scholarly journals Applying a leverage points framework to the United Nations climate negotiations: The (dis)empowerment of youth participants

Elem Sci Anth ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 8 ◽  
Author(s):  
Leehi Yona ◽  
Marc D. Dixon ◽  
Richard B. Howarth ◽  
Anne R. Kapuscinski ◽  
Ross A. Virginia
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Social Power ◽  
Participatory Action ◽  
Action Research Project ◽  
Leverage Points ◽  
Climate Negotiations ◽  
Climate Action ◽  
The Face ◽  
The United Nations

Young people are both among the generations to be most affected by climate change and critical advocates for climate action. In the face of growing urgency surrounding the climate crisis, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has become an important institutional framework for political progress. We developed a community-based participatory action research project centered on youth involved in the COP climate negotiations. A “leverage points” approach guided our research; this paper is the first time the framework has been applied in an international negotiations context. Our findings point to the structural power, networks, and paradigms that youth might engage with for international climate justice work. We identify actionable leverage points through which youth organizers might increase their social power in the COP process to bring about climate action. Many of these leverage points are rooted in dynamics of power, which we expand upon and connect to broader literature. Moving forward, these findings can benefit and inform the strategies of youth as they participate in the COP process.

scholarly journals Building climate diplomacy back better: imagining the UNFCCC meetings of tomorrow

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Richard Klein ◽  
◽  
Katy Harris ◽  
Inès Bakhtaoui ◽  
Andrea Lindblom ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United Nations ◽  
United Nations Framework Convention ◽  
The Real ◽  
Climate Negotiations ◽  
The Future ◽  
Fit For Purpose ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Business As Usual

Could the future of our planet be decided on Zoom? The feasibility of “online climate negotiations” was the issue the OnCliNe project initially set out to assess. However, experiences over the last 18 months illustrated that many of the diverse activities organised under the umbrella of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) could be held online, albeit with challenges. The real question was whether they could be held in ways that increase the effectiveness, inclusiveness and transparency of the UNFCCC process. This report reflects the sentiment of many stakeholders that there is an opportunity to harness the interruption and introspection that the pandemic imposed into a “positive disruption” of the process. If actions taken now can transcend the tendency to return to “business as usual” as soon as circumstances allow, and instead work towards a meaningful transformation of the climate talks, the UNFCCC process can be made more fit for purpose for tackling one of humanity’s greatest challenges. This will require creativity, courage, and active and decisive leadership.

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change—The Basis for the Climate Change Regime

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Freestone
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Greenhouse Effect ◽  
Structural Organization ◽  
Scientific Uncertainty ◽  
United Nations Framework Convention ◽  
Effective Implementation ◽  
The Face ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Dangerous Anthropogenic Interference

This chapter delves deeper into the development and structural organization of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which forms the basis of the climate change regime. As a framework, the Convention urges action to preserve human safety where risks are high even in the face of scientific uncertainty. Its overarching aim, however, is not to reverse the greenhouse effect but rather, to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system. The Convention establishes a number of institutions to further its work: a Conference of the Parties (COP) that makes decisions necessary to promote the effective implementation of the Convention, a Permanent Secretariat, and two subsidiary bodies: the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) and the Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI).

President's Page: Advancing sustainability in SEG

2022 ◽  
Vol 41 (1) ◽  
pp. 6-7
Author(s):  
Maria Angela Capello
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Integrated Approach ◽  
Economic Progress ◽  
Climate Action ◽  
Development Goals ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
Brundtland Commission ◽  
Framework Development

In 1987, the United Nations Brundtland Commission defined sustainability as “meeting the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.” In this framework, development is conceived as an integrated approach to elevate the quality of life by raising economic progress with environmental protection considerations. This vision evolved into the formulation in 2015 of the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) to mitigate the hazards of climate change and to contribute to the development of society in every aspect, establishing targets to be attained by 2030. As an example, SDG 13: Climate Action calls for initiatives to moderate climate change within development frameworks. SDG 14: Life Below Water and SDG 15: Life on Land also call for more sustainable practices in using the earth's natural resources. The world is not making progress against the SDGs fast enough to achieve all the goals within the established timeline, yet with international agreements and specific actions, the success rate is growing incrementally.

scholarly journals A TRANSITIVITY ANALYSIS OF GRETA THUNBERG’S 2019 CLIMATE ACTION SUMMIT SPEECH

2020 ◽  
Vol 7 (2) ◽  
pp. 191-198
Author(s):  
Ardelia Karisa ◽  
Stefanny Lauwren
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United Nations ◽  
Systemic Functional Grammar ◽  
Existing Problems ◽  
High Profile ◽  
Climate Action ◽  
The United Nations ◽  
The Government ◽  
The One ◽  
Climate Crisis

Climate change has been one of the most significant concerns for the United Nations. As a result, the United Nations held a summit in 2019, inviting several notable speakers in the field. One of them is a young teenager from Swedish, Greta Thunberg. Greta Thunberg is a prominent climate activist who delivered a speech at the United Nations Climate Action Summit 2019, which is about how people and the government need to limit global warming. Her address became viral and garnered attention from many media, and roused a massive youth-led climate rally. Thus, this study analyzed her speech as the object of the study and employed a descriptive qualitative method. The study scrutinized 54 clauses through transitivity analysis from Hallidayan Systemic Functional Grammar (SFG) to understand the processes in the address and its function. This current study has revealed that the speaker’s dominantly used material process (37%) to describe the damage to the environment done by people. The use of relational process (31.5%) describes climate change's effects on the world and her life. The mental process used in 16.7% of the data provokes guilt and responsibility, as she pointed the audience as the actors that cause climate change. The behavioural process (7.4%) shows that Thunberg will not stay quiet on climate crisis when her generation is the one who will suffer from it. Existential process (3.7%) is used to describe the existing problems, while verbal process (3.7%) is used in quoting the high-profile politician to prove that none of their promises have been fulfilled.

scholarly journals The COVID-19 test of the United Nations Security Council

2021 ◽  
pp. 002070202098689
Author(s):  
Bruno Charbonneau
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
United Nations ◽  
International Cooperation ◽  
Security Council ◽  
United Nations Security Council ◽  
Global Order ◽  
Multilateral Cooperation ◽  
The United Nations

The United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has failed the COVID-19 test, unable to promote or facilitate multilateral cooperation in dealing with the outbreak. This is worrying given its relevance as a principal organ of the United Nations (UN) that could enable or constrain international cooperation and given the need for such cooperation in responding to the COVID-19 pandemic. The failure of the UNSC to respond adequately to the COVID-19 pandemic highlights the historical limits of the UNSC as a forum for international cooperation. It also suggests that highlighting and debating UNSC reforms are not sufficient or even productive ways to move forward, especially in the context of the challenges that pandemics and climate change represent for global cooperation. It is far from clear if the UN system can change the global structures on which it was built. What does seem clear is that the UNSC is not where one will find the seeds of change for reimagining global order.

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