Part II of assignment #5

1. Sustainable development, which focuses on going hand in hand between environmental protection and economic development, is one of the key international policy agendas for many countries. In spite of multiple meanings of this symbolic agenda, several scholars mention that development, in the context of sustainable development, means that the “Third World’s economies will become equal to the developed world’s economies.” This, in turn, will alleviate poverty and suffering in poor countries and make the world more equitable for all human beings (according to T. Davis in What is Sustainable Development?). With this in mind, I think currently developing countries have the right to exploit forests and other natural resources for economic growth, but there are several limitations for doing this. Tobin’s chapter 13 and Economy’s chapter 14 of Vig and Kraft’s book show well why developing countries cannot create economic development or exploit forests or natural resources efficiently and effectively. Common reasons regarding the inability of developing countries concerning exploiting natural resources are that they are “unwilling to pay the political and economic price to make thriving economies with manageable environmental problems” (Economy, p. 321). As Tobin mentions, there are some factors influencing how events in rich and poor countries influence the quest for sustainable development with rather different routes: a country’s population, a country’s capacity to support its population (p. 288), and different patterns of consumption and inequalities in consumption among rich and poor countries (pp. 295-300). Therefore, the developing or poor countries, having little political and economic capital compared with the developed countries, show rather different development strategies in terms of sustainable development. Economy’s chapter dealing with the case of China’s national strategy for creating cooperation and reconciliation between environmental protection and economic development (focusing on “grand-scale urbanization plans” since the 2000s) show us that several problems arise in the process of implementing such a strategy: serious air pollution (acid rain and yellow dust), water hazard, spoiling the party (flourishing corruption and illegal connections among local businesses and government officials), and the like. The case of China tells us that sustainable development is hard with the current political and economic infrastructure and capitals and the logic of economic growth like urbanization or modernization movement might bring about serious environmental degradation and deconstruction, unlike the developed countries. Theoretically, the environmental Kuznets curve, before becoming flatter, shows the situation of developing countries having low income and environmental degradation gets higher in this situation.

2. Climate change debate has long been made with several issues in terms of socio-economic and environmental impacts, causes, equity among industrialized and developing countries, and intergovernmental and international efforts for minimizing these negative impacts. Of them, the equity issue is one of the sensitive issues which are hard to make a consensus on. Through the Kyoto-Protocol, international societies attempt to address and solve global warming and many have asked whether developed nations - which led the industrial revolution and are responsible for most of the greenhouse gases now in the atmosphere - should bear a greater responsibility for combating climate change. According to the United Nations Foundation (http://www.unfoundation.org/), the principle underlying Kyoto is known as "common but differentiated responsibilities," which continues as a centerpiece principle for those calling on developed countries to assume a greater responsibility. China, India, and other developing countries call for recognition of this principle, while many developed countries argue that conditions have changed as developing countries have begun to industrialize and pollute more rapidly in recent years.

Selin and VanDever’s chapter 12 (“Global Climate Change”) discusses the global climate change issue under international and multilateral perspectives. Through several international efforts for reducing global climate change risks, like the UNFCCC or Kyoto Protocol, several countries conduct GHG reduction but procedural and distributional justice issues can be mentioned among countries. As the author mentioned, the adoption of means to address ongoing and accelerating climate change requires the investment of additional resources, and helping particularly vulnerable countries and local communities that face significant challenges as a result of climate change should be a priority for the international community, but the funding needs and requests have greatly outnumbered the amount of financial resources made available by UNFCCC Annex II countries and international organizations (p. 281). Therefore, many developed countries argue that the climate change issue is a collective, global problem that can only be successfully combated if every country puts its wits and resources fully behind resolving the crisis. Developed and developing countries are equally responsible for resolving the crisis. If developed nations were forced to cut emissions and developing nations allowed to increase per capita emissions, overall emissions would be kept constant and not reduced.

On the other hand, developing countries focus on different socio-economic and environmental situations. Under the current lack of political and social capital for dealing with the climate change issue, they argue that the equity issue should be preferentially considered compared with other reference points. Emissions per capita are much higher in developed countries compared to developing ones. This means that individuals in developed nations are more responsible for causing global warming, more responsible for continuing global warming, and so more obligated to cut emissions and solve the problem. Regarding strategies of developing countries to climate change mitigation, Mohan Munasighe suggests the DES (Development, Equity and Sustainability) approach based on the UNFCCC principle. Especially, regarding equity, two principles should be considered: (1) specific needs and special circumstances of developing countries (like fair burden sharing in mitigation as “common but differentiated responsibilities”) and (2) developed nations to take the lead of global climate change policy based on the fact that socioeconomic and development and poverty eradication are the first and overriding priorities of developing countries.

China’s case in Economy’s chapter 14 shows the possibility of serious environmental destruction and degradation when a developing country focuses on economic growth under the name of grand-scale modernization or urbanization. As I mentioned in question 1 of part II, the developing countries’ inability to pay the political and economic price to create thriving economies with manageable environmental problems has different results of sustainable development among industrialized and developing countries. That is, the developing countries’ lack of political and economic capacity (or capital) toward sustainable development and lack of balance between economic development and environmental protection give rise to serious environmental problems. Without any mechanisms or strategies for increasing government accountability, greater transparency of the process of implementation of global environmental policy, and greater independence in the legal system (Economy, p. 324), developing countries’ preoccupation with economic growth might bring about undesirable environmental results.

The equity issue is a very important and sensitive topic regarding climate change policy in terms of the international perspective. Several existing studies dealing with climate change mitigation strategies consider equity as one of the key points. However, I am not sure whether or not it is most important and only a policy goal regarding the climate change debate. We should consider several points concomitantly: economic and political situation, sustainable development, technological development, and global cooperation. First and foremost, the enduring trust and cooperation of most countries should be based on the implementation of global climate change policy. With a scientifically rigorous, economically achievable plan, developing countries try to make economic development along a sustainable low-GHG path while industrialized countries drastically attempt to reduce their own emissions and not create mechanisms that can be used opportunistically to shift the primary burden to the developing countries. Developed and developing countries alike mobilize several trillion dollars to accomplish the technical and infrastructure transformation, but those high-GHG-emission countries pay more than others.