Copenhagen 8: Peering through the Eye of the Needle

by Kennedy Graham

We are at the moment of truth, here in Copenhagen.

For 8 days the conference has ground along in true diplomatic style, officials parsing words and bracketing phrases within the mindless straitjacket of 193 inflexible cabinet decisions thrashed out in advance of what purports to be multilateral negotiations.  Behind the screens, leaders are talking.  But not necessarily agreeing.

Now we are at the public High-Level Segment, today and tomorrow.  As I write, President Sarkozy is speaking.  Failure, he says, is not an option.  This is not, he says, a symposium on climate change – it is the moment for decision.  There are less than 24 hours left.  He urges leaders to take decisive action and he means it. Others agree.  Great. Must be time for action.

This has been a unique conference.  Although it is not over and although we do not yet know the outcome, I believe we can see the future through the veil.  Or, to switch the metaphor, humanity is peering through the eye of the needle, sizing up our chances of squeezing through.  Into the deliverance of global unity.  That includes the rich, who are in the business of recomposing themselves.

I have attended major UN conferences before – disarmament in ’88, Rio in ’92, Cairo’s Population Conference in ’94, and others.  This is different in kind.  Those conferences, governments were negotiating on behalf of nation-states.  This one, governments are negotiating on behalf of humanity.  In 2009, virtually all humans see climate change as a personal threat – to themselves and their mortal posterity.  We’d rather not condemn our descendants to Hell.  They might resent it – and remember who we were.

Nuclear weapons were the first global threat.  Einstein and others cried out for global change.  Yet the bean-counting could naturally be confined to the nation-state, so after the failed Baruch Plan the weapons stayed within our own arsenals.  But you can’t condense the global carbon atmospheric concentration inside the national cake-tin.  The global commons is shared.  We all breathe the same air.  We feel the same heat.

So the global civil society has kicked into action in an unprecedented manner and to unprecedented effect.  That does not, in itself, determine decisions – or lack thereof.  But it does influence the broader dynamics in a way that has national leaders running – for present cover or future office.  Global justice is no longer a prescriptive moral vision; it is a condition of survival.

And at the conference the political imagery is different from Rio.  That conference, I remember only one national leader referring to Earth in a cosmic context and he was regarded as barking mad.  This morning, one compares Earth with Mars and suggests we choose Earth.   Others talk of the beautiful pearl in space.  One calls for a global referendum on five questions that would logically lead leaders to a singular decision-point.  Outside the assembly hall the British Prime Minister appeals to humans the world over to sign a global petition to pressure leaders.  Leaders appealing to be pressured.  That is where we have come to.  So the philosophical context is different.  It is, as they say, a ‘paradigm shift’.  And that is an historic advance.  Equal to Apollo 8’s ‘Earthrise’ back in ’68.

So why do we not get agreement?   Because of a second truth.  Our 19^th century conference machinery is inadequate for 21^st century problems.  If humanity faces truly global problems today, and we do, then the principle of subsidiarity, accepted by nation-states in a regional context, requires certain limited global decision-making power at the global level.  Instead, we have 193 sovereign entities, bickering in tribal fashion over misperceived national interests.  New Zealand is one of the worst offenders.  And we have the simian gall to rail at Tuvalu for their intemperate behaviour – emotionally appealing for survival.

Humanity’s technological advance has outstripped its political evolution.  Our institutional structures, resting as always on underlying political assumptions and premises, remain national.  They are not even truly regional.

We can contemplate four alternative scenarios post-Copenhagen.

• We can, miracle of miracles, reach genuine agreement, legally-binding and reflecting national self-abnegation, collectively meeting the prescribed global targets, based on informed scientific evidence.  Chances?  5%.
• We can, miracle of miracles, refashion our decision-making at the national-regional-global levels that avoids the dysfunctionality of the traditional conference machinery, and emerge with a global solution of a genuine, legitimate kind.  Chances?  10%.
• We can fail to act with sufficient resolve and capability, and watch the UN Security Council adopt binding enforcement powers under Chapter VII in response to increasing international instability.  Legislate for climate change, the way it has for terrorism.  Alarmist?  In April 2007, the Council held a debate on climate change and its security implications.  The Pacific Islands Forum urged the Council to be prepared to act.  Presumably, that included New Zealand.  But China implacably opposed even a joint statement.  Then in June this year the General Assembly expressed concern over the adverse impacts of climate change, including sea-level rise, and the possible security implications this could have.  It urged the Security Council to return to the issue and asked the Secretary-General to report back.  So don’t write it off.  Chances?  40%.
• Or, we can wallow in the mire, continuing to fight one another for competitive national advantage, grabbing deck-chairs for the best positions on the Titanic.  Literally observing the icebergs as the boat goes down.  Chances?  No comment.  See if we can deny the maths.  See if we can thwart the Devil.

Copenhagen cannot be a ‘success’.  Barring a miracle (0.001%), there will be no numbers.  But ‘failure’ can be avoided.  This requires a strong statement of political agreement, and a decision to adjourn rather than close.  The conference would re-open within six months for a legally-binding treaty reflecting agreed obligations by both North and South in the global interest.  Six months.

Anything less is a failure.  And failure is not an option, for the President of France.  Nor for my grand-daughters.  Mia is 5.  Khali is 3.  Mala is 2.  Oshani is 3 months.  Four cute girls, very vulnerable.

Better get our act together.