The Costs of the Failure to Lead
Climate talks stall over requirements for rich nations – washingtonpost.com
Global climate talks ground to a halt Monday morning when a large bloc of developing countries complained that rich nations are abandoning the pact that has governed climate policy for more than a decade, though work continued behind the scenes on a new agreement.
The group of developing nations, known as the G-77, accused the United States and other industrialized countries of forsaking the Kyoto Protocol, the climate agreement that imposes emission limits on nearly every developed nation.
The reality is that unless and until the United States takes a leading role, we won’t get a durable agreement on climate change.
Clearly, there is a limit to how much the United States can and should do without getting others on-board, but the logic of the situation is that the United States has to be the first mover. We could always withdraw from a climate regime down the road if others were not stepping up, but requiring the developing world to commit to measures before we do is simply not going to be an effective approach.
