AOSIS achievements in UNFCCC negotiations

The appointment of AOSIS’s first Chairman, Robert van Lierop, to the Intergovern-mental Negotiating Committee’s Bureau³⁵ represented an early recognition of the voice of AOSIS during the formation of the UNFCCC negotiations. This afforded AOSIS an ideal opportunity to shape the agenda and, to a certain extent, to influence the outcome of negotiations leading to the UNFCCC. AOSIS achieved this by combining as a negotiating bloc to ensure effective participation within the negotia-tions and by adopting 12 specific objectives.³⁶ AOSIS was successful in ensuring that most of its 12 objectives were included within the Convention, including:

lead to social cohesion and less likelihood of violent political or social conflict, leading to more social and political resilience than other developing countries in the face of adversity.

32 See Jon Barnett, ‘Titanic States? Impacts andRresponses to Climate Change in the Pacific Islands’, 59 Journal of International Affairs (2005) 203–219 at 207.

33 W. Jackson Davis, ‘The Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS): The International Conscience’, 2 Asia-Pacific Magazine (1996) 17–22 at 18.

34 Daniel Brindis, ‘What Next for the Alliance’, supra note 29, at 1.

35 Chasek, ‘Margins of Power’, supra note 3, at 132.

36 Ashe, ‘The Role of the Alliance’, supra note 20, at 212.

• a preambular reference to the particular problems and special needs of SIDS;

• an indirect reference to SIDS within the Convention by the inclusion of the special needs of vulnerable countries in Art. 3(2);

• inclusion of the precautionary principle in Art. 3(3);

• inclusion of the goal of stabilization of greenhouse gases (GHGs) in Art. 4(2) (although a reference to ‘immediate and significant cuts’ in GHGs was not in-cluded); and

• references to a funding mechanism and institutional mechanisms of the Confer-ence of Parties (including a secretariat and a subsidiary body for sciConfer-ence and technology).³⁷

AOSIS was not, however, successful in securing specific commitments for emissions reductions within the Convention itself, or a reference to the ‘polluter pays’ principle.³⁸ Building on its relative success with the Convention, AOSIS called for an immediate start to negotiations on a new Protocol to include binding emissions reductions.

AOSIS put forward a draft Protocol to facilitate negotiations as early as 1994;³⁹ the 1997 Kyoto Protocol⁴⁰ being based upon the initial AOSIS draft.⁴¹ However, the 20 per cent emissions reduction target proposed by AOSIS was not adopted, and much weaker emissions reductions replaced it within the Kyoto Protocol, marking a failure for AOSIS on one of its most important objectives.⁴² The failure to agree strong mitigation action, primarily because of economic concerns, has continued to plague the negotiations, leading some authors to argue that the shift from the pre-dominance of environmental to economic concerns within the negotiations repre-sents a decline in influence of the AOSIS coalition.⁴³

37 For a detailed analysis of the achievement of the AOSIS objectives, see Ashe, ‘The Role of the Alliance’, supra note 20, at 211–215.

38 The ‘polluter pays’ principle broadly states that the person responsible for the pollution should be required to bear the costs of such pollution. However, it is debatable whether this has, in fact, crystallized into a principle of customary international environmental law, mainly because the extent of the costs which would be applicable remains unclear. For more information on the principle see, for instance, Philippe Sands, Principles of International Environmental Law (Cambridge University Press, 2007) 279–285.

39 Farhana Yamin and Joanna Depledge, The International Climate Change Regime. A Guide to Rules, Institu-tions and Procedures (Cambridge University Press, 2004) at 38.

40 Kyoto Protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Kyoto, 11 December 1997, in force 16 February 2005, 37 International Legal Materials (1998) 22.

