Is the U.S. too big to fail?

On the 6th day after Copenhagen a conclusion came to me...

The “failure” to reach a comprehensive and binding agreement on climate charge in Copenhagen was due in some part to two related issues, the scale of nation states and their representative forms of government.

Large nation states are among the largest emitters and play a leading role at the environmental bargaining table. At the same time, they are made up of many entities with conflicting needs across geographic, industries, cultural, demographic and sociological strata. Imagine the difference one finds across a country such as the United States, Australia, China, India, Russia or Brazil and it is easy to see the many conflicts that can arise when discussing what country’s optimum position on various aspects of climate change, environmental protection, trade or economic development. Small nation state’s, particularly island state, issues are more bounded and more easily focused, i.e. Mohamed Nasheed, President of the Maldives is dealing with externally driven sea level rise and salt water infiltration of their ground water without the need to consider issues related to a domestic coal industry or loss of jobs in a major domestic industrial group, such as automotive sector.

At the same time, leaders of large nations with representative forms of government are torn between the conflicting needs of their many constituents, leaving them without a clear mandate. In essence, this leaves them powerless to demonstrate the leadership demanded by many or to take strong positions on issues that may, in the short term, negatively impact significant elements of their constituency. As an example, Australia and Prime Minister Kevin Rudd had been leading voices for bold legislative change, Emissions Trading Schemes (ETS) and aggressive GHG emission targets in the run up to COP15 and was planning to attend COP15 with signed legislation in hand. That is until Tony Abbott, a stanch climate skeptic ascend to the leadership of the leadership opposition (Liberal) party immediately prior to the summit. In preparing to attend COP15, Rudd is quoted in the "Now that Tony Abbot and the extreme right have taken over the opposition it's difficult to see legislation passing the Australian parliament." In contrast, China with its centralized form of government had significant advantages at the bargaining table in Copenhagen as a result.

Are we treating the large, industrialized nation states as we have the large global financial institutions of the recent financial crisis, i.e. too big to fail? Will climate change reforms require a new approach governance and implementation, in essence a break from Kyoto? I think yes. As we are seeing in the case of California in climate/environmental legislation and the broader global trade regime, regionalization and cross-border coalitions with tighter alignment around political, strategic resource and economic factors will evolve to fill the governance gap. It has been said political boundaries that historically have been arbitrarily set for a variety of reasons, would be better aligned according to the ecosystems boundaries and subdivisions of the natural watersheds. This is a unique point of view that triggers interesting thinking around the issues of climate change and governance.

Map Description

This map shows the location of 106 major watersheds of the world. It includes the world’s  largest transboundary watersheds and other small basins that are representative of a particular geographic area. Omitted regions, shown in white, are primarily smaller coastal drainage basins or regions with no permanent rivers.

Source: Earth Trends Institute