304: From Outrage to Action: Your Questions, Our Answers
Christiana Figueres, Paul Dickinson and guest host Fiona McRaith respond to thought-provoking questions from listeners around the world.
About this episode
We’re handing the mic over to you on this week’s Outrage + Optimism: The Climate Podcast.
In this special Q&A episode, Christiana Figueres, Paul Dickinson and guest host Fiona McRaith (Director of The Climate Pledge at Global Optimism) respond to thought-provoking questions from listeners around the world.
They consider the future of the COP model, whether the Pacific concept of vā may offer a better way to think about our local and global relationships, what a multipolar world might mean for climate diplomacy, and much more. Plus, friend of the show Nigel Topping (Founder of Ambition Loop, and former UN Climate Change High-Level Champion at COP26) helps to explain why UK electricity prices are tied to gas - and how we can fix it.
From the philosophical to the highly practical, this episode is a wide-ranging conversation about where climate progress is stalling, where it’s surging forward, and how global cooperation might evolve in the years ahead.
Learn more
Listen back to some of our episodes that are referenced in this Q&A, including:
⏳ Momentum vs Perfection, where Fiona joins Tom to explore different theories of change within the climate movement.
✊🏽 The Climate Case of the Century: Inside the story of a youth-led legal movement, where Cynthia Houniuhi shares her story of how the landmark ICJ case came to be.
🌿 Sovereignty and Survival: A Spotlight on Vanuatu, where Christiana reports back on her time in the South Pacific.
🤝 COP30: Can Brazil deliver a global breakthrough?, where Tom brings back the latest news from Belém, and the team considers whether COP30 can become a genuine moment of diplomatic progress.
🌎 Other episodes exploring the shifting geopolitics of climate, including our deep dives on China, Australia and Canada
🎤 Leave us your voice notes and questions for upcoming episodes on SpeakPipe
Follow us on social media for behind the scenes moments and to watch our videos:
Instagram @outrageoptimism
LinkedIn @outrageoptimism
Or get in touch with us via this form.
Producer: Ben Weaver-Hincks
Video Producer: Caitlin Hanrahan
Additional production: Miriam Hall
Exec Producer: Ellie Clifford
Commissioning Editor: Sarah Thomas
This is a Persephonica production for Global Optimism and is part of the Acast Creator Network.
Full Transcript
Paul: [00:00:02] Hello and welcome to Outrage and Optimism. I'm Paul Dickinson.
Christiana: [00:00:05] I'm Christiana Figueres and da da da da da da da da.
Paul: [00:00:10] Da da da.
Christiana: [00:00:10] We have a fantastic guest co-host with us today who hopefully listeners will recognize her voice. It is a she. She has been a co-host on our podcast. In fact, she's been the co-host of the most popular.
Paul: [00:00:28] Successful.
Christiana: [00:00:29] Series.
Paul: [00:00:30] By a whisker, by the way.
Christiana: [00:00:32] Oh yeah, by a whisker. So who has guessed that we have the one and only Fiona McRaith?
Fi McRaith: [00:00:38] Hello, everyone. It's great to be back.
Paul: [00:00:41] How are you doing?
Fi McRaith: [00:00:41] I'm doing great. How are you both?
Christiana: [00:00:43] We're doing well. We're a little bit sad not to have Tom.
Paul: [00:00:46] Yeah. Where's Tom?
Christiana: [00:00:48] However, it is wonderful that that means that we get. You feel fantastic.
Paul: [00:00:53] Indeed. And we've got a fantastic show of the most amazing listener questions. I'm really looking forward to getting to what I think was going to be a very exciting and interesting discussion.
Christiana: [00:01:02] Thanks to you, listeners, we've had so many questions and such interesting questions that we actually decided to devote two episodes to answer questions and look forward to more questions.
Paul: [00:01:15] I mean, it's like a real deep dive because we go quite into some of these questions in some considerable detail, and I think it's a fascinating discussion. And there are even a few that we couldn't answer ourselves. I mean, I would have given a bit of myself, but but but Christiana had the great idea. We're going to phone a friend, so we're going to bring some real experts also in to answer some technical questions where we haven't got the skill. I just want to acknowledge the extraordinarily tragic, very sad, very moving loss of life in Texas from the flooding, you know, innocent children. It's absolutely heartbreaking. But I know that we've all seen it on our screens. And I hope that, you know, the message that Mother Nature has this extraordinary power will be heard and understood, because this kind of weather event is entirely consistent with what we would expect from a warming world.
Christiana: [00:02:00] Every time that I see something like this, my thought is always, how many more of these is it going to take? The heat dome in Europe.
Paul: [00:02:10] Which is serious.
Christiana: [00:02:11] Very serious. Serious. This flooding event in Texas is serious. How many more of these extreme weather events is it going to take before we wake up and go like thus far, no farther. We have to wake up, but somehow we don't.
Paul: [00:02:31] Let me invite you to see if I can pick on you for a moment. You've been living in the United States of America for the last ten years. Do you have a sense of why? Extreme weather? I mean, it's a question of it in any country, but why extreme weather doesn't cut through into a kind of narrative like we must do something about climate change.
Fi McRaith: [00:02:45] Yeah, it's a great question. Not only was I living in the United States for the past ten years, I was born and raised in the United States for my life, but I did just recently move. I have, as you ask me this. What came to mind immediately was the LA fires at the beginning of this year, which were so horrific. Hard to fathom the the speed and scale of that tragedy unfolding in a city as we're glued to our screens. I know Cristiana, your daughter lives there, and so many friends and loved ones that we have and many others have lived there, and it it fades away so quickly, I think news cycle and social media and and phones and just the pace of how we consume media shifts, the the poignancy of things, that and how long they stick with us and how much they root in us and we digest them and are motivated towards action. I will also say that the United States is a vast, large country, and you can be living in Texas, in the state of Texas, where these these floods happen and not be experiencing that. And in fact, your reality might be incredibly hot or a perfectly beautiful sunny day. And I think reconciling that. And I think you see small island states, for example, really feel the reality of climate impacts on their lives in just a completely different way, in part because there's so much geographically smaller and thus also different types of tight knit communities. It's it's just hard until you're experiencing it. And my hope and plea would be that not everyone has to experience it for change to happen.
