Faculty of Law University of Toronto
Law, Governance and Global Environmental Change Workshop Series
presents
What Future for the Global Climate Regime?
A Roundtable Discussion of the Copenhagen Meetings on Climate Change
Moderator:
Steven Bernstein (Department of Political Science, University of Toronto)
Panelists:
Jutta Brunnée (Faculty of Law, University of Toronto)
Jane Gray (The Climate Group)
Andrew Green (Faculty of Law, University of Toronto)
Matthew Hoffmann (Department of Political Science, University of Toronto) John Kirton (Department of Political Science, University of Toronto)
Christie Kneteman (Faculty of Law, University of Toronto)
Friday January 29, 2010
12:30 – 2:00
Solarium (room FA2), Falconer Hall, 84 Queen’s Park
In December 2009, the eyes of the world were on the Danish capital, Copenhagen. “Copenhagen” was to set the world on course to forestall dangerous climate change. To that end, “Copenhagen” was to yield at least the contours of a global regime that would commit all major economies to a long-term curbing of their greenhouse gas emissions. But the meeting did not go as planned. In the end, it produced a slim document dubbed the “Copenhagen Accord,” negotiated at the eleventh hour by only five countries (Brazil, China, India, South Africa and the United States) and later “taken note” of by the 194 parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change just before their meeting was gavelled to a close. US President Barack Obama, who had brokered the accord, called it a “meaningful and unprecedented breakthrough.” But for many observers the outcome spells failure, both in the world’s fight against climate change and in the UN climate change regime.
The panelists, several of whom attended the Copenhagen meetings, will present brief perspectives on the outcome of the of the negotiations, and will then engage in a moderated discussion with one another, and with members of the audience.
A light lunch will be provided.
This workshop series is co-sponsored by the Centre for International Studies
University of Toronto.
For more workshop information, please contact Nadia Gulezko at n.gulezko@utoronto.ca.
