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Climate Change and the UN Security Council: Bully Pulpit or Bull in a China Shop?

  • Ken Conca
  • Joe Thwaites
  • Goueun Lee
Global Environmental Politics Vol 17 Issue 2

Whether the Council should address climate change is a highly politicized question, tied to controversies about the Council’s mandate, membership reform, and the appropriate division of labour in the UN system. Lost in this political debate has been a more fundamental question—what exactly could the Council do?

The research paper examines six specific proposals for Council action culled from the academic and policy literature and the public positions of member states. These include

1.     incorporating climate risks into peacekeeping operations,

2.     developing an early-warning system,

3.     managing the threat to small-island states,

4.     engaging in preventive diplomacy,

5.     addressing climate refugees,

6.     and embracing a climate-related analogy to the norm of a responsibility to protect.

For each proposal, the authors examine what it would mean and require for the Council to act, and identify steps to use climate as part of a larger transformation toward a better Council.

Download the article here.

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