Christiana: [00:04:21] I think you're absolutely right into that, I would agree. The fact that our attention span has contracted so dramatically, and so we see this news being reported and we even look at the videos and we go, okay, that's happening next. Yeah. And we scroll or we change or the channel or whatever, and we don't pause to take in the news and ask ourselves why? And should we be doing any of this? It's just taken as a piece of news and one ready for the next piece of news of, you know, what celebrity wore, what dress and what event. Yes, and it's just not the same importance of news.
Fi McRaith: [00:05:03] Also to that. And I know we'll come to this in this episode, but bearing witness is hard. And it it is a grief and agony to really sit with the terrors of the world and the atrocities and the loss of innocent lives, the suffering. And it's even harder when you don't know what to do, like, without something to be done in, in your own life that feels in some way kind of chipping away at that what the terror is unfolding, it's even harder. It's even more tempting to just keep scrolling or to look at something that, you know, a celebrity's dress or something, whatever, whatever it is. Right. And, um, I think that is a question I know that we'll get to in this episode about what can what can individuals be doing?
Paul: [00:05:53] I mean, I can tell you one thing that, you know, the people who do pay attention to this because it's their job to do so are insurers. And what insurers do say, oh, well, we're going to reprice those kinds of risks. And where everyone is going to get the information is when they start to see the values of properties falling because of the the increasing insurance cost. And that's going to be a message for millions, hundreds of millions of people across the world. And you're not going to be able to skip to something else in the headlines when your property starts becoming less and less valuable, because that's the central part of most people's concept of wealth.
Christiana: [00:06:27] Anyway, I am brought to the terrifying memory that I have that was etched into my brain, my heart, and my gut. Just before the Paris Agreement, I had quite a few conversations with the insurance industry, and one of the statements that one of them made, one of the CEOs, was, if we ever get to a two degree world. We will have a world that is systemically uninsurable. Systemically. It doesn't mean we're going to carve out, you know, this area in Florida. That area in Texas, this area? No, it means systemically uninsurable. I don't know that we can just sit for a moment and conceive of a world in which there is no insurance to be had.
Paul: [00:07:21] And that's a world where people are much more nomadic, frankly. But anyway. Well, a shocking note to end this part of our discussion on. Let us now think more broadly about the fact that many of our wonderful listeners have actually come in with some very stimulating questions. And I think I personally most enjoy these episodes because we get a chance to sort of look at this particular challenge and opportunity for many, many different angles. Okay, so let's get into this. And our first question comes from Finnur.
Listener Finn: [00:07:49] Hey, Outrage + Optimism team. My name is Finn and I come from Iceland. My question to you about the road to cop 30 is how you think recent domestic politics developments will impact the negotiations. Because in my experience at the cops, domestic politics shape very heavily the stance that individual countries take and therefore influence coalition building and the potential for higher ambition. So, for example, we've got new climate leaders in Canada and Australia since since the last cop. So how do you think that's going to impact this important cop in Brazil? Thank you.
Fi McRaith: [00:08:25] So thank you for that question. We heard about the question really for me, what I took from that was how do domestic politics influence cops agenda? And as I was listening to your great question, I thought, well, this isn't new. This is how it's always been, both with potentially terrible outcomes. When when domestic politics are in favor of things that continue the climate crisis, like increased fossil fuel extraction, but also perhaps for areas of great hope or areas like loss and damage. But I really love to open this up and hear more from both of you about what you think.
Christiana: [00:09:06] There's so much in this question, so let's just unpack it. One is, can a cop presidency take a particular viewpoint or particular position? My sense is no, because the Cop presidency needs to be neutral and open and really in deep listening mode to every single country. That's the Cop presidency to be differentiated from the hosting government. The government will definitely. And it was true in the UAE. It is certainly true in Brazil. The government is not only entitled, but actually in this case of Brazil, they are taking their particular pro climate view as Brazil, not as cop presidency as Brazil very seriously. And they are using this quite smartly to pursue many other domestic policies that they would like to pursue. Now it's a difficult balance between the government and the Cop president or presidency, but it is an important balance. The other piece that this question evokes is what happens when you're not the presidency? What happens when you're not the host country? What happens with countries like Canada and Australia that now have very pro climate governments, as opposed to what they had before? So what that actually means is, of course, that those countries take that Position, domestic position. They take it to the international arena. So we can expect a Canada that is going to be much more responsible this time. We can expect an Australia that is going to be much more responsible. We also have a question mark of what does this mean for the traditional negotiating groups, because it so happens that Canada and Australia are part of a very, very long standing negotiating group called JUSCANNZ, which has nothing to do with cans of juice.
Paul: [00:11:13] It is the world's longest acronym.
Christiana: [00:11:15] Right? J I'm not sure J you can I don't think that's a.
Speaker5: [00:11:19] Long list of bravery.
Paul: [00:11:21] Just to say, take a juice scan out of what is just a very good what does he stand.
Christiana: [00:11:25] For? So it stands for Japan, the United States, New Zealand, Norway and Canada. And those countries have typically for many, many years negotiated together because traditionally they had similar positions. That is clearly not the case now. Clearly not the case. Because for one thing, the United States, as we know, has exited the Paris Agreement, so they will not be there as a party. They will be there if they come as an observer. They will have a very different role. They cannot participate actively in decision making. They can ask for the floor as an observer, but it's a pretty demoted status if you're there as an observer rather than as a party. And so the question is, you know, what happens? What happens to juice cans? Well, juice, these juice cans, um, will not be able to negotiate as a group. And one can expect actually governments to step out. I think of their traditional negotiating groups and gravitate more toward coalitions of like minded countries. And wisdom says that you never negotiate individually. You always want friends and allies to negotiate with you. So it's going to be very interesting to see Canada and Australia. Will they negotiate together? Will they go out and try to find allies and friends that will negotiate with them? All of this in the context of the recognition that there's very little left to negotiate.
