The Foreign Service Journal, October 2021

THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL | OCTOBER 2021 53 Nations agencies—the World Meteorological Organization and the U.N. Environment Program—created the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. A scientific intergovernmental body, the IPCC has delivered increasingly clear and forceful reports about the growing threat of climate change. The now-authorita- tive science underscores the urgent and overdue need to act. … This action must take at least three forms: negotiation, invest- ment and adaptation—negotiation to reduce global emissions, investment to bring about a complete transformation of the world’s energy systems, and country-by-country adaptation to the inevitable effects of climate change. —Timothy Wirth, former member of Congress (House and Senate) and under secretary of State for global affairs, from his article of the same title in the February 2008 FSJ. The Arctic Bellwether The projected climate changes in the Arctic present challenges with no parallel in human experience to date. They are likely to cause substantial dislocation and expose vulnerabilities among the residents. Further, because these changes are directly linked to global processes such as a rise in the sea level, the availability of new sea routes and the opening of new natural resources, the effects promise to be equally profound around the globe. … One major factor that must be taken into account is the asym- metry between the time scale in which the climate system reacts to increases in greenhouse gases and the time scale to recover from such increases. Recovery takes roughly 10 times longer than it took to increase global greenhouse gas concentrations in the first place. —Robert W. Corell, global change program director for H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics, and the Environment, from his article of the same title in the February 2008 FSJ. Climate Change Negotiations Lessons from Montreal A number of factors were critical to the success of the Montreal Protocol. Important among themwas the leadership role played by the United States from the beginning, well before the start of negotiations on the pro- tocol. The United States was among the first to recognize the threat posed by CFCs, and took early action, along with some of the Nordic states, to ban their use inmost aerosols. … The negotiators of the Montreal Protocol, like those now seek- ing agreement on how to meet the challenge of global warming, faced formidable difficulties in dealing with a problem whose effects, while perhaps tolerable in the short run, were likely to be catastrophic over the long term in a “business as usual” scenario. Moreover, as with climate change, they had to deal with skepti- cism about the science involved. —Richard J. Smith, FSO (ret.), from his article of the same title in the December 2010 FSJ. An Existential Threat That Demands Greater FS Engagement Climate change is one of the gravest dan- gers facing the world today, with profound implications for the future of all humanity. …These issues will long remain central to U.S. security and economic interests and will likewise remain of great interest to our partners around the world. We ignore them at our peril. … Climate change is much more than an environmental issue. It is fundamentally about how our economies are powered. … In essence, international climate negotiations have been a “design and build” process, restructuring 21st-century econo- mies so that we can move beyond fossil fuel-based development to low-carbon or zero-carbon development. No one country can solve the global challenge that is climate change, but the United States has an outsized role in finding a solution, both substan- tively and symbolically. Much of the world looks to the United States for leadership, not simply because of our political, military and economic might, but because of the historic responsibility we have as the largest historic emitter of greenhouse gases. … For more than 25 years, climate change negotiators across the globe have worked to bridge deep divides among virtually all of the world’s countries to reach consensus decisions with far-reaching implications for how economies are structured and how we will maintain a habitable planet. —Tim Lattimer, FSO, from his article of the same title in the July-August 2017 FSJ. It’s Not Just about Paris: International Climate Action Today Although the Paris Agreement has drawn the lion’s share of recent international climate headlines, it is far from the only forum in which Americans can, and do, address climate issues. A glorious profusion of state, non-state and hybrid entities in the United States and elsewhere is demonstrating impressive inge- nuity in relevant policy and technology. —Karen Florini, former deputy special envoy for climate change at the State Department (2015-2017), and Professor Ann Florini, from their article of the same title in the July-August 2017 FSJ. n