William Moomaw and Mihaela Papa Sustainable Development
Diplomacy and Governance Discussion Paper Climate change is a
serious threat to all nations. This raises the question of why
continuous treaty negotiations for more than two decades have
failed to create a viable or adequate international climate
regime. The current strategy of addressing climate change
misdiagnoses the issue as a pollution problem by focusing on
symptoms (emissions) and not on underlying causes (unsustainable
development). In short, the wrong treaty is being negotiated.
Drawing on negotiation analysis, it is argued that the existing
and proposed climate treaties fail to meet the national
interests of any party. An alternative strategy for addressing
climate change is proposed that reframes the overall approach to
reflect all countries’ development needs and links climate
protection goals to the development structure of the treaty. The
current deadlock over emissions reductions might be overcome and
a mutual gains agreement reached by di