Multilateral climate action remains the best game in town
Gillian Nelson, Policy Director
This article was first published in Financial Times’ Sustainable Views.
As the world prepares for the UN climate summit and the G20 the relevance of multilateralism is once again in the spotlight. Agreements by nations working together to address global challenges can feel painfully slow, often weighted down by bureaucracy and dominated by the interests of the most powerful. Decision-making can be cumbersome, and the enforcement of international agreements is often criticised.
Much has been said of the repeated influence of petrostate hosts on the UN climate summits of recent years; or the legitimacy of a G7 that claims to represent the main democratic economies but doesn’t formally include the likes of Brazil, China and India; or the effect of the absence of particular Heads of State at a G20 summit. And in light of these real criticisms there have been calls for more agile, regional, or even unilateral solutions.
But long problems and evolving challenges, like poverty, food insecurity, conflict, AI, health, climate change, biodiversity loss and migration, are not issues that can be solved in the span of a single political cycle. They demand sustained political will, investment, and global cooperation over decades. In a mega-year for country elections, and the US’s happening right now – the short-term electoral timelines of most national governments, compounded by volatile politics in many key nations, pose challenges for maintaining consistent policies.
This is where multilateral agreements, like the Universal Declaration of Human Rights, the European Union Single Market, the Treaty on the Non-Proliferation of Nuclear Weapons, the Geneva Conventions, or the Montreal Protocol, among many others, play a crucial role, offering a framework for long-term accountability that lift the aims beyond a purely domestic setting. Multilateralism is nowhere near perfect, but the alternative—an uncoordinated patchwork of short-term national policies and unilateral actions—would be far worse.
On perhaps the most intractable crisis in the history of the planet – climate change – it’s hard to imagine a way forward without multilateralism. The causes and impacts of climate change don’t stay within borders – a global response is required to address this truly global problem.
Multilateralism on climate change has landed significant achievements. The Paris Agreement is a prime example. This landmark accord brings nearly 200 countries together in the fight against climate change. The 2015 agreement set long-term goals for limiting global temperature rise and reducing greenhouse gas emissions. While each country is responsible for its own contributions, the collective framework ensures a global push toward the same objectives. Furthermore, mechanisms for regular review and improvement of national commitments encourage countries to enhance their efforts over time.
While implementation of the Paris Agreement has not yet reached the speed or scale necessary to stave off the worse impacts of climate change, it has already led to significant strides forward. Since its entry into force, many countries have set their own timebound targets for achieving net zero emissions, started transitioning to renewable energy, developed climate adaptation strategies, and committed to reducing deforestation. And this has a significant knock-on effect for the private sector and markets. For companies, government policy plays a vital role in their assessment of risks and opportunities that guides decision-making.
In a recent study over 70% of companies surveyed identified government regulation as the most important driver for accelerating the energy transition. Since 2015, the number of companies publicly committing to reducing their emissions through setting targets aligned with climate science has increased exponentially from just over one hundred at the time of COP21 to many thousands at the end of 2023, representing 39% of the global economy by market capitalisation. This action in the real economy has contributed to falling costs of the transition, which in turn brings more companies on board and gives governments confidence to further strengthen policy measures to accelerate the transition.
The Paris Agreement set a framework on which further multilateral negotiations can build, becoming more ambitious and targeted towards meeting its collective goals. The Glasgow Climate Pact from COP26, for example, saw countries agree to reduce coal consumption, the largest contributor to carbon emissions. This commitment represented the first step towards global acknowledgment of the need to transition away from fossil fuels, which was then cemented by the language of the UAE Consensus from COP28 in 2023 which also confirmed the need to triple renewable capacity and double energy efficiency by 2030.
In parallel to these negotiations under the formal UN structures, other multilateral forums such as the G7 and G20 play an important role in setting high level political direction. Discussions within these voluntary groupings can set the direction and tone of formal UN negotiations
In the same year that we saw the historic COP28 agreement around transitioning away from fossil fuels and tripling renewable energy by 2030, for example, the G7 had committed to phase out unabated fossil fuels, and the G20 to pursue efforts to triple renewable energy by 2030. These forums provide different, yet complementary, spaces for inching forward towards the progress needed.
Transitioning to a low-carbon economy and restoring ecosystems will require trillions of dollars in investments, much of which will need to be stimulated by a flow from richer nations to developing ones and be supported by mobilised private capital. This is because the countries most vulnerable to climate impacts are usually those with the least resources to adapt to them. Addressing this inequity is not only a moral imperative but also a pragmatic one, as climate-induced instability in one part of the world will have ripple effects across the globe – another prime reason why a response based in multilateralism is essential.
This year’s COP29 looks to separately negotiate a new pot of international climate finance (NCQG) that has the potential to accelerate private sector investment – both decarbonising and building resilience along supply chains that cross borders and regions.
At the heart of multilateralism lies the principle of shared responsibility, and mutual self-interest, around issues that impact every nation, regardless of economic status or geopolitical influence. No country, no matter how powerful, can mitigate rising global temperatures or the depletion of natural resources alone. The interconnectedness of these challenges is evident—what happens in the Amazon or Congo Rainforests affects communities as far apart as Florida, New Delhi, Nairobi and New York.
The success of climate and nature efforts at the upcoming G20 in Rio de Janeiro and COP29 in Baku will hinge on cooperative and inclusive conversations that work towards sustained, long-term global goals. In this time of great conflict around the globe, we should do all we can to protect these spaces where diverse countries come together to collectively solve the great problems facing humanity. Multilateralism, with all its flaws, remains the best game in town. To abandon it would be to gamble with the future of the planet.