Fi McRaith: [00:13:03] Yes.
Paul: [00:13:04] And it's more about the sort of spirit that the nations bring to the discussions and the narrative in the world. Just an observation. You know, Canada is actually a pretty major oil and gas exporter. Australia exports a great deal of coal, but these are really flourishing democracies with advanced, highly technocratic governments that are plentifully aware of climate change and the vulnerabilities of their citizens. And it's their democratic character that I have the greatest hope and belief in. And certainly I've had multiple discussions where kind of decarbonizing the economy and democracy can even be seen to be aligned, notwithstanding the fact that we're getting enormous help from China, which is definitely not a democratic country in the conventional sense, but I really do believe that there's something extremely exciting about thoughtful nations turning their back on the kind of what I'm sorry to say, increasingly, my media tells me, is an authoritarian and increasingly authoritarian USA. And that's the tragedy of, of of, you know, fossil fuels kind of getting into the government.
Fi McRaith: [00:13:58] Just really quickly to double click on something Christiana said, which I had. I must admit, a bit sheepishly, I had not fully appreciated. With the US exiting the Paris Agreement, which is, of course, you know, unfortunate on paper, perhaps that actually means that they have much less ability to be obstacles. I mean, I'm sure you never know behind the scenes, but that is so, so interesting. And I just think a really brilliant point that I hadn't heard, talked about very much.
Christiana: [00:14:28] And let's just remember, this is not the first time that they go through this little adventure, right? Um, they they withdrew in 2017, during Trump's first presidency, the United States still attended the cops as an observer. Yes. And what was what was very interesting is that the presence of the United States was actually much more powerful and much more eloquent and vocal. Through us subnational actors who were there, I just remember, you know, they had the biggest physical presence. The flags were everywhere. I've just never seen subnational actors be as belligerently against their national government. So there were states, cities, businesses, and they were all in under the banner of we're still in totally. They were all there under. We're still in. So we don't know what's going to happen this time. Do we have we're still in part two. We don't know. But it's going to be fun, to say the least, to say.
Fi McRaith: [00:15:30] And to the what we were speaking about with the San Antonio floods, I mean, with that subnational, that is local presence, that is, leaders who have guided their communities through any type, any number of climate extreme weather impacts. So, um, yeah, to see in, um, in Cop.
Paul: [00:15:50] The fourth largest subnational economy in the world is California. I mean, these subnational are bigger than nearly every nation in the world. So when they speak, the world shakes. Okay, let's move on to the next question, which is from Dave.
Listener Dave: [00:16:04] Hi Christiana and Paul. I've been a regular listener to your show since the very start. I love the episode on Vanuatu and I wanted to ask whether you, Christiana, came across the concept of lava when you were on your travels. It's a concept I heard about about eight years ago, and it's really rearranged my brain and translates it something like the space between things. It's a relational way of knowing that, as far as I can understand, it comes in part from the idea in the Pacific nations that the space between the islands. So the ocean is at least as important as the islands themselves. So connections are more important than what is connected. The connections, the space between. That's where knowledge, wisdom, experience, power, energy, resource is so much more. That's where that's held. I'm just wondering if this idea of lleVā to lleVā, the space between the sacred, if it came up in your travels around Vanuatu, and if so, if you think it might have a wider currency in response to climate change. Thanks so much for the show.
Christiana: [00:16:59] Chave. Thank you so much for that question. And absolutely yes, yes, yes, I was introduced to the concept of Vā by the very powerful New Zealand poet Karlo Mila during the Fiji retreat. She actually, if you're interested, she has actually written a treatise about Pacific words and their deeper meaning that I can highly recommend. Command. But this is what I learned from her about the concept of Vā. She explained to me that in the Pacific, many islands, not all of them use the word Vā to denote a relational space. It's not an empty space. It is the space between two entities. It could be the space between two people. It can be the space between two islands. It can be the space between two nations. But it always refers to the space as being the relational bridge between the two. She also explained to me that in the Pacific culture, the health and well-being of people, of communities, of islands is related and directly related to the quality of the Vā, which means the quality of your connection with the land, with the sea, with the sky, with your family, with other people. And I was just so taken by the fact that they have understood what I am still trying to learn, which is that the quality of life is synonymous with the quality of your relationships, and that you have a direct influence on what those relationships are.
Christiana: [00:18:57] So all the many things that I learned in Fiji at the retreat that we were. This is the one that has really stayed with me so much, because it is very adjacent conceptually to the Buddhist concept of inter being, which is the understanding that we're all a part of each other and that we're all a part of the web of life. It is the exact opposite of the zero sum mentality. I win, you lose, you win, I lose. It is the very opposite of competition. It is actually to understand that we're all in this space together. We're all in the energy together. We're all in the planet together. And that it behooves us to ensure that we all work toward a better quality of life. So thank you so much for that question, and thank you for giving me the opportunity to talk a little bit about the Vā.
Paul: [00:19:59] I mean, I think it's the most beautiful concept, and to me, it really speaks of how we should consider the relationships between nations, because there's a beautiful quote talking about us having, you know, 190, whatever it is, different cabins and then on a ship. But there's no kind of captain with her or him deciding where the ship goes. And it's because we don't appreciate the importance of the relationship between ourselves. And there's a lovely little statue somewhere. A sign on a building says to the friendship of the English speaking peoples. It's on the BBC or BBC building, but it should be the friendship of all speaking peoples, should be to the friendship of all life, should be the to the, to the friendship and understanding between us all. Because that's actually the center of this crisis. We're locking ourselves in little economic units and forgetting that we're entirely dependent upon each other in our relationships.
