This introduction to the 2023 special issue of Global Environment Politics brings questions related to politics and political processes to the forefront in the study of climate change loss and damage. The aim of avoiding the detrimental impacts of climate change has been at the heart of the international response to global climate change for more than thirty years. Yet the development of global governance responses to climate change loss and damage—those impacts that we cannot, do not or choose not to prevent or adapt to—has only over the last decade become a central theme within the discussions under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Loss and damage has also become a research topic of growing importance within an array of disciplines, from international law to the interdisciplinary environmental social sciences. However, the engagement of scholars working in the fields of political science and international relations has been more limited so far. This is surprising because questions about how to best respond to loss and damage are fundamentally political, as they derive from deliberative processes, invoke value judgments, imply contestation, demand the development of policies, and result in distributional outcomes. In this introduction we describe the context and contributions of the research articles in the special issue. By drawing on a wide range of perspectives from across the social sciences, the articles render visible the multifaceted politics of climate change loss and damage and help to account for the trajectory of governance processes.

In 1991, in meetings constructing the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the small island state of Vanuatu introduced a proposal requiring wealthy countries to pay for damages related to sea level rise. More than thirty years later, countries finally agreed to establish a financing mechanism for loss and damage associated with climate change. Scholars have observed the slow progress on loss and damage finance, but what tactics did countries use to obstruct negotiations? We answer this question using data from primary and secondary sources, observations at negotiations, and key informant interviews. Our analysis details four periods of obstruction and outlines a typology of fourteen tactics countries have used to delay progress. These tactics limited the issue’s scope, reduced transparency, manipulated language, and advanced nontransformative solutions. These findings contribute to the study of obstructionism in climate governance and can help loss and damage advocates better anticipate and respond to obstruction.

The governance of public climate finance for mitigation and adaptation in developing countries is fragmented on both the international and national levels, with a high diversity of actors with overlapping mandates, preferences, and areas of expertise. In the absence of one unifying actor or institution, coordination among actors has emerged as a response to this fragmentation. In this article, we study the coordination efforts of the two most important multilateral climate funds, the Climate Investment Funds (CIF) and the Green Climate Fund (GCF), on the global level as well as within two recipient countries, Kenya and Zambia. The CIF and the GCF are anchored within the World Bank and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, respectively, and represent two diverging perspectives on climate finance. We find that on both levels, coordination was depoliticized by treating it as a technical exercise, rendering invisible the political divergences among actors. The implications of this depoliticization are that both funds coordinate mainly with actors with similar preferences, and consequently, coordination did not achieve its objectives. The article contributes to the literatures on coordination, climate finance, and environmental governance by showing how a response to the fragmentation of climate governance did not overcome political fault lines but rather reinforced them.

Global climate governance is in transition. As the focus shifts from negotiations to implementation, the quest for ways to effectively coordinate ambitious climate action has become a key concern. While existing studies frame this problem mostly in terms of institutional design (to “facilitate” state ambition) and strategic delegation of authority (to “orchestrate” nonstate action), this article builds on dramaturgical policy analysis to examine soft coordination in practice. Using ethnographic methods, we analyze public performances at the twenty-fifth Conference of the Parties (COP25) in Madrid. We find that these were shaped by preestablished governance scripts and social roles available to participants, but also by creative improvisations and interventions. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change Secretariat and COP Presidency intervened to configure the physical setting of the conference, mold its narrative arch, and shape available roles. We conclude that performances and dramaturgical interventions are important tools of soft coordination in global climate governance. Their analysis constitutes a productive entry point for grasping contemporary transformations in global politics.

The 2015 Paris Agreement is often depicted as a turning point for global climate governance. Following years of diplomatic gridlock, it laid the foundations for a new global climate regime that invites states to partner with nonstate actors in the transition to the low-carbon society. This article critically examines the political rationalities that inform the pluralization of climate politics after Paris and the turn toward cooperative modes of governing. Drawing on an analysis of initiatives led by the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change that were launched to engage nonstate actors in the evolving Paris regime, we identify a global governmentality that mobilizes nonstate actors as active and responsible partners in the quest for rapid and deep decarbonization. In its search for cooperative and efficient forms of problem management, we argue, this form of rule nurtures a global space free from friction and opposition where businesses, investors, and industry are elevated as the real partners of government.

From a nonideal justice perspective, this article investigates liability and compensation in their wider theoretical context to better understand the governance of climate loss and damage under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The usual rationale for considering compensation takes a backward-looking understanding of responsibility. It links those causing harm directly to its remedy. This article shows that, under current political circumstances, it is more reasonable to understand responsibility as a forward-looking concept and thus to differentiate responsibilities on grounds of capacity and solidarity. The article argues that loss and damage entitlements in UNFCCC governance should be understood as entitlements to a threshold of capabilities for resilience. While compensation merely means redressing the situation ex ante a threat, entitlements to capabilities for resilience can entail more demanding responsibilities of support. This means that Article 8 of the Paris Agreement has much more demanding implications than it might at first appear.

