| 英文摘要: | Some countries have pledged to become carbon neutral, while others' emissions continue to rise. Differences in their political attributes could explain the discrepancy in ambitions. Countries will come together this December for the latest round of international climate negotiations in Paris. But countries' ambitions are likely to vary widely. So, why are some nations more willing to commit to larger emissions reductions than others? That question is the subject of a recent article by Julia Flagg in Environmental Sociology1, where she examines why nine nations have pledged to be carbon neutral. Flagg argues that political alliance building has been integral to the emergence of the carbon-neutral pledges. She says pledge states have better governance scores, more environmental non-governmental organizations, smaller populations and lower income inequality. These conditions, she argues, facilitate greater collective action. Using world society theory, particularly the work of Meyer and colleagues2, Flagg explains how states have been embedded in a global culture where a script or blueprint of how they should act on the global stage has been created. These states are reluctant to diverge from this script and adhere to particular norms, such as the need for environmental protection, with other states creating a check through international political pressure. Hence, there can be a spill-over effect of other nations adopting similar pledges. Such pledges can have their provenance in the global south — interesting, given that international climate governance under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) has been historically dominated by the global north. World systems theory, using the ideas of Wallerstein3, argues that nations' actions are a reflection of their position in the world economy. This hinders action being catalysed by the global south because such countries would blame the global north for emitting the most and causing the problem in the first place. Hence, only developed economy states might be expected to adopt carbon-neutral pledges. But this has not been the case. Flagg says this is because these two theories do not explain local actions in individual countries. Rather, state-in-society theory explains how local actions can shape domestic policy, which then has an influence on how states act on the international stage. Flagg arrives at four hypotheses regarding pledge and non-pledge states, summarized in Box 1.
Box 1: Flagg's attributes of carbon-neutral pledge and non-pledge states.
- States dependent on extractive industries are less likely to make carbon-neutral pledges.
- States dependent on industries such as tourism are more likely to make carbon-neutral pledges.
- Corrupt states led by small elites tend to ignore public good and so are less likely to make carbon-neutral pledges.
- More environmental non-governmental organizations would result in greater access to elite decision-makers making it more likely that the state will make a carbon-neutral pledge.
- Flagg, J. A. Environ. Sociol. 1, 202–212 (2015).
- Meyer, J. W. et al. Int. Organ. 51, 623–651 (1997).
- Wallerstein, I. M. World-Systems Analysis: An Introduction 23–30 (Duke Univ. Press, 2004).
- Biermann, F. et al. Science 335, 1306–1307 (2012).
- Falkner, R., Stephan, H. & Vogler, J. Glob. Policy 1, 252–262 (2010).
- Mantyka-Pringle, C. & Kythreotis, A. P. Nature 514, 567 (2014).
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- Petherick, A. Nature Clim. Change 4, 81–83 (2014).
- Kythreotis, A. P. Prog. Hum. Geog. 36, 457–474 (2012).
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Affiliations
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Andrew Kythreotis is at the School of Planning and Geography, Cardiff University, Glamorgan Building, King Edward VII Avenue, Cardiff CF10 3WA, UK
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