dupont, “The European Union’s International Climate Leadership,” 1095–1114.
13 See note 4 above.
14 IEA, World Energy Outlook 2021.
15 Chen et al., “Long-Term Temperature and Sea-Level Rise Stabilization Before and Beyond 2100,” 074032.
16 Meng et al., “The Rise of South-South Trade and Its Effect on Global CO2 Emissions,” 1871.
17 Dubash, “The Politics of Climate Change in India,” 191–201; Mohan, “From Rio to Paris,” 39–61; Zhang et al., “How to Achieve the 2030 CO2 Emission-Reduction Targets for China’s Industrial Sector,” 83–97; Zheng et al., “Regional Development and Carbon Emissions in China,” 25–36.
18 Delman, “China’s 'Radicalism at the Center’,” 183–205.
19 Sapiains et al., “Exploring the Contours of Climate Governance,” 46–59.
20 Sprinz and Vaahtoranta, “The Interest-Based Explanation of International Environmental Policy,” 77–105.
21 Liefferink and Wurzel, “Environmental Leaders and Pioneers,” 951–968.
22 Ibid.
23 Wurzel et al., “Pioneers, Leaders and Followers in Multilevel and Polycentric Climate Governance,” 1–21.
24 See note 21 above.
25 See note 23 above.
26 Ibid.
27 See note 21 above.
28 Klebaner and Ramírez Pérez, “Managing Technical Changes from the Scales of Legal Regulation,” 442–468.
30 Blondeel and Van de Graaf, “Toward a Global Coal Mining Moratorium?,” 89–101.
31 Wiering et al., “The Internal and External Face of Dutch Environmental Policy,” 18–25.
32 Naurin and Wallace, “Unveiling the Council of the European Union”.
33 See note 20 above.
34 Ibid.
35 Hickmann, “Science–Policy Interaction in International Environmental Politics,” 21–44.
36 Tørstad et al., “The Domestic Politics of International Climate Commitments,” 024021.
37 Wang et al., “Whether Crude Oil Dependence and CO2 Emissions Influence Military Expenditure in Net Oil Importing Countries?,” 112281.
38 Abatement costs from economic transition are proxied by carbon emission intensity. This is based on the fact that the lower the carbon emission intensity, the more advanced technology should be used to reduce the remaining carbon emissions, thus the marginal abatement cost of carbon emissions becomes higher (Du et al., “Estimating the Marginal Abatement Cost Curve of CO2 Emissions in China,” 217–229).
39 According to Hickmann “See note 35 above”, expected economic loss will occur for countries that have profited from the carbon-intensive products. Therefore, the share of carbon-intensive sectors in GDP is a direct representation of expected economic loss.
40 March and Olsen, “The Institutional Dynamics of International Political Orders,” 943–969.
41 Barbi, “Governing Climate Change in China and Brazil,” 357–370.
42 Raymond et al., “Making Change,” 197–211.
43 Blaxekjær and Nielsen, “Mapping the Narrative Positions of New Political Groups Under the UNFCCC,” 751–766.
44 Bernstein, The Compromise of Liberal Environmentalism; Blondeel et al., “What Drives Norm Success?,” 63–84.
45 The results of the survey are available at https://www.ipsos.com/sites/default/files/ct/news/documents/2022-04/Ipsos%20-%20Global%20Advisor%20-%20Earth%20Day%202022%20-%20Release%201.pdf.
46 Karlsson et al., “Looking for Leaders,” 89–107; Parker et al., “Climate Change Leaders and Followers,” 434–454.
47 Fuhr, “The Rise of the Global South and the Rise in Carbon Emissions,” 2724–2746.
48 Pan, “Carbon Competitiveness is China’s Future,” 16–21; Zhai, “Thoughts on Low-Carbon Development.”
49 Fang et al., “Clean Air for Some,” 10.
50 Yu et al., “China Can Peak Its Energy-Related Carbon Emissions Before 2025,” 91–107; CAT, “Glasgow’s 2030 Credibility Gap”; Duan et al., “Assessing China’s Efforts to Pursue the 1.5° C Warming Limit,” 378–385.
51 Chen et al., “Climate Technology Transfer in BRI Era”; Li et al., “Challenges and Opportunities for Carbon Neutrality in China.”
52 Wu, Energy and Climate Policies in China and India; Gupta et al., “Achieving Sustainable Development in India Along Low Carbon Pathways,” 104623.
