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1 Issue-linkages
âą Adaptation and the climate change regime
âą Issue-linkages to climate change
âą Conclusion
The climate change regime is a regime âcomplexâ as it was founded on a number of distinct cooperation problems.1 These core issues include: the coordination of emission regulations; compensation for developing countries by developed countries for past emissions; the coordination of efforts to prepare for climate change, in particular adaptation and geoengineering; and the coordination of common scientific assessments. Although all of these issues were present at the inception of the climate regime, it is only in the last decade that adaptation has become a major issue of concern for states in the UNFCCC negotiations. This chapter traces the evolution of adaptation within the UNFCCC, the institution at the heart of the climate change regime. It does not cover debates over emissions reductions; for this the reader should look elsewhere.2 Rather it contributes to a nascent literature on adaptation governance within the climate regime.3
The chapter focuses on the emergence of two substantive issue-linkages: climate change and development; and climate change and migration. It traces the work of civil society, academics, and epistemic communities in establishing causal connections between these distinct areas. These substantive issue-linkages offered a rationale for UNHCR, UNDP, and IOM to engage with climate change. These linkages shaped when and why these three organizations engaged with climate change and are critical contextual information for the following three case study chapters.
The chapter begins by examining when and how adaptation became a more central part of the UNFCCC negotiations. It suggests that the climate regime broadened with a more explicit focus on adaptation, as donor states pledged funds to assist developing countries to deal with and prepare for the impacts of climate change, and new financing mechanisms were established. This opened the door for a number of international organizations with no environmental mandate to directly engage in the climate change negotiations. It then unpacks how issue-linkages between climate change and development and climate change and migration were forged. This is important as today it may seem obvious to many that climate change will have an impact on developing countries, and lead to migration and displacement. However these linkages were not so evident in the early 1990s, and the exact nature of the causal connection between climate change and migration is still debated today. In fact, this chapter will also be of interest to scholars of issue-linkages as it examines how such linkages evolve and strengthen.
Adaptation and the climate change regime
In the 1990s and early 2000s the dominant focus of the UNFCCC, as well as scientists and activists, was to stop climate change through mitigation, reductions in greenhouse emissions.4 Adaptation (preparing for and dealing with the impacts of climate change) was not a focus for the IPCC or the UNFCCC.5 Many saw adaptation as a dangerous agenda item. At best, focusing on adaptation might distract statesâ attention and resources away from mitigation. At worst, it represented defeat for states seeking emissions reductions as they would have to acknowledge that mitigation was not sufficient to combat climate change.6 Environmentalists and scientists were also wary of discussing adaptation. Although both the UNFCCC agreement and the first IPCC report (1990) mentioned adaptation, it was a marginal issue for both that received little attention.7 In fact, during the first ten years the IPCC did not devote a single chapter of their reports to adaptation to climate change.8
The emergence of adaptation
In 2000 adaptation began to gain traction when the IPCC held their first workshop explicitly on adaptation. This workshop became Working Group II on âImpacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability,â one of three working groups of the IPCC. The group wrote its first chapter on adaptation in the IPCCâs Third Annual Assessment in 2001 and directed states to respond to the impacts of climate change.9 Adaptation also began to be a more central part of the UNFCCC. As the negotiations over the Kyoto Protocol became difficult, the EU agreed to establish an annual climate change fund of US$15 million to target adaptation as well as mitigation. Meanwhile, the new US president, George W. Bush, announced he would withdraw the United States from the Kyoto Protocol, which President Bill Clinton had previously signed.10 The absence of the worldâs largest economy and emitter jeopardized an agreement; however other states continued to negotiate and in 2001 finalized the Kyoto Protocol.
At the 2001 Conference of the Parties (COP) 7 of the UNFCCC in Marrakech, states began to prioritize the adaptation needs of Least Developed Countries (LDCs). In the final agreement states established the Least Developed Countries work program and called for LDCs to identify and report their adaptation needs through the National Adaptation Programmes of Action (NAPAs).11 NAPAs became a key reporting and policy-making tool for adaptation in many developing states. They established the Least Developed Countries Fund to assist LDCs to develop these National Adaptation Programmes for Action. In addition, states also established two other multilateral funds: the Special Climate Change Fund, based on voluntary donations from states to facilitate technology transfer from developed to developing states; and the Adaptation Fund which was financed by a two percent levy on the Clean Development Mechanism. The establishment of these three climate funds signaled that adaptation had become a necessary response to climate change.
