Post-2020 Climate Change Regime Formation

1  Why the world has failed to slow global warming

David G. Victor

In the late 1980s the United Nations began the first round of formal talks on global warming. Over the subsequent two decades the scientific understanding of climate change has improved and public awareness of the problem has spread widely. These are encouraging trends. But the diplomacy seems to be headed in the opposite direction. Early diplomatic efforts easily produced new treaties, such as the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the 1997 Kyoto Protocol. Those treaties were easy to agree upon yet had almost no impact on the emissions that cause global warming. As governments have tried to tighten the screws and get more serious, disagreements have proliferated ...