53 Atteridge et al., “Climate Policy in India,” 68–77.
54 Rajamani, “The Indian Way,”
55 Michaelowa and Michaelowa, “India as an Emerging Power in International Climate Negotiations.”
56 Mohan, “From Rio to Paris.”
57 Vihma, “India and the Global Climate Governance,” 69–94; Mohan and Wehnert, “Is India Pulling Its Weight?,” 275–282.
58 Vihma, “India and the Global Climate Governance,” 69–94.
59 Downie and Williams, “After the Paris Agreement,” 398–407.
60 As mentioned above, the two countries have different national contexts in terms of geographic and demographic vulnerabilities, and the diplomatic situation is also different. Therefore, competition is an unavoidable existence. For example, as noted by Jayaram “‘Sino-Indian Cooperation at the Climate Change Negotiations’, 1450010,” the two countries have diverged on a number of times, most notably over the topic of low-carbon Intellectual Property Rights (IPR). On broader issues, as neighboring countries, China and India face complex contradictions and competitions on issues such as territorial disputes, regional influence competition, and waterway control. However, with regards to the global challenge of climate change, the two countries have similar situations, positions, and national interests, and the cooperation has been more prominent compared to competition.
61 Rapp et al., “The Copenhagen Protocol, How China and India Sabotaged the UN Climate Summit.”
62 Mizo, “India, China and Climate Cooperation,” 375–394.
63 Guan et al., “Structural Decline in China’s CO2 Emissions Through Transitions in Industry and Energy Systems,” 551–555.
64 One exception is China’s share of carbon-intensive sector increase since 2015. This is mainly driven by electric generation sector that went through restructuring reform in 2015. After the reform, power plants’ revenue and value added both increase.
65 Johnsson et al., “The Threat to Climate Change Mitigation Posed by the Abundance of Fossil Fuels,” 258–274.
66 Meckling et al., “Oil and State Capitalism,” 1159–1187.
67 Stavins, “The Problem of the Commons,” 81–108.
68 Nordhaus, Managing the Global Commons.
69 Abubakar and Dano, “Sustainable Urban Planning Strategies for Mitigating Climate Change in Saudi Arabia,” 5129–5152.
70 Torney, “Follow the Leader?,” 167–186; See note 23 above.
71 Liu and Lo, “Pathways to International Cooperation on Climate Governance in China,” 417–434.
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Funding
Notes on contributors
Shiyi Chen
Shiyi Chen is a Special Term Professor of Economics at Fudan University, Director of Green Finance Research Center of Fudan University, and Executive Vice President of Anhui University. His research interest is in China’s economic transformation and financial development, risk management and economic efficiency, energy environment and development economics, and applied econometrics. His research is supported by the National Natural Science Foundation of China’s National Science Fund (NSFC) for Distinguished Young Scholars, and he is now an academic leader of a Science Fund for Creative Research Groups.
Chang Wang
Chang Wang is a PhD Candidate in Finance at the School of Economics, Fudan University and a former Fox International Fellow at the Whitney and Betty MacMillan Center for International and Area Studies, Yale University (USA). Her research focus is economics of energy and environmental policy as well as climate finance.
Yue Guo
Yue Guo is a PhD Candidate in Human Geography at the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research, Chinese Academy of Sciences, and a former visiting researcher at the Warwick Business School, University of Warwick (UK). His research focus is geopolitical economy of global energy.
Yu Yang
Yu Yang is a Professor of Energy Geography at the Institute of Geographic Sciences and Natural Resources Research (IGSNRR), Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS) and University of Chinese Academy of Sciences (UCAS). He is the deputy director of the Department of Economic Geography and Regional Development of the Key Laboratory of Regional Sustainable Development Modeling, CAS. He focuses on global energy geographies and reginal sustainable development. He is a principal investigator of an Excellent Young Scientists Fund of the National Natural Science Foundation of China (NSFC) and a backbone researcher of a Science Fund for Creative Research Groups.
Mathieu Blondeel
Mathieu Blondeel is an Assistant Professor at the Environmental Policy Analysis (EPA) department of the Institute for Environmental Studies (IVM) of VU Amsterdam (Netherlands). Previously, he obtained a PhD at Ghent University (Belgium) in International Politics and worked as postdoctoral researcher at the Warwick Business School (UK). His work is situated at the intersection of global energy and climate politics. Currently he is working on a variety of issues, with a primary focus on the geopolitics of energy system transformation and the political economy of the global oil industry.