Fi McRaith: [00:20:53] Listening to this beautiful question, I was reminded of the the ceremony that you joined or were a part of, and you talked about cultural synchronicity. And I wonder if Ben or in the show notes, you can of course link to that, but also just playing that that noise again, it is so beautiful the way in which they are relationally, through their voices and through being together, illustrating this concept, still not visible, but so felt also the UN Ocean Notion conference and your conversation with Sylvia Earle and the Blue Marble, representing everything that is relational of where all people live is our ocean, and we are all ocean creatures, and we are one ocean. Our world is one ocean as well. And I, I think this concept is so, so beautiful and one that I'm very happy to be thinking about today.
Christiana: [00:21:52] Yeah, thanks for bringing that up. Because as I learned there in the Pacific, they think of themselves not as being islands separated by the ocean. They think of themselves as being people's joined by the ocean across the ocean. It's a very different concept. Totally, very, very different concept.
Paul: [00:22:10] And if I can quote Sylvia Earle, she also said that in her lifetime, the human population had gone from 2 billion to 9 billion. So we must get better at that interrelation because there are so many more of us to be connected.
Speaker5: [00:22:23] Huh?
Paul: [00:22:24] Okay, you got us thinking there. Thank you. Next question is coming from Giles.
Listener Giles: [00:22:29] Cop after 30 episodes. Seems like a tired, worn out format. It's a crazy process of wordsmithing a document with goodies and baddies and a lot of performance and hassle. Could it be time to reimagine, reinvigorate, and reinvent the format?
Fi McRaith: [00:22:51] Thank you so much for that great question. So is it time to reinvigorate the Cop process, something that is being talked about so much? And I know Christiana has written about this and Will will share some of her thoughts, but something that I was ruminating on hearing this is, you know, the cop process perhaps was created and established to deliver pretty much exactly what it has delivered, which is text and agreements that the parties make together and agree upon together, and then perhaps need a bit more negotiating through subsequent meetings. But it's perhaps not the most effective mechanism to track implementation and to hold accountability and to keep track of what those commitments once were. So it's just perhaps not the right format. So thank you for this question. I have the same one and I'm quite honored.
Speaker5: [00:23:49] To meet you here. Yes that's right. So, Christina. Yes. Yeah.
Christiana: [00:23:53] Well, the fact is that there are many people thinking about this. The Secretariat itself. The Climate Secretariat itself has a process to think about this. And there are many NGOs and I believe even parties thinking about it. So. So we're all in good company. But as you say, the fact is that the design of the Cop that was done by something called the International Negotiating Committee way back in the 90s, the design of the Cop was specifically to support a multilateral negotiation among sovereign national governments to agree on guidelines toward a decarbonised economy. Okay. And form follows function. First, what is the function that we wanted? And I say we because I was there. What is the function that we wanted the cop to perform. And once that was clear, which was a multilateral negotiation to guide the decarbonization, then everything was designed around that. And as you say, we substantially we have actually accomplished that. So we should actually thank the cop process for having delivered slowly snail's pace, but surely having delivered what it was created for. The question then is and now what? Because I have the sense that the progress from here on, or in fact, a couple of years on is no longer to be sought in climate diplomacy, for which the cop was designed, but rather in climate economics, which means the real world.
Christiana: [00:25:31] What is the real world doing? And that is everything that takes place surrounding the cop. Sadly, everything that takes place surrounding the cop, where the financial sector is, the private sector, the NGOs, et cetera, etc. everybody who's really pulling this forward, they are classified as observers to pick up. The first comment that we made. Are they really observers now? They're actually the main actors. And so can we actually recognize the fact that the so-called observers are no longer bystanders, but they're actually today the very engine of transformation, of the transition toward cleaner, safer economies. So the question is not how do we redesign the Cop? For me, the question is how do we give the engines of transformation, the engines of change? Who are the private sector, the NGOs, the finance sector? How do we give them the role and the attention that they have earned? They have earned it because they now are taking the lead. We know the nightmare that we're in in, you know, multilateral diplomacy. Geopolitics is in a nightmare situation. Fine. Let them take care of that. In the meantime, let those who have their hands on the levers of change actually do their work. So I just feel that we are victims of our success, because we did make a very concerted effort to drum up a heck of a lot of media attention for the Cop process, and I am truly grateful for the amount of media attention that we got in the lead up to the Paris Agreement.
Christiana: [00:27:26] But now we're a victims of that success because now the media is obsessed with the comma, the agenda, the, you know, whatever that is, frankly no longer where we should be focusing. And the fact that media and even our attention has still to develop the capacity to embrace the plethora of solutions that are on the table from every single actor from across all sectors. It's just because we have not stepped up into this opportunity. So for me, that's the question now how do we do it and how do we give national governments a I don't know, do we give them an observer status? Do we give them a collaborator status? Maybe it's the collaborator status because it is true that we still need national policies. We still need the development of national policies. But you don't go to the Cop to discuss national policies. You go to the Cop to discuss international agreements. National policies are far behind where they ought to be. So the two points of focus ought to be now national policies that accelerate and deepen decarbonization and the actors who are actually doing it. It is not about multilateral negotiations.
Paul: [00:28:50] Yeah. No, I mean, look, I meant all of that, Christiana, and you know, better than anyone else. And it is this idea that we sort of can look to governments as kind of a Leviathan that's going to kind of sort all of this out. And of course, that's impossible. The governmental process has sort of achieved a global consensus. We now have a process with the NDC and, you know, there are national transition plans. There are corporate transition plans. Just a little thing on the UN. I think it was Dag Hammarskjöld, one of the second secretary general. He sort of said, you know, everything's going to be okay when we stop looking at the United Nations as some kind of weird Picasso abstract drawing, but rather something we made ourselves. And the next phase of us making it ourselves is to have. And you've heard me say this a million times. The policy collaborator. You know that we're now with finance, we're industry, we're corporations, we're NGOs, we're civil society, we're cooperatives, we're regional governments, national governments collaborating to do the right thing.
