Cutting the Climate-Development Gordian Knot - Economic options in a politically constrained world

Jean Charles Hourcade (), P.R. Shukla and Sandrine Mathy
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Jean Charles Hourcade: CIRED - centre international de recherche sur l'environnement et le développement - Cirad - Centre de Coopération Internationale en Recherche Agronomique pour le Développement - EHESS - École des hautes études en sciences sociales - AgroParisTech - ENPC - École nationale des ponts et chaussées - CNRS - Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique
P.R. Shukla: IIM Ahmedabad - Indian Institute of Management Ahmedabad

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Abstract: Climate policies must deal with a contradiction generic to global environment policies: as was recognized as early as in 1972 at the UN conference on Human Environment at Stockholm, the participation of developing countries is essential. The current emissions of developing countries are also significant. If the trend continues, the future share of global emissions from developing countries will be even larger. However, developing countries do not yet see the need to cooperate because they perceive environmental issues to be a form of Malthusianism. Thus, despite repeated calls for sustainable development at Rio (1992), the negotiations for framing a climate regime have remained disengaged from the debates on how to embark on sound development paths, thus tying a Gordian knot through a succession of misunderstandings.This unhappy turn in policy talks is all the more grave as the timing of the climate change issue is inopportune for developing countries. The increasing attention to the climate change phenomenon has coincided with a period in which many developing countries are experiencing rapid economic growth and in which global power equations are changing (military power, globalization of world markets, and control over natural resources). No sword of a present-day Alexander can cut this knot tied by history. The aim of this chapter is to pick out the threads that, when pulled, may untie the knot.

Keywords: Climate regime; synergies between climate and development; international negotiations (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2008
Note: View the original document on HAL open archive server: https://shs.hal.science/halshs-00366286v1
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (7)

Published in Roger Guesnerie and Henry Tulkens. The design of Climate Policy, The MIT Press, pp.75, 2008

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Related works:
Working Paper: Cutting the Climate-Development Gordian Knot - Economic options in a politically constrained world (2005)
Working Paper: Cutting the Climate-Development Gordian Knot - Economic options in a politically constrained world (2005)
Working Paper: Cutting the Climate-Development Gordian Knot - Economic options in a politically constrained world (2005)
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