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The G77 Makes Their Move
Dec. 15th, 2009 11:52 amThe G77, a union of developing nations, walked out of the climate talks on Monday, leaving the talks suspended and in chaos. Predictably, they returned to the negotiating table later in the day. However, this make it clear that they have the organization and the solidarity to scuttle the conference if necessary.
Here's how the game goes now: If rich nations want to preserve the appearance of multilateralism, they have to at least appear to negotiate in good faith until Friday. Otherwise, the conference will be over before some heads of state even arrive. Walking out on Friday won't be a very meaningful move, it will be spun as "we negotiated in good faith all week, then they left when they didn't get their way". So the idea is to keep the conference on track until Friday. At that point, it's all up to Barack Obama, who's arriving on the final day of the conference.
If the G77 stays past Thursday, that means they have some amount of trust in Obama. If they expect Obama to sell them out, they'd be wise to really walk-out before he arrives. Obama has the power to swing this conference: If he can convince the rich nations that US is serious about climate-change mitigation (specifically, that it is possible to push something meaningful through the US Senate), than he'll probably be persuade everyone to buy into something substantial. On the other hand, if he's arriving with some airdropped-in, screw-the-poor-nations "alternate" plan, he'll probably be able to convince the developed world to buy onto that. The developing nations would probably walk out at that point, but it wouldn't matter much politically.
Here's how the game goes now: If rich nations want to preserve the appearance of multilateralism, they have to at least appear to negotiate in good faith until Friday. Otherwise, the conference will be over before some heads of state even arrive. Walking out on Friday won't be a very meaningful move, it will be spun as "we negotiated in good faith all week, then they left when they didn't get their way". So the idea is to keep the conference on track until Friday. At that point, it's all up to Barack Obama, who's arriving on the final day of the conference.
If the G77 stays past Thursday, that means they have some amount of trust in Obama. If they expect Obama to sell them out, they'd be wise to really walk-out before he arrives. Obama has the power to swing this conference: If he can convince the rich nations that US is serious about climate-change mitigation (specifically, that it is possible to push something meaningful through the US Senate), than he'll probably be persuade everyone to buy into something substantial. On the other hand, if he's arriving with some airdropped-in, screw-the-poor-nations "alternate" plan, he'll probably be able to convince the developed world to buy onto that. The developing nations would probably walk out at that point, but it wouldn't matter much politically.