Fi McRaith: [00:29:42] Yeah, I mean, the UN and all the Bretton Woods institutions are still new. I mean, like, I think it is hard to remind ourselves of that. But when I do and I center myself in that newness, there's an invitation to evolve as the world changes. And the world has changed so much since the 90s, when the function was being determined. And who's to say that it couldn't be Re-evaluated and determined what the function of the UNF triple C, for example, should be. And I hear that many are doing that, but I think that must include deep acknowledgement for where a lot of the work is taking place outside of the international bodies like the UN or even national policies. I mean, to an earlier question, we were talking about the perhaps organic, but the real hard work that's happening at subnational level in the United States, that hasn't stopped. It may look different, it may sound different, it may be quieter. But that hasn't stopped. Nor will that stop. Businesses are still taking action on climate. Again, the context around it has changed, but that doesn't mean that the directionality of work has been impacted. But I do to the question was, could it be time to reimagine, reinvigorate and reinvent the format? And I think what I'm hearing is an astounding yes. And that can look so beyond what we even, you know, the narrow constraints of who is a participant to that process.
Paul: [00:31:16] I did register once the URL United Corporations. I mean, you know, it's you know, we we did an amazing episode about Costa Rica, which has been such an extraordinary leader in these incredible areas in the world. And then I was looking at a Swiss chocolate maker called Nestlé, which economically is actually far larger than Costa Rica, the nation.
Christiana: [00:31:33] Well, it's not difficult to be larger than.
Christiana: [00:31:35] Costa Rica.
Speaker5: [00:31:36] I just want an episode on all the URLs you've registered.
Paul: [00:31:39] There's an awful lot. There's an ambitious miles ahead of kind of the fulfillment of anything useful coming from this, but.
Paul: [00:31:45] I know I'll register the URL only cost a few dollars
Speaker5: [00:31:48] Listeners, make that a question for a future. Yeah, we have the full list. Oh, wow. Okay.
Paul: [00:31:54] Shout out to Diary Manager and manage your diary in an interactive television WAP phone. 100,000 active users in 1999. And I'm still not a billionaire. How about that? And we've got a few more questions we want to go through in this episode. But right now, let's go for a break. Welcome back. Now, let us move on to a question from David. Load More
Listener David: [00:32:16] My name is David. I'm a PhD candidate in climate change law in the Netherlands. Thanks for your program. I listened every week. My question follows the discussion about the ICJ case, the International Court of Justice case. How do you think the UN General Assembly can make the most of this decision? When it comes out in a few weeks, we're told, and particularly. What do you think about this proposal for a UN climate change Council? How could that be helpful? Thanks a lot.
Christiana: [00:32:45] Okay. It seems like our listeners are delivering all the questions that I am excited about. Or at least a few of the questions that I'm very excited about.
Paul: [00:32:55] I mean, you're just phoning up your friends and asking them to phone in questions?
Christiana: [00:33:03] David. So I am also very excited about this question because little did everyone know. But on July 3rd, which is just a few days ago, the Inter-American court. Okay. This is the one for the American continent. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights issued a second a second advisory opinion, and it clarifies the specific obligations of states to address the climate crisis through a human rights lens. It worked its way through all the judges of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, at the request of Chile and Colombia, because one thing that we have learned from the ICJ episode is that because these are courts at the national level, the request has to come from a government. The ICJ received a request from 130 nations. In this case, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights received a request from Chile and Colombia, and it's the first time that that court has explicitly framed climate change as a human rights issue. It had also released an advisory opinion way back in 2017, where it had recognized a right to a healthy environment for everyone. But it didn't exactly on the nose address climate change. It sort of skirted around the issue and it said a right to a healthy environment. This time they have not skirted around the issue. They have said it is a human rights issue for governments to or human rights obligation for governments to protect their citizens from the impacts of climate change because of human rights. That's a huge step forward. It is an advisory opinion.
Christiana: [00:35:02] So those who have listened to the Vāious times we've discussed this. It is not legally binding. But what it does do is it actually helps to build the jurisprudence that we will see coming forward from the ICJ and many others. And the court on the continent of America has actually said the climate crisis does not affect everyone equally in the Americas and globally. Indigenous peoples, Afro descendent communities, rural and fishing populations, women, children, older people, socioeconomically marginalized groups face disproportionate impacts and have zero responsibility. So that is why the injustice is actually being framed as a human right. And it ruled on the specific duties of states to prevent harm and ensure protection of those groups specifically. And it said it's a human rights obligation of states. It is not a political choice. Amen. Is all I can say. Hey, women a women a they? Yes, a they. There you go. So I am so thrilled that this came out now because I'm sure that the ICJ has taken note. There's no way that they're going to I hope, I trust. I pray that they're going to come out with something that is weaker than this. But one has to recognize that one court is on the human rights, right. That's how they're judging it. And the other court is actually on the legal obligations. So there will be a difference in the text and the messaging of the two different advisory opinions. But I don't think they're contradict each other. Yeah. So it's very exciting.
Paul: [00:36:55] I mean, I just love the way that that, uh, you you're always using this word jurisprudence, and I've been looking into it a bit, and it means kind of like the philosophy of law, but it's not a it's not, you know, when you give this very real example of this court, this Inter-American court, it's not an abstract concept. It's a very, very practical concept. And, you know, there's a legal community and there's a government community, and there's these these branches of of governing are woven together and are being woven together better and better. And the idea of a UN climate change council, I think it could provide high level political direction and clarity outside of just UNF policy negotiating. Its very exciting comment on NDCs adequacy. We need to be thinking about new arms of the international system and these courts. And that judgment particularly, I think, is definitely a part of kind of cementing a sensible, sober future reality out of the kind of chaos of resource extraction, without consideration of the implications.