41 See Betzold ‘Borrowing Power’, supra note 23, at 7. AOSIS was also instrumental in the establishment of the Clean Development Mechanism to fund adaptation activities. The Clean Development Mechanism allows industrialized countries to earn certified emission reduction (CER) credits which they can use to meet their emissions targets under the Kyoto Protocol. CERs are earned by industrialized countries invest-ing in emission-reduction projects in developinvest-ing countries. Two per cent of the value of the CERs issued is levied and invested in the Adaptation Fund. For more information on the CDM mechanism, see

<http://cdm.unfccc.int>.

42 Betzold ‘Borrowing Power’, supra note 23, at 7.

43 See Alexander Gillespie, ‘Small Island States in the Face of Climatic Change: The End of the Line in In-ternational Environmental Responsibility’ 22 UCLA Journal of Environmental Law & Policy (2003–2004) 107–129 at 128–129.

Particularly during the period of 1990–1997, and even today, AOSIS can be consid-ered a major player in the climate change regime. Its members have regularly been invited to chair negotiation groups, with Ambassador John Ashe from Antigua acting as Chair of the Ad Hoc Working Group on Further Commitments for Annex I par-ties under the Kyoto Protocol (AWG-KP) group since 2009. This represents a meas-ure of confidence in the individual negotiators themselves, who have managed to demonstrate strong capabilities within the negotiations, which is remarkable given the traditional negotiating constraints of small countries.⁴⁴ Although a member of the G-77, AOSIS has adopted an independent position within the negotiations by calling for not only deep emissions cuts by Annex I parties, but for formal emissions cuts by developing countries as well.⁴⁵ By circumventing traditional and competitive negotiating positions, and symmetric power relations which can arguably lead to deadlock,⁴⁶ AOSIS has managed to build a respected reputation within the nego-tiations.

AOSIS’s success has been attributed to its sense of unity, leadership and the emerging consciousness within the international community of the importance of its cause.⁴⁷ AOSIS has also benefited from the multilateral process itself. Drumbl argues that the inclusive nature of the multilateral process provides, in some part, a sense of coop-eration, as nations whose contributions are minimal may benefit from the agreement of larger developing countries such as Brazil, India and China, to less favorable terms than they might in bilateral negotiations.⁴⁸ Zartman argues that asymmetric power relations within negotiations often lead to more mutually satisfactory outcomes than expected.⁴⁹ In addition, AOSIS has successfully employed a number of negotiation strategies.

Carola Betzold identifies four strategies employed by AOSIS during 1990–1997 which has allowed it to ‘borrow power’ in order to influence the negotiations.⁵⁰ Employing a discourse of vulnerability as part of a context-based strategy, AOSIS appealed to principles and morality, presenting their member states as ‘innocent

44 For a consideration of such constraints, and ways in which they might be overcome, see Elizabeth Mrema and Kilaparti Ramakrishna, ‘The Importance of Alliances, Groups and Partnerships in International Environmental Negotiations’, in Tuula Honkonen and Ed Cozens (eds), International Environmental Law-making and Diplomacy Review 2009, University of Eastern Finland – UNEP Course Series 9 (Uni-versity of Eastern Finland, 2010) 183–192.

45 See Slade, ‘The Making of’, supra note 5, at 541.

46 William William Zartman, ‘The Structuralist Dilemma in Negotiation’ (Research Group in Interna-tional Security, 1997), available at <http://id.cdint.org/content/documents/The_Structuralist_Dilemma_

in_Negotiation.pdf> (visited 6 April 2011) at 7.

47 Jackson Davis, ‘The Alliance of Small Island States’, supra note 33, at 19–20.

48 Mark A. Drumbl, ‘Northern Economic Obligation, Southern Moral Entitlement, and International Environmental Governance’ 27 Columbia Journal of Environmental Law (2002) 363–380 at 373.

49 William Zartman ‘The Structuralist Dilemma’, supra note 46, at 7. Zartman at 3 describes a new concept of power as action by one party intended to produce movement by another, so power is no longer defined by components (i.e. the control of resources) or by the result of negotiations, but as a purposeful action.

