Carmen Bunzl - Universidad Pontificia Comillas

Chapter 5. Conclusions 231
China’s Five Year Plan goal to cut the energy intensity of economic output by 20
percent.
Some kind of top-down approach is certainly needed in order to address the urgency
of the climate change issue; but any bottom-up initiative is welcome, as a complement to
the main climate change architecture.
The international agreements’ architecture – its potential shape and structure
– can basically take three formats: targets and timetables, harmonized domestic
actions, and coordinated and unilateral policies.
The existing international climate policy framework focuses on countries’
efforts through national targets – quantitative country-level emissions goals –
and timetables – over a specified timeframe. Proposals would maintain the
international emissions trading and clean development project institutions that
have received broad support in Europe and developing countries. They attempt
to remedy the primary drawback in the Kyoto Protocol by explicitly addressing
participation by the United States and developing countries.
Some academics and policy makers argue that top-down architectures, such
as those based on multilateral agreements on targets and timetables, may not
provide robust incentives for participation and compliance. Because national
governments maintain their sovereignty, the design of policy architectures
should focus on harmonizing domestic actions across much stronger national
and regional institutions. Some have suggested a limited initial participation of
the few most pivotal countries in climate change; but this would be against the
global commons nature of climate change. Even if negotiations are more
demanding, countries can not be left aside. This approach may certainly
complement the climate change future architecture – similar to what some
reduced groups of countries such as the Asia-Pacific Partnership for Clean
Development and Climate or the G8 are contributing today – but the future
climate regime will probably not be solely based on harmonized domestic
actions.
Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingeniería ICAI Carmen Bunzl Boulet Junio 2008