Christiana: [00:37:53] The power of words. I'm taken by the fact that those who are proposing this are proposing a UN climate change council. What does that remind you of in the UN.
Paul: [00:38:02] Security.
Christiana: [00:38:03] Council? There you go. So what they're trying to do is they're trying to say, look, you guys, you have a Security Council that looks at international security, military, etc., etc. climate has come to the point where it is not just an environmental issue, it is a global crisis.
Paul: [00:38:25] 100%.
Christiana: [00:38:25] And they're trying to elevate climate to the level of attention that the Security Council has for war and peace. Yeah. And they're trying to say this is just as much a threat. It has to be treated with the same seriousness as peace and security. And it has to go to the highest level of multilateral diplomacy. Here. We're back. Right. So is it going to go back to multilateral Diplomacy with a council. Or is it going to go into climate economics, the forces of the market, or are we going to have both? Which would be ideal?
Fi McRaith: [00:39:05] Yeah, I think I think both in time. But the process of establishing precedents is so important as we see more and more impacts of climate. And I think one of the things that just to bring it to a very human level, I was listening to both of you speak and thinking a lot about imposter syndrome and self-doubt. And the more that we all across all of our different roles in this ecosystem and all of us working on climate, can surface the precedence for these types of cases, it will help the legal teams working on it make their case stronger, help them doubt themselves less feel. And they are creating whole new fields of law, just as wars of the past have informed the way in which we guide that Security Council and have established what is appropriate or inappropriate or legal or not legal to use more appropriate terms for this discussion. But, you know, I think that is one way that we can also bear witness to the wonderful things coming out of some of these and help service them also internally. You know, I do a lot of work with businesses, and there's questions around how can contracts and clauses that worked in one place be more widely shared, so that within companies you have a simpler route to smart policies through your own internal legal teams. And it's this on a much smaller case, and I think it's just a brilliant way of helping us all learn much more quickly through the collective mind.
Paul: [00:40:41] System change, not climate change
Fi McRaith: [00:40:42] Absolutely.
Christiana: [00:40:44] Okay. We have a question that came in from Julia in the UK via Spotify that I will read, but I actually want to suggest that we call our good friend Nigel Topping on this because this is one of his pet topics, so he's much better placed. So the question is, wouldn't it really help the narrative in the UK if electricity prices were less linked to gas prices? I'd love to hear your opinions on what the barriers to this are and what we can do to push for this change. It feels like it would be so positive. What can we do to accelerate a move in this direction from government?
Paul: [00:41:27] Phone a friend!
Christiana: [00:41:27] Shall we get Nigel in?
Nigel Topping: [00:41:30] So this is a great question. And the fact that in the UK, wholesale electricity prices are set by an auction every half hour, which means that they're set by the marginal cost of gas, because that's the most expensive, much more expensive than the renewable sources. It means that 98% of the time, the cost of electricity in the UK is set by the cost of gas, which is kind of weird. And the reason that's a problem, it's actually twofold. It's a narrative problem. Definitely, because it it's very easy to make the false comparison between the fact that the UK has got ambitious net zero targets and the fact that the UK has uncompetitive, expensive electricity. They're not linked. You know, the drive to renewables is reducing the level of the cost of electricity. It's the it's this historic link to gas prices driving the wholesale cost of electricity, which is the problem. So that that needs to be decoupled somehow. That's quite technical and the government's looking at it. But the bigger problem in a way, is what's called the spark spread, the difference between the electricity price and the gas price. That's also driven by the way that the electricity prices set. And the reason this is a problem is because one of the big bits of the next transition will be the move from using gas to heat homes to using electricity to hit homes, using them much more efficient heat pumps.
Nigel Topping: [00:42:43] They're about 400% efficiency, more than four times as efficient as gas. But right now in the UK, electricity is 24 per unit and gas is six per unit, so it's about 4 to 1. So it's very hard to save money even if the heat pumps four times as efficient. So what the what the government could usefully do and what people are asking the government to change would be rather than getting into all the technicalities, just address that ratio going from 4 to 1 to 2 to 1. So if electricity was £0.16 and gas was £0.08, that would be 2 to 1. Then all the transitions to heat pumps would be very much in the money, and the market would drive that. The government could do that by removing some of the policy burden that it's put on power prices and making it a level playing field by, for example, including a carbon price on the gas that is used to heat homes, as well as on the gas that's used to create electricity that is used to heat homes. At the moment, it's only put on the electricity. It's a bit like a policy designed by somebody who wants to perpetuate gas markets. So great question a need to link it. But you need to address the ratio between electricity and gas prices.
Christiana: [00:43:50] Super. Thanks, Nigel. We brought you in because we know that you have given that a lot of thought.
Paul: [00:43:56] Very good at explaining things, Nigel. Okay. Should we go on to the next question, which is from Lilla?
Listener Lilla: [00:44:02] Hi. Outrage and optimism. I have a question about a multi-polar world that we're living in. So now there are more countries with more equal power distributions than previously, like 20 years ago. So my question is, does that make multilateral agreements easier or harder? So is it easier to sign a treaty or to get to a cop negotiation when the people negotiating them represent countries that have more equal power status? Or does it make it harder? Thank you so much. Also for the podcast. I listen every week and it helps so much to understand what's going on.
Fi McRaith: [00:44:42] Great question. I suppose my question right back and posing to the two co-hosts I have here today, though Tom would have brilliant other co-hosts.
Paul: [00:44:51] Tom is a secret co-host.
Paul: [00:44:53] Which is kind of like part of your, you know, dinner table. Well, today I think i'm sorry.
