The 28th Conference of the Parties to the Framework Convention on Climate Change is over. People place a lot of weight on COPs, and well they should, but they need to remember the purpose is to talk and that’s all. Action is left to the parties — meaning the member nations of the UN, not what happens in the delegates’ penthouse suites. Those who want “enforceable” dictates need to think about how they would get 195 countries to agree to be told what to do by someone they did not elect, and punished if they don’t.
Most of the parties, or partygoers, are laggards and that’s the real problem. They get together at COPs and set aspirational targets for the sake of humanity. A few, mostly the Nordics, Germany and some island nations, actually exceed them. The majority talk a good game but duck out when the workday starts.
I wrote here last week:
Ever since Eleanor Roosevelt conceived of it, the United Nations has been a watering hole, not a battlefield. It does not have its own army. It can’t force those who sign its treaties to abide by them. Roosevelt saw the value, however, of being able to talk. To negotiate. To set a North Star in the sky. Can we all agree that genocide is bad? Can we establish laws of war? A Law of the Ocean? A Convention on Biodiversity? A Framework Convention on Climate Change by which we come together each…