Adaptation was institutionalized as a top priority, on par with mitigation, between 2006 and 2014. The âAfricanâ COP in Nairobi in 2006 pushed this change. African states saw adaptation as a top priority and argued that they were amongst the most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change.12 At Nairobi states finalized the Nairobi Work Programme on adaptation, a five-year plan of work to support climate adaptation which sought to enhance information exchange and capacity to identify vulnerability and implement effective adaptation responses.13 At Nairobi they also officially launched the Adaptation Fund; states had spent the previous six years elaborating its governance and operational structure. Adaptation became a politicized developing-country issue, and not just a technical concept linked to discussions over impact thresholds. Developing states and their allies argued that those who suffer most are the least responsible for climate change.
Then at COP 13 in 2007 states initiated the Bali Action Plan, which called for âenhanced action on adaptation.â14 In particular it suggested the consideration of âthe urgent and immediate needs of developing countries that are particularly vulnerable to the adverse effects of climate change.â The Bali Action Plan set out the framework and priorities for the two-year lead-up to the negotiations in Copenhagen, which were billed as the critical negotiations to determine what would follow on after the Kyoto Protocol. Adaptation also featured strongly in the deliberations of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention (AWG-LCA).15
The 2007 IPCC fourth report reinforced the call for adaptation measures: no longer was climate change a future problem but it was here now. Global warming was predicted to have adverse effects on everything from rural livelihoods (crops may no longer grow in some areas as rain frequency and temperatures change) to the spread of disease (malaria mosquitoes will inhabit a much larger area).16 Increased extreme weather events from floods to droughts could undermine development programs and be an obstacle to achievement of the Millennium Development Goals.17 The IPCC report emphasized that developing states were the most âvulnerableâ to climate change due to their lack of financial or technological resources. A comparison of the Netherlands and Bangladesh, two low-lying states which are largely dependent on agricultural production, illustrates this. The Netherlands has a much greater capacity than Bangladesh to adapt because of its economic resources and technical skills.18 Development agencies looked to include adaptation activities and âclimate proofâ their development activities.19 Meanwhile civil society organizations, international organizations, and NGOs increased their pressure on states at the UNFCCC to address climate adaptation. Between 2007 and 2009 there was a dramatic increase in the number and range of international NGOs and international organizations attending the UNFCCC.20
At the UNFCCC negotiations in Poznan in 2008 discussions of binding emissions targets stalled, however delegates discussed new funding for mitigation and adaptation. States agreed on principles for a dedicated fund to assist developing states with the impacts of climate change. A crucial criterion was that this funding had to be additional to current development spending. Developing states argued that existing development assistance should not be diverted. They were supported by a broad civil society movement calling for âclimate justiceâ: the Global North had an obligation to pay for adaptation as its industrialization process had led to climate change. For this reason, climate financing had to be distinct from, and on top of existing development financing commitments.21 In the lead-up to Copenhagen, activists mobilized around the world demanding a binding agreement and additional climate financing for developing countries.
The Copenhagen climate change negotiations were widely seen as a massive failure.22 State parties reached no agreement on the post-Kyoto Protocol, and the final day of negotiations carried on throughout the night and into that Saturday without a consensus. In the end, the primary document emerging from the negotiations was a political agreement drafted by the heads of states from the United States, China, India, Brazil, and South Africa during a private meeting. The three-page document committed parties to âscaled up, new and additional, predictable and adequate fundingâ and established a new âGreen Climate Fund.â23 States pledged US$30 billion annually in additional climate financing for the 2010â2012 period and outlined their intentions to mobilize US$100 billion through a range of sources by 2020.24 These pledges at Copenhagen were a significant breakthrough: till then states had only been invited to make financial contributions on a voluntary basis and no targets had been set. However, the accord was not formally agreed to by all states, rather they were invited to take note of the final agreement. How states would meet these pledges, and through what mechanisms the financing would flow became the focus for the following UNFCCC negotiations.
There was a general sense of disillusionment and despair after the failure of Copenhagen to secure a binding, international agreement on climate change. Expectations were much lower the following year at negotiations in CancĂșn and states successfully reached a final agreement, adopted by all parties, which set out a new âCancun Adaptation Framework.â The Framework was the result of the previous three years of negotiations following the Bali Action Plan and states agreed that âadaptation must be addressed with the same priority as mitigation and requires appropriate institutional arrangements to enhance adaptation action and support.â25 The agreement endorsed the COP pledges and requested that developed states provide developing countries ânew and additional finance.â Furthermore, it entrenched adaptation within the negotiations through the establishment of a new Adaptation Committee to promote enhanced action on adaptation under the convention and further elaborated the Green Climate Fund.
Adaptation remained a central topic of negotiations at Durban (2011), Doha (2012), and Warsaw (2013). At Durban states sought to develop the architecture for the new climate fund, in the midst of wider debates about what would happen when the Kyoto Protocol period ended. They elaborated the governance structure of the Green Climate Fund and in the final agreement specifically requested the board to balance the allocation of Green Climate...
