The outcome of the UN Climate Summit in Glasgow has been criticised by commentators as unambitious, with some calling it a “monumental failure”. Even the summit’s host, British Prime Minister Boris Johnson, admitted the deal was “tinged with disappointment”. This is hardly surprising: historically, most climate promises have fared badly.
It is easy and popular for politicians to talk up the dangers of climate change and promise safety, with grandiose policies for 2030 or 2050. It is much less popular when it is time to ask voters to pay for these draconian climate policies. When French President Emmanuel Macron enacted a tiny petrol tax, he was met with years of yellow-vest protests.
Moreover, cutting emissions is not mostly about what the rich world does, because most emissions in the 21st century will come from China and India, along with the rest of Asia, Africa and Latin America. For them, the current climate approach of paying huge amounts for achieving negligible temperature reductions in 100 years’ time is spectacularly unattractive.
Just days before the Glasgow summit 24 emerging economies, including China and India, said the demand for them to achieve net zero by 2050 is unjust because it stops poor countries from developing their economies. Ugandan President Yoweri Museveni put it even more bluntly: “Africans have a right to use reliable, cheap energy.” Little wonder that these nations intervened against language in the final deal that would have called for the phasing out of coal.
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