Fi McRaith: [00:44:57] I suppose I wonder, is power spread more equally today than it was 20 years ago? And or has the center of where power is held? The seat perhaps just shifted, particularly with the US having left. If we're thinking about the UNF, triple C, having left the Paris Agreement, which of course didn't exist. Happy 10th birthday Paris Agreement. Or is it just shifting as the world evolves, as it always has and always will? And I think I want to give an honorary mention, of course, to coalitions of governments that enter negotiating together, which, as Christiana said earlier in answer to another question around when you negotiate, it is much more powerful to go in together. Much wiser. Used a different word that I can't recall. But I think that my take. And then, please, turning it over to my wiser colleagues here.
Christiana: [00:45:53] Hardly.
Fi McRaith: [00:45:53] Hardly is. I think it just looks unfamiliar where power is held right now. Both quietly or loudly. It can appear that it is more equal or more unequal, but in reality is just an unfamiliar era that we are entering after perhaps ten years since 2014 to 2024, for me, felt more like a familiar era of being guided by the Paris Agreement and getting that across the line. And it now feels like we're walking into something that is unknown. The future is always unknown, but it feels much more different. It feels like many things afoot are afoot and shifting quite a lot, but I would really wonder if it is genuinely becoming more equal.
Paul: [00:46:39] Thanks. I think that sets it out, and I would like to just dive in for a moment into what I think are two very, very significantly different definitions of power. And I want to start off describing what I'm going to call soft power. And this is something that, you know, democratic governments like to think that they have pioneered over the years. And the US was was often seen as a very significant hub or pole or leader of soft power. And the idea behind soft power is we build trading relationships, we build security relationships, we increase trade and flow and sharing of kind of technology and ideas, and we have freedom of expression and all the rest of it. And I'm sorry to, to to put a pin in it here, but I think Donald Trump has absolutely killed this idea of soft power. And if I can just quote him, he said in March to the joint session of Congress, of all people, with God's help over the next four years, we are going to lead this nation ever higher, and we're going to forge the freest, most advanced, most dynamic, and most dominant civilization ever to exist on the face of this Earth. I mean, it's kind of ludicrous, overblown rubbish, but it's this notion of dominant power, which I'm afraid is is actually beginning to increase. And I think we should be thinking about how there are exciting opportunities for soft power, the multilateral power, or as the Brazilians might call it, the multiracial power of us coming together for common cause.
Fi McRaith: [00:48:12] Just a response on Trump. I think that might be a, um, peacocking of dominant power, but it's really just loud.
Paul: [00:48:24] Yes. Sorry. I mean, I probably shouldn't give him the weight, but I just I felt he was trying to kill soft power, even though the US in many ways pioneered it.
Fi McRaith: [00:48:33] I would, I would just say, and there are brilliant analysts who study this much more than me, but I would say he wants it to look and he wants to. Again, I'll use the word peacock, but he wants to distract.
Paul: [00:48:47] Yes.
Fi McRaith: [00:48:48] From what soft power might be taking place. Because I guarantee you, and you too have both held more senior positions than I have. I guarantee you there are always conversations quietly happening, regardless of how loud or dominant the person who holds the presidency or highest chair is. There there. There are still teams of governments and staff that are negotiating things, having conversations in their own style that typically you were used. This is my point around unfamiliar territory, like we're used to seeing much more soft, humble power in that seat in the United States, except for the first term. And I say this as an American. There are other nationals across the world who would say, no, we're not. We are not used to that at all. But it is just I think perhaps what is desired is to distract you from what soft power may still exist.
Paul: [00:49:48] In defense of the position of the United States.
Fi McRaith: [00:49:51] That's a generous term for what I just did. I would not want to be defending that statement. I just nuanced it.
Paul: [00:49:59] Christiana has a wry look.
Christiana: [00:50:00] I wanted to come back to your insight of the shift that we're witnessing, and that makes us feel uncomfortable because we're not kind of not used to it. And I think that that is definitely what we're witnessing. And at several levels, I would argue there is evidence, although definitely not a guarantee, that we're seeing a shift of power from the global North to the global South, and that the global South is feeling much more empowered. Much sorry for saying so much wiser than the Global North. Definitely. And that they feel it's it's their turn to figure out what they want to do. I think they are, frankly, fed up with the Global North. Telling them what to do and imposing measures and, you know, policies, whatever that may be good for the global North, but not for the global South. So I think there's a shift from the global north to the global South. I think there's also a shift that has been ongoing, but that is accelerating, especially in the United States, from national governments to sub nationals. Yeah. And we saw that under the first Trump presidency. And we're seeing it now again, and not only in the United States. I think there is much more of a standing up of sub nationals of regions, provinces, cities saying this is our purview, this is what we're going to be doing. I think there's also a shift and maybe maybe that's related to national governance. And subnational is much more of a feeling of bottom up than top down.
Christiana: [00:51:48] I think we were very used to hierarchical structures in power, and somehow it doesn't cut it anymore. So Lila does say that we're seeing a multipolar world, that distribution of power among governments, but also within each country is also something that we're seeing much less tolerance, I would say, now for top down directives than for bottom up initiatives, much less tolerance. And finally, I think the other shift, to use your very good term fee is a shift from public to private. I do think, and we said this before, that the Paris Agreement was sort of the the high point of public power. And it is shifting. It is shifting now to to private and to the logic and the imperatives that private sector can actually bring to bear. As long as the public sector is supportive, not in the conditions in which the public sector is actually on a war path, which it is now, at least at the federal level in the United States. But if the public sector is supportive, collaborative in your terms, then I would say those who are actually pulling the card forward is the private sector. So many shifts at the same time. And and that's why maybe we feel disconcerted because it's not just that we're shifting one thing. It's like a whole bunch of different levels or shifting, and we feel somewhat disconcerted. I think it's great.
