Too Hot to Handle - Essay Example

Too Hot to Handle? The economic activity in the past three decades has been marked by rapid industrialization and urbanization among countries aroundthe world. These elements have been largely credited as the main drivers of the incidence of the global warming – the phenomenon marked by an increase in the Earth’s temperature. It is, hence, not surprising that this environmental issue has attained a high-profile status of global proportion. Global warming has been hogging the headlines these past years. The latest development to have stoked the fiery debate on the controversy was when Al Gore released his recent unapologetic documentary discussing global warming and all its dimensions. This paper seeks to answer why despite the numerous international conferences and conventions, addressing the issue, global warming or climate change is always seems to be ‘put in the too hard basket’ – too hard to merit immediate action and in arriving at concrete solutions. Identifying the Threat The amount of attention and furor generated out of global warming - as a possible threat to mankind - pressured the international community, cause-oriented groups and policy makers to initiate numerous studies, hold conferences and draft treaties addressing its effects or at least show efforts with some semblance to attempts at solving the problem. As early as 1827, the French scientist Fourier have already argued that the earth’s atmosphere warms the surface by letting through high-energy solar radiation but trapping part of the longer-wave heat radiation coming back from the surface. (Grubb, Brack & Vrolijk 1998, 4) From then on, the subject attracted little attention until the 1970s when the United Nations was sufficiently concerned about the possible climate change resulting to a possible catastrophic warming effect. According to Hirofumi Ozawa (2003), this is symbolically illustrated by two international conferences convened by the United Nations – the Stockholm Conference in 1972, on the one hand, and the Rio Conference in 1992, on the other. (1) The first conference was more on identifying and defining global warming as a problem while the latter was geared more on establishing a framework that will govern international behavior towards climate change as environmental problem. The first World Climate Conference was held in 1979 and was responsible for the founding of the World Climate Research Programme as well as the UN Environment Programme which convened a series of international scientific workshops, international meetings whose culmination was the launching of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change. (Grubb, Brack & Vrolijk 1998, 4) The Kyoto Protocol Perhaps the most significant result of the frenzied negotiations among governments on what to do about global warming was the ratification of the Kyoto Protocol. This treaty seeks to formulate legally binding terms that will regulate the greenhouse emissions from industrialized countries as well as the rest of the countries albeit in lesser degrees. Grubb, Duncan and Vrolijk (1998) provide us an insight on its inception and how the international community participated in its negotiations: The Kyoto conference was the biggest and most high-profile event on the international environment since the Rio Earth summit itself, more than five years previously. The United States alone brought almost a hundred people in its official negotiating delegation… Almost 10,000 people attended in all. Ministers from around the world flew in, including the UK Deputy Prime Minister and, more briefly, US Vice-President Al Gore. (61) Indeed, the Kyoto Protocol is distinguished from other conferences, those which just seek to raise awareness on global warming and climate change. Kyoto Protocol is significant primarily because its objective is to lay down specific binding decisions about commitments of nation-states, in the recognition that previous efforts were not sufficient to cover the problematic areas of this particular environmental concern. All in all, the Kyoto Protocol became some form of a benchmark in gauging the participation and responses of the different countries committed to solving the problem about climate change. And so the success in the enforcement of the Kyoto Protocol reflects the huge steps taken closer to the solution. In the same way, failure in achieving the Kyoto Protocol’s objectives and in meeting and adhering to its requirements reflect the failure of the international community to arrive at achieving concrete solutions to the problem. Sadly, current developments show more of the latter scenario and so, we elaborate on the main thesis of this paper – why we have not arrived at a concrete solution that will solve the global war problem despite the numerous efforts of the international community to come up with one. Challenges Difficulties encountered in the aftermath of the Kyoto Protocol are partly political and partly economic in nature, but it can also be attributed to the incomplete understanding of what exactly has been agreed in the Protocol. On the political front, we highlight case of Japan. Here, if Japan succeeded in