50 Betzold, ‘Borrowing Power’, supra note 23, at 1.

victims’⁵¹ of the actions of other negotiation participants. AOSIS sought also to isolate obstructionist members and build coalitions with more progressive partici-pants, such as the European Union, in a target based strategy.⁵² This strategy enjoyed limited success, as short-term cost concerns from the majority of industrialized coun-tries outweighed the long-term benefits of deep emissions cuts. Bertzold points to a third strategy; of third party based support which AOSIS embraced in accepting both scientific and lobbying support.⁵³ Slade argues that this openness to third party as-sistance is characteristic of SIDS, displaying ‘pragmatism and reasonableness, prefer-ring consensus building to obstruction and confrontation’.⁵⁴ NGO support has been particularly useful for enhancing the coalition’s impact within UNFCCC negotia-tions.⁵⁵ Finally, Bertzold argues that AOSIS employed process based strategies, or

‘learning to play the game’ strategies.⁵⁶ For example AOSIS gained first-mover ad-vantage by putting forward a draft Kyoto Protocol early on in negotiations, as this draft eventually formed the basis of the Kyoto Protocol.⁵⁷

Beyond the period 1990–1997, one may argue that AOSIS is still enjoying substan-tial influence on the course of negotiations. In Cancún, AOSIS was successful in establishing a contact group to discuss a new draft legal form of the outcome from the long-term cooperative action (LCA) negotiations, including a new work pro-gramme on Loss and Damage, and the establishment of an Adaptation Committee within the COP16 decision.⁵⁸ There were also institutional and process successes by a reference to the prioritization of funding for SIDS in the new fast start finance fund, and representation of SIDS on the Board and transitional committee for the new green climate fund.⁵⁹ However, the most important AOSIS goals⁶⁰ have not found significant enough traction within the negotiations in recent years to be in-cluded as firm commitments in COP decisions, although both the Copenhagen Accord⁶¹ and the Cancún COP16 decision do include a review of the long-term 2 degree Celsius goal in 2015. The COP16 decision states that the 2015 review will

51 Ibid. at 6.

52 Ibid. at 7.

53 Ibid. at 8. Of particular note is the support provided by the NGO Foundation of International Environ-mental Law and Development (or FIELD).

54 Slade ‘The Making’, supra note 5, at 534. This openness has arguably also earned AOSIS a measure of resentment among G-77 partners, who may be suspicious of outside influence.

55 See Yamin and Depledge, The International Climate Change Regime, supra note 39, at 38.

56 Bertzold, ‘Borrowing Power’, supra note 23, at 9.

57 Ibid. at 9.

58 ‘Outcome of the work of the Ad Hoc Working Group on long-term Cooperative Action under the Con-vention’, COP Draft decision -/CP.16, available at <http://unfccc.int/files/meetings/cop_16/application/

pdf/cop16_lca.pdf> (visited 22 June 2011).

59 Ibid.

60 In particular, a limit of global average surface temperature increases to well below 1.5 degree Celsius from preindustrial levels, global CO₂ reductions of 45 per cent by 2020 and by 95 per cent from 1990 levels by 2050, and the peaking of global GHG emissions by 2015 in a legally binding agreement.

61 Decision 2/CP.15 ‘Copenhagen Accord’, in Report of the Conference of the Parties on its 15th sess., UN Doc. FCCC/CP/2009/11/Add.1 (2010), Addendum.

consider strengthening the long-term goal on the basis of the best available scien-tific knowledge, including in relation to the 1.5 degree Celsius goal.⁶²

However, there is a general reluctance among industrialized countries to commit to deep emissions reductions unless all major economies do the same,⁶³ and this dead-lock within the negotiations continues to leave AOSIS negotiators in a difficult, and often frustrating, position. It is surprising, then, that most AOSIS negotiators appear to be satisfied with the progress the coalition has made to date, although it is clear that many of the negotiators consider that various capacity constraints hamper their negotiating positions.