A Climate Accord Based on Global Peer Pressure

导读:秘鲁利马——周日凌晨刚过2点，经过了36个小时的谈判，近200个国家的高层官员终于达成了史上第一个协议，要求每个国家承诺减少导致全球变暖的化石燃料废气的排放。

LIMA, Peru — Shortly before 2 a.m. on Sunday, after more than 36 straight hours of negotiations, top officials from nearly 200 nations agreed to the first deal committing every country in the world to reducing the fossil fuel emissions that cause global warming.
In its structure, the deal represents a breakthrough in the two-decade effort to forge a significant global pact to fight climate change. The Lima Accord, as it is known, is the first time that all nations — rich and poor — have agreed to cut back on the burning oil, gas and coal.

秘鲁利马——周日凌晨刚过2点，经过了36个小时的谈判，近200个国家的高层官员终于达成了史上第一个协议，要求每个国家承诺减少导致全球变暖的化石燃料废气的排放。

这个协议的框架代表了20年来寻求建立应对气候变化的国际共识的努力取得了突破。《利马协议》是所有国家——无论穷富——第一次同意都减少石油、天然气和煤炭的消耗。

But the driving force behind the new deal was not the threat of sanctions or other legal consequences. It was global peer pressure. And over the coming months, it will start to become evident whether the scrutiny of the rest of the world is enough to pressure world leaders to push through new global warming laws from New Delhi to Moscow or if, as a political force, international reproach is impotent.

The strength of the accord — the fact that it includes pledges by every country to put forward a plan to reduce emissions at home — is also its greatest weakness. In order to get every country to agree to the deal, including the United States, the world’s largest historic carbon polluter, the Lima Accord does not include legally binding requirements that countries cut their emissions by any particular amount.

但是，新协议背后的动力不是制裁或其他法律后果，而是国际压力。国际社会的批评是否能产生足够的压力，促使从新德里到莫斯科的国家领导人通过新的气候立法，还是最终被证明只是一种软弱的政治压力，接下来的几个月就会见分晓。

这份协议的优点——每个国家都做出了关于国内减排的承诺——也是它最大的弱点。为了让所有国家都同意，包括美国这个历史上最大的碳排放国，《利马协议》没有包含任何具有法律约束力的条款，要求各国必须把排放减少多少。

Instead, each nation will agree to enact domestic laws to reduce carbon emissions and put forth a plan by March 31 laying out how much each one will cut after 2020 and what domestic policies it will pass to achieve the cuts.

Countries that miss the March deadline will be expected to put forth their plans by June. The plans from every country, known within the United Nations as “Intended Nationally Determined Contributions,” will form the basis of a sweeping new deal to be signed in Paris in 2015.

各国只是同意各自执行本国的法律去减少碳排放，并将在3月31日之前提出一个关于它们打算在2020年之后减少多少排放的计划，以及它们将制定怎样的国内政策去保证目标的实现。

到3月份不能提交计划的国家可以推迟到6月。这些在联合国被称为“预期自主气候贡献”的国家计划将构成2015年在巴黎签署一揽子气候协议的基础。

By asking countries to put forward plans dictated by their own economies and domestic politics, rather than a top-down mandate, the Lima Accord helped secure the agreement of every nation to some kind of carbon-cutting action, experts say.

But with no language requiring the significant cuts scientists say are needed to stave off the costly effects of global warming, countries can put forth weak plans that amount to little more than business as usual. Countries can even choose to ignore the deal and submit no plan at all.

专家认为，通过允许各国根据自己的经济情况与国内政策制定计划，而不是形成一个自上而下的决议，《利马协议》实现了国际共识，各国都同意做出某种碳减排的行动。

但是，因为没有强制性条文，要求各国做出科学家认为足以避免灾难性全球面暖的减排幅度，各国很可能只会拟定一个弱计划，现状难有实质性改变。它们甚至可以无视这个协议，根本不提交计划。

“If a country doesn’t submit a plan, there will be no punishment, no fine, no black U.N. helicopters showing up,” said Jennifer Morgan, an expert on climate negotiations with the World Resources Institute, a research organization.

Instead the architects of the plan, including top White House officials, hope that the agreement will compel countries to act to avoid international condemnation.

“如果各国不提交计划，也不会有惩罚措施，没有罚款，联合国也不会派出黑色直升机找你，”研究机构世界资源研究院的气候谈判专家詹妮弗·摩根(Jennifer Morgan)说。

事实上，这个计划的制定者，包括白宫高级官员，正是希望《利马协议》能迫使各国为了避免受到国际谴责而开始行动。

“It relies on a lot of peer pressure,” Ms. Morgan said. The structure of the deal is what political scientists often call a “name-and-shame” plan.

Under the Lima Accord all countries must submit plans that would be posted on a United Nations website and made available to the public.

“很大程度上靠的是国际压力，”摩根说。

协议的框架是政治科学家所说的“点名批评”法。

根据《利马协议》，所有国家都必须提交计划，这些计划将在联合国网站上公布，对公众开放访问。

A requirement that all countries submit plans using identical metrics, for easy comparison, was deleted from the accord because of the objection of developing nations.