achieving its emission target as mandated by the Kyoto Protocol it would have a diplomatic coup over the United Sates or the more powerful of the European Union states. According to Paul Harris (2003), Japan sought to play the role of intermediary between EU and non-EU countries as its foreign policymakers consider the global environmental problem as a means to improve relations with developing countries in Asia. (148) When political rivalries emerge, such as when the US did not sign the treaty, a huge setback happens, which in this particular case was the withdrawal of the US from the negotiating table at the expense of the interest in the accord from other countries. Loosely, the adverse impacts of the response measures adopted under the Protocol could open difficult new ground in the relationship among countries. The economic factor in the failure to arrive at an effective and enforceable solution to global warming resides on the fact that the reduction of greenhouse gases emissions would take a considerable toll on the industries of a particular country. Those staunch supporters of the anti-Protocol sector warn that the accord could have a devastating effect on the US economy and American workers. This economic dimension to the challenges comes with the domestic political implications, as this financial issue is not favorable to the public’s opinion. Another significant aspect why international cooperation fails to take aggressive steps towards putting an end to global warming is the fact that current sanctions regarding violations to the frameworks on climate change such as the Protocol is not very effective. The US is a glaring example on how countries could get away with refusing to participate in these global efforts with not even a slap on the wrist. Finally, we also mention some skeptics who do not view the threat of global warming as serious while some even view climate change positively. For instance, Melvin Benarde (1992) chronicled his interview with a Soviet Unions leading climatologist, and he recounted what the scientist had to say about the issue: He said the warming will be beneficial and should be encouraged. Dusting off his crystal ball he sees cattle grazing in what is now the dry Sahara and crops growing in the currently arid steppes of Central Asia. He dismissed fears that the grain belts of the American Midwest and the Russian Ukraine would permanently dry out. (9) Indeed, excluding the public relations machine of affected industries under the greenhouse emission regulations, there are credible scientists who view that the global warming is overly hyped and deserved another perspective. This scientific sector lends credence and excuse for economies, especially the industrialized countries, to shrug off existing negotiations and treaties citing that the cost is too much considering the uncertainty of the negative climatic change effects. Conclusion On the issue of the globally-coordinated effort at enforcing climate-change framework and ratified treaties, some analysts proposed giving more teeth to sanctions for defiant nation-states. For example, we quote the idea of Griffin on this matter: I see only one way to coerce reluctant countries into participation in a climate-change regime and that is by coupling participation in the regime to the benefits of membership in the World Trade Organizations. (208) Environmental problems such as global warming have always been put in the “too hard basket” because it has a complicated nature that requires sacrifices from among countries because they have an adverse impact on the economic and political sectors. Policymakers are pressured to have environmental policies subordinate to economics and politics especially among democratic and developing countries because public opinion is more concerned on the short term issues. The US withdrawal from the negotiating table in the Kyoto Protocol is also a major setback that needs to be addressed. Even though Japan and the European Union were able to steer the negotiations forward (Vig & Faure 2004, 208), the psychological effect of George Bush’ administration disavowal of the Kyoto Protocol and the Montreal Protocol, henceforth, is a problem in itself that must be addressed in order for a framework or for a future environmental accord on climate change to work. Unfortunately, what the public could get out of all these developments in climate change is that they can be assured, only to a certain degree that the best scientists and policymakers are working hard to come up with answers and, hopefully, solutions, given that global warming is indeed an environmental hazard. Works Cited Benarde, Melvin. Global Warning... Global Warming. Wiley-IEEE, 1992. Griffin, James. Global Climate Change. Edward Elgar Publishing, 2003 Grubb, Michael, Brack, Duncan, and Vrolijk, Christiaan. Kyoto Protocol: A Guide and Assessment. James & James/Earthscan, 1998 Harris, Paul., Global Warming and East Asia. Routledge, 2003. Uzawa, Hirofumi. Economic Theory and Global Warming. Cambridge University Press, 2003. Vig, Norman and Faure, Michael. Green Giants?: Environmental Policies of the United States and the European Union. MIT Press, 2003 Read More