To achieve the Paris Agreement’s temperature goal, fossil fuel production needs to undergo a managed decline. While some frontrunner countries have already begun to adopt policies and measures restricting fossil fuel supply, an outstanding question is how international cooperation in support of a managed decline of fossil fuel production could take shape. This article explores two possible pathways—one following a club model and the other more akin to a multilateral environmental agreement. Specifically, the article discusses the participants in an international agreement; the forum through which cooperation will take place; the modalities, principles, and procedures underpinning the agreement; and the incentives to induce cooperation. The article concludes that the most likely scenario at this juncture is the emergence of club arrangements covering particular fossil fuel sources and groups of actors that, over time, give rise to growing calls for a more coordinated and multilateral response.

Hard climate policy (e.g., regulation, taxes/pricing, phaseouts) is needed to meet ambitious climate targets, but when such policy is introduced, it can sometimes trigger backlash. Backlash involves an abrupt and forceful negative reaction by a significant number of actors seeking to reverse a policy, often through extraordinary means that transgress established procedures and norms. Yet, explanations of policy backlash remain nascent and fragmented. I synthesize insights from within and beyond climate politics to argue that contested legitimacy is central to climate policy backlash, which provokes attempts toward delegitimation. I develop a conceptual pathway to explain the occurrence of climate policy backlash and generate hypotheses about how practices of delegitimation occur, and their effects. This contributes to explaining why backlash occurs, highlighting ideational factors alongside interests and institutions. Overall, I suggest the need for a contextually embedded approach to understanding the volatile dynamics of backlash, bringing political sociology into conversation with political economy.

Developing countries are growing apart on environmental issues. International environmental negotiations are no longer characterized merely by the North–South conflict. Rising powers have come to divide the Global South and redefine the Common-But-Differentiated Responsibilities principle. This article explains the divergence of China and India at the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol, one of the first global environmental agreements to differentiate obligations between developing countries. China and India, the world’s two largest hydrofluorocarbon producers, ended decades of collaboration and split the rest of the developing world behind them. I argue that developmental strategy and political institutions shape the preferences and influences of industrial, governmental, and social stakeholders, thereby explaining their negotiation behavior and outcome. This article explains why China moved faster and further than India on negotiations for hydrofluorocarbon regulation. It has important implications for the two rising powers’ implementation of the Kigali Amendment and for their position formulations on other environmental issues.

In this article we measure, describe, and demonstrate the importance of differential treatment for developing countries in multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs). So far, we argue, quantitative research on differentiation has been minimal due to data constraints and the complex nature of relevant provisions. In response, we offer a way of relieving this constraint, exploiting the fact that MEAs with differentiation typically identify distinct sets of “developing country” parties. After describing the data collection process, we show that differentiation is surprisingly uncommon, appearing in only 6 percent of MEAs, and disproportionately appears in larger, more recent agreements. We then test a key conjecture about differentiation by revisiting the debate on the depth–participation dilemma. We demonstrate, specifically, how it conditions this relationship. When MEAs do not differentiate, greater depth reduces participation; when they do, the relationship is reversed, making it possible to sustain high levels of both. This result helps to reconcile conflicting findings in earlier studies and has important policy implications.

The political economy of lithium, a “critical mineral” for the renewable energy transition, is marked by two striking developments. First, Global North governments that have historically offshored mining are onshoring lithium to enhance “supply chain security.” Second, these governments have committed to “sustainably sourcing” lithium. In this article, I theorize both developments in terms of a novel security–sustainability nexus : an interlocking set of policies and justifications that promote lithium extraction and emphasize the environmental credentials of Global North mining. The security–sustainability nexus evidences an alignment between state and corporate interests. For public officials, onshoring policies counter China’s “dominance” over battery supply chains. For mining and auto firms, onshoring translates into lucrative incentives, supply security, and reputational benefits. However, despite this state–corporate alignment, the tensions within the security–sustainability nexus illuminate the contradictions of green capitalism. I conclude that the geopolitical and socioenvironmental conflicts over the material foundations of the energy transition are reshaping the inequalities linked to extractive sectors.

State-to-state accountability has greatly failed to improve compliance with multilateral environmental agreements. As this is also the case in the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), this article explores how and with what effect nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) persuade states to fulfill their commitments to conserve biodiversity. The article conceptualizes accountability as learning-enabling dialogue with the potential to influence state behavior through the provision of constructive criticism. The underlying argument is that NGOs can contribute to overcoming implementation challenges by engaging in constructive dialogue with states. The triangulation of interviews with NGOs, CBD documents, and gray literature suggests that NGOs can challenge or even prevent states’ inertia by establishing critical but cooperative multilevel partnerships with states to advance implementation. Reconceptualizing accountability as constructive dialogue may contribute to realizing the transformative potential of accountability. However, more evidence is needed to understand the roles of NGOs in fostering learning and the impact of learning on improving implementation, compliance, and environmental outcomes.

This Forum article reports on a meta-review of more than 19,000 published works on water security, of which less than 1 percent explicitly focus on race or ethnicity. This is deeply concerning, because it indicates that race and ethnicity—crucial factors that affect the provision of safe, reliable water—continue to be ignored in academic and policy literatures. In response to this finding the Forum calls for building intersectional water security frameworks that recognize how empirical drivers of social and environmental inequality vary both within and across groups. Intersectional frameworks of water security can retain policy focus on the key material concerns regarding access, safety, and the distribution of water-related risks. They can also explicitly incorporate issues of race and ethnicity alongside other vectors of inequality to address key, overlooked concerns of water security.