Climate change is a global concern.

How effective are the legal mechanisms for tackling

climate change?

There is no doubt that climate change is a global concern, with many perspectives debating
over the magnitude and the validity of the threat climate change poses as suggested by
scientific research and findings during the past decades. Based on this accumulated
evidence, which has been prominently publicised in the media, scientists and activists have
all confidently asserted the detrimental impact of climate change. Hence, they have been
continually lobbying for legal intervention. National governments recently have also publicly
recognised the concerns over climate change, as well as the global community. To tackle the
concerns of climate change, international agreements have been implemented as well as
domestic laws. The effectiveness of these legal mechanisms can only be seen in the long
term as the phenomenon of climate change is unpredictable. Therefore we can only, to a
degree, assess the relative effectiveness of the current legal mechanisms for tackling climate
change.

The United Nations, formed with the principal aim of establishing and maintaining world
peace, would expectedly be the first to demonstrate its stance on climate change. Its
international authority offers it the ability to legally influence the future of climate change.
The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC or FCCC) is an
international environmental treaty drafted by the United Nations at the United Nations
Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) held in Rio de Janeiro from 3 June
to 14 June 1992. This treaty, with its objective of “stabilising greenhouse gas concentrations
in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with
the climate system” (Article II), demonstrated that the United Nations was acknowledging
the causes for climate change. The United Nations can therefore be seen as being utilised as
a central and fundamental legal mechanism in creating international agreements and
treaties. This acknowledgment of climate change, on a global scale, is evidence that the
legal mechanisms employed have been effective to a notable extent. However it is still
inadequate for current efficient tackling of climate change as it is more important that
palpable action is taken.

Another well known agreement is the Kyoto Protocol where most nations agreed to reduce
greenhouse gas emission of an average 6% to 8% below 1990 level between the year 2008
and 2012. The Bush administration, as well at the Howard government, however, explicitly
rejected the Kyoto protocol, which questions the effectiveness of an international treaty.
Even though international law, as established earlier, acknowledges the impacts of climate
change, it is not sufficient enough as a legal mechanism in thoroughly tackling climate
change. This is primarily due to the notion of state sovereignty as it allows nations to
withdraw from a treaty or a part of it. Therefore, the effectiveness of an international treaty
as a legal mechanism is limited and subsequently inadequate.
 It is through domestic law that the desired purposes on the tackling of climate change can
be better achieved. By analysing and examining the laws or proposals, if any, that have been
put forward by advanced nations, we can be able to obtain a substantial depiction on the
current effectiveness of tackling climate change. Australia, being an advanced democratic
nation is an example where the issue of climate change is of vast importance. The current
Prime Minister of Australia, Mr. Kevin Rudd had signed the Kyoto Protocol as his first official
act after being sworn in after the 2007 Federal election, hence symbolising the importance
of dealing with climate change. Although this was, in legal terms, a positive step forward,
Mr. Rudd’s plan to independently introduce an “emission trading scheme” for Australia in
2010 was unsuccessful. This scheme, known as the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme,
proposed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions to a range of between 5% and 15% less than
2000 levels for Australia in 2010. Mr. Rudd, however, recently announced that the
Government would delay implementing an emission trading scheme and subsequently
“blamed” it on a hostile senate, where the Bill did not pass. As well taking international law
into account, the legal process and the controversies behind the effectiveness of a climate
change Bill also form a barrier to introducing domestic laws to tackling climate change. In
this case, we can therefore say the barriers have rendered the legal mechanisms to be less
effective.

It has now been clearly ascertained that climate change is a concern in the global
community with the United Nations introducing an international treaty that attempted to
put forward an agreement between many nations on tackling climate change. It is also
ascertained in steps taken by some individual nations in order to further increase the
effectiveness on its international agreements on climate change, for example, adopting
schemes to adapt to a nation’s particular climate. This is evident in Australia in its proposal
of an emission trading scheme. Clearly, however, that the legal mechanisms currently are
not adequately effective, as witnessed in Mr. Rudd’s delay of the emissions trading scheme
to 2013 and the failure to reach a desired international agreement on tackling climate
change in the Copenhagen summit in 2009. If the legal mechanisms for tackling climate
change are not effective currently, then its effectiveness in the long term is in doubt.
Therefore, the legal mechanisms for tackling climate change, through international and
domestic law, are considerably inadequate.
Bibliography

 Shah, A. February 15 2002, COP3-Kyoto Protocol Climate Conference’, accessed 20 th

April 2010, http://www.globalissues.org/article/183/cop3-kyoto-protocol-climate-
conference

 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, 2010, accessed 20 th April

2010, http://unfccc.int/2860.php