“What’s essential for naming and shaming is that the individual contributions be comparable,” said Robert Stavins, a professor of Environmental Economics at Harvard University.

一条要求所有国家用相同标准制定计划便于比较的条款被从协议中删除了，因为发展中国家反对。

“点名批评的关键在于各国提交的计划需要有可比性，”哈佛大学环境经济学教授罗伯特·斯塔文(Robert Stavins)说。

But already, a number of research groups and universities expect to crunch the numbers of the plans, producing apples-to-apples assessments. The hope, negotiators said, is that as the numbers and commitments of each country are publicized, compared and discussed, countries will be shamed by the spotlight into proposing and enacting stronger plans.

但许多团体和大学已经做好了准备，它们将对各国提交的计划做数据分析，生成具有可比性的分析结果。谈判者说，他们希望各国的数据和承诺被公开、对比和讨论之后，一些国家会被放在聚光灯下，当众丢脸，从而促使它们制定并执行更强有力的计划。

“We see the sunlight as one of the most important parts of this,” said Todd D. Stern, the senior climate-change negotiator for President Obama.

The motivations of the world leaders and whether they care about those assessments are essential to the success of the deal.

“我们认为，暴露在阳光下是这份协议最重要的部分，”奥巴马总统的高级气候变化谈判代表陶德·D·斯特恩(Todd D. Stern)说。

各国领导人的动机和他们是否在乎国际社会的对比分析，是协议能否奏效的关键。

Mr. Obama wants to sign on to the plan because he sees his role in fighting climate change as a cornerstone of his legacy, both he and his advisers say. But whether the United States will follow through on his commitment depends on whether his successors and fellow politicians feel the same.

奥巴马有意愿签署协议，因为据他本人和总统顾问说，他把自己在应对气候变化中发挥的作用视为自己政治遗产的基石。但美国能否履行他做出的承诺，取决于他的继任者和政府同僚是否也这么想。

The president has pledged that the United States will cut emissions by as much as 28 percent by 2025. The nation can achieve some of that under new regulations of tailpipe and power plant emissions enacted by his administration.

But further laws or regulations, enacted after Mr. Obama leaves office, must be put in place for the United States to meet its pledge, experts say. Most in the emerging field of Republican presidential contenders have come out fiercely against Mr. Obama’s domestic climate-change policies, and they may not be swayed by international scorn if the United States does not follow through on its Lima pledge.

美国已经承诺到2025年减少28%的排放。借助奥巴马政府已经执行的有关汽车尾气和发电厂排放的新法规，美国可以部分做到。

但专家说，美国要想兑现承诺，需要在奥巴马离任之后继续有新法规出台。多数有总统竞争力的共和党政客已经强烈反对奥巴马的国内气候政策，到时候，即使美国不履行利马承诺，他们可能也不会在乎国际社会的谴责。

There is much speculation about how India, the world’s third largest carbon polluter, will respond. Prime Minister Narendra Modi has declared repeatedly that his top priority is economic growth and lifting people out of poverty, even if that means the construction of hundreds of new coal-fired power plants to deliver cheap electricity. Mr. Modi is also seen wanting to resist being viewed as caving in to pressure from Mr. Obama.

世界第三大碳排放国印度将如何反应，有很多猜测。印度总理纳伦德拉·莫迪(Narendra Modi)已经多次强调他的首要任务是经济增长和扶贫，即使那意味着建造更多火力发电厂，输送廉价的电能。莫迪看起来也不希望给人留下屈服于奥巴马压力的印象。

In New Delhi, critics have already begun pushing back against the deal.
“The burden of tackling climate change will decisively shift to developing countries, making their efforts toward poverty reduction and sustainable development difficult and expensive,” said Sunita Narain, director of the Centre of Science and Environment, an Indian advocacy group.

在新德里，批评者已经开始反对《利马协议》了。

“应对气候变化的重担将毫无疑问地转移给发展中国家，让它们减贫和可持续发展的工作变得更困难，成本也更高，”印度倡导组织科学与环境中心主任苏尼塔·那雷恩(Sunita Narain)说。

However, India’s environment minister, Prakash Javadekar, noted last week in Lima that climate change has already affected his nation, and that his government intends to submit a plan by June that would show how India would lower the rate at which it produces pollution.

Observers are also closely watching Russia, the world’s fifth-largest polluter, for its response to the plan. President Vladimir V. Putin has publicly scoffed at the science of human-caused climate change and shown a willingness to defy international opinion. But this week in Lima, Russian delegates said that Moscow is at work on an emissions reduction plan.

但印度环境部长普拉卡什·雅瓦德卡尔(Prakash Javadekar)上周在利马说，气候变化已经影响到印度，他的政府准备在6月前提交计划，阐述将怎讲降低制造污染的速度。

观察人士也在密切注意俄罗斯，世界第五大污染国，看它将怎样应对。普京总统曾公开对人为原因造成气候变化的科学结论表示不屑，也表现出愿意抵制国际观念。

但本周在利马，俄罗斯代表称莫斯科正在制定减排计划。

来源:互联网爱语吧作者:互联网