From regime-building to implementation: Harnessing the UN climate conferences to drive climate action

W. Obergassel, S. Bauer, L. Hermwille, S.C. Aykut, I. Boran, S. Chan, C. Fraude, R.J.T. Klein, K.A. Mar, H. Schroeder, K. Simeonova

Research output: Contribution to journalArticleAcademicpeer-review

Abstract

The gap between the internationally agreed climate objectives and tangible emissions reductions looms large. We explore how the supreme decision-making body of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the Conference of the Parties (COP), could develop to promote more effective climate policy. We argue that promoting implementation of climate action could benefit from focusing more on individual sectoral systems, particularly for mitigation. We consider five key governance functions of international institutions to discuss how the COP and the sessions it convenes could advance implementation of the Paris Agreement: guidance and signal, rules and standards, transparency and accountability, means of implementation, and knowledge and learning. In addition, we consider the role of the COP and its sessions as mega-events of global climate policy. We identify opportunities for promoting sectoral climate action across all five governance functions and for both the COP as a formal body and the COP sessions as conducive events. Harnessing these opportunities would require stronger involvement of national ministries in addition to the ministries of foreign affairs and environment that traditionally run the COP process, as well as stronger involvement of non-Party stakeholders within formal COP processes. This article is categorized under: Policy and Governance > International Policy Framework.

Original languageEnglish
Article numbere797
Number of pages12
JournalWiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Climate Change
Volume13
Issue number6
DOIs
Publication statusPublished - 1 Nov 2022

Bibliographical note

Funding Information:
Part of the work for this article was funded by the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) through DIE's Klimalog project ( www.klimalog.info ).

Funding Information:
This article builds on a series of online seminars with the title “It's the End of the COP as We Know It” jointly organized by the German Development Institute/Deutsches Institut für Entwicklungspolitik (DIE) and the Wuppertal Institute (Bauer et al., 2020). The authors thank all contributors to the seminar series for the rich discussions. The authors also thank the two anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments. Open Access funding enabled and organized by Projekt DEAL.

Publisher Copyright:
© 2022 The Authors. WIREs Climate Change published by Wiley Periodicals LLC.

Keywords

  • COP
  • Conference of the Parties
  • UNFCCC
  • climate regime

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