Trump’s bad COP

 

Donald Trump’s victory in the US presidential election has cast a dark shadow over the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP29) in Baku. Having made no secret of his belief that climate change is a “hoax,” Trump’s return to power threatens to undo much of the progress made in combating the climate crisis, leaving global leaders and policymakers with ample reason to feel disheartened.

Trump is expected to ramp up domestic fossil-fuel production. During a meeting at Mar-a-Lago in May, he openly asked for US$1 billion in campaign contributions from oil and gas executives in exchange for promising to roll back regulations threatening their profits. His pick to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, former congressman Lee Zeldin, has already vowed to “deregulate” the EPA.

During his first term, Trump withdrew the US from the 2015 Paris climate agreement – a decision later reversed by his successor, Joe Biden. He is widely expected to withdraw from it again.

Notably, Argentine president Javier Milei, Trump’s political ally, recalled his country’s delegation from COP29 – a move that may signal Argentina’s imminent departure from the accord.

The mood at COP29 was further dampened by the conspicuous absence of global leaders like Biden, French president Emmanuel Macron, Indian prime minister Narendra Modi, German chancellor Olaf Scholz, and Chinese president Xi Jinping, all of whom skipped this year’s summit.

As the escalating climate crisis disproportionately affects the world’s poorest populations, and the ongoing wars in the Middle East and Ukraine continue to generate massive greenhouse-gas emissions, prospects for meaningful climate action appear increasingly remote.

But the fight against climate change is not necessarily doomed. The ability to avert catastrophe will depend on the global response to Trump’s obstructionism and whether other countries can come together to confront the crisis, even without US leadership.

It is also worth noting that the US has long been a reluctant participant in global climate initiatives, regardless of who occupies the White House. This reluctance is hardly surprising, given its position as the world’s largest producer and net exporter of fossil fuels.

Even under Biden, America’s green policies have been primarily additive, focussing on expanding renewable-energy production rather than replacing or reducing fossil-fuel extraction.

As Indian journalist Nitin Sethi has noted, the US approach to climate negotiations has been to “retain, reinforce, and gain new competitive economic advantage,” wielding “climate language as a tool” to advance its national interests.

This helps explain many of America’s policy positions. Over the years, the US has blocked discussions on climate reparations and shifted the burden of mitigation and financing onto emerging economies like China and India while subjecting them to intense scrutiny.

It has ensured that financing and mitigation measures remain voluntary rather than enforceable. At the same time, it has sought to benefit American companies by prioritising enforcement of intellectual-property (IP) rights over the broader dissemination of green technologies. And it has favoured vague, non-binding language in international agreements on national mitigation goals, adaptation support, and compensation for loss and damage.

Given this reality, many negotiators believe that America’s involvement in the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) is driven less by a commitment to multilateral cooperation and more by the pursuit of narrowly defined, self-serving goals. Moreover, the US frequently bypasses the UN system, favouring bilateral deals that align more closely with its economic and geopolitical interests.

Paradoxically, Trump’s anticipated withdrawal from the Paris agreement could pave the way for more effective climate negotiations – a dynamic that also could prompt the Trump administration not to withdraw so that the US acts as a spoiler.

Irrespective of Trump’s policies, it is now clear that the COP process is no longer fit for purpose. Earlier this month, I joined other academics and climate advocates in sending an open letter to UNFCCC executive secretary Simon Stiell and UN secretary-general António Guterres, arguing that the current framework “simply cannot deliver the change” we need “to ensure a safe climate landing for humanity”.

Instead of hosting grand annual summits that often serve as platforms for fossil-fuel lobbyists to broker side deals, we called for “smaller, more frequent, solution-driven meetings”.

Trust between high-income and lower-income economies is crucial for any collaborative climate effort. To promote transparency and accountability, governments must prioritise feasible near-term goals over distant, meaningless targets, and rich countries must make genuine, well-defined, and transparent climate-financing commitments.

Importantly, climate finance must not take the form of loans, which often trap developing countries in perpetual cycles of debt and distress, exacerbating their external vulnerabilities. Equally pressing is the need to share the knowledge and technologies critical for both mitigation and adaptation.

To be sure, achieving this would require a re-evaluation – or even an outright waiver – of existing IP rules, so that these vital resources are treated as global public goods and are accessible to all.

Even if a second Trump presidency disrupts multilateral arrangements, there is still significant potential for large international coalitions to tackle climate change. The clean-energy transition, led by China and other countries, is not just inevitable – it is already under way.

As this shift becomes harder to ignore, even a US administration fixated on getting the best “deals” may realise it cannot afford to be left behind. - FMT

Jayati Ghosh, professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, is a member of the Club of Rome’s Transformational Economics Commission and co-chair of the Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation.

The views expressed are those of the writer and do not necessarily reflect those of MMKtT.