Paul: [00:53:31] I mean, just That's a brilliant description. One, one. You know, obvious. State the obvious. A very powerful country diplomatically, is the enormous great nation of China. And it is going to be avidly encouraging people to use renewable energy and electric vehicles, because it is the world's largest manufacturer of renewable energy, very soulless and electric vehicles. And we can see that, you know, it's not just Petro states pushing in one direction. It's the clean economy pulling in another v a visual.
Fi McRaith: [00:53:59] I'm a very visual person. So one of the things that I think about is there's a process that lakes organically take each year, which is when the water and the and the nutrients shift from the bottom to the top. And that is a critical process for the health of the ecosystem. And it results in quite a lot of sediment and sometimes decreased visibility. And, you know, much more is in the water moving around before it re re anchors itself into it settles. And I think I remind myself when I feel unsettled from this, that this is actually a very healthy thing to be going through. Yeah. For our world.
Paul: [00:54:41] To be very, very well made point. Well, there's been an extraordinary conversation absolutely full of, well, just diverse, rich pushing the debate forward. And we're only halfway through the questions.
Christiana: [00:54:51] Right. Yeah. Amazing, amazing. Really, really good to challenge ourselves to think across so many different topics. Thanks to the listener questions. Really fantastic.
Paul: [00:55:05] But I have a question for would you come back next week and do another episode? Would you.
Fi McRaith: [00:55:10] Mm. Only if you use the word brilliant to describe me at least four more times.
Paul: [00:55:14] I think you're absolutely brilliant. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant.
Fi McRaith: [00:55:19] All right, I'm back.
Paul: [00:55:21] Okay, well, that's agreed. We're gonna do it next week. See you then. Bye for now.
Christiana: [00:55:24] Bye bye.
Christiana: [00:32:45] Okay. It seems like our listeners are delivering all the questions that I am excited about. Or at least a few of the questions that I'm very excited about.
Paul: [00:32:55] I mean, you're just phoning up your friends and asking them to phone in questions?
Christiana: [00:33:03] David. So I am also very excited about this question because little did everyone know. But on July 3rd, which is just a few days ago, the Inter-American court. Okay. This is the one for the American continent. The Inter-American Court of Human Rights issued a second a second advisory opinion, and it clarifies the specific obligations of states to address the climate crisis through a human rights lens. It worked its way through all the judges of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, at the request of Chile and Colombia, because one thing that we have learned from the ICJ episode is that because these are courts at the national level, the request has to come from a government. The ICJ received a request from 130 nations. In this case, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights received a request from Chile and Colombia, and it's the first time that that court has explicitly framed climate change as a human rights issue. It had also released an advisory opinion way back in 2017, where it had recognized a right to a healthy environment for everyone. But it didn't exactly on the nose address climate change. It sort of skirted around the issue and it said a right to a healthy environment. This time they have not skirted around the issue. They have said it is a human rights issue for governments to or human rights obligation for governments to protect their citizens from the impacts of climate change because of human rights. That's a huge step forward. It is an advisory opinion.
Christiana: [00:35:02] So those who have listened to the Vāious times we've discussed this. It is not legally binding. But what it does do is it actually helps to build the jurisprudence that we will see coming forward from the ICJ and many others. And the court on the continent of America has actually said the climate crisis does not affect everyone equally in the Americas and globally. Indigenous peoples, Afro descendent communities, rural and fishing populations, women, children, older people, socioeconomically marginalized groups face disproportionate impacts and have zero responsibility. So that is why the injustice is actually being framed as a human right. And it ruled on the specific duties of states to prevent harm and ensure protection of those groups specifically. And it said it's a human rights obligation of states. It is not a political choice. Amen. Is all I can say. Hey, women a women a they? Yes, a they. There you go. So I am so thrilled that this came out now because I'm sure that the ICJ has taken note. There's no way that they're going to I hope, I trust. I pray that they're going to come out with something that is weaker than this. But one has to recognize that one court is on the human rights, right. That's how they're judging it. And the other court is actually on the legal obligations. So there will be a difference in the text and the messaging of the two different advisory opinions. But I don't think they're contradict each other. Yeah. So it's very exciting.
Paul: [00:36:55] I mean, I just love the way that that, uh, you you're always using this word jurisprudence, and I've been looking into it a bit, and it means kind of like the philosophy of law, but it's not a it's not, you know, when you give this very real example of this court, this Inter-American court, it's not an abstract concept. It's a very, very practical concept. And, you know, there's a legal community and there's a government community, and there's these these branches of of governing are woven together and are being woven together better and better. And the idea of a UN climate change council, I think it could provide high level political direction and clarity outside of just UNF policy negotiating. Its very exciting comment on NDCs adequacy. We need to be thinking about new arms of the international system and these courts. And that judgment particularly, I think, is definitely a part of kind of cementing a sensible, sober future reality out of the kind of chaos of resource extraction, without consideration of the implications.
Christiana: [00:37:53] The power of words. I'm taken by the fact that those who are proposing this are proposing a UN climate change council. What does that remind you of in the UN.
Paul: [00:38:02] Security.
Christiana: [00:38:03] Council? There you go. So what they're trying to do is they're trying to say, look, you guys, you have a Security Council that looks at international security, military, etc., etc. climate has come to the point where it is not just an environmental issue, it is a global crisis.
Paul: [00:38:25] 100%.
Christiana: [00:38:25] And they're trying to elevate climate to the level of attention that the Security Council has for war and peace. Yeah. And they're trying to say this is just as much a threat. It has to be treated with the same seriousness as peace and security. And it has to go to the highest level of multilateral diplomacy. Here. We're back. Right. So is it going to go back to multilateral Diplomacy with a council. Or is it going to go into climate economics, the forces of the market, or are we going to have both? Which would be ideal?
Fi McRaith: [00:39:05] Yeah, I think I think both in time. But the process of establishing precedents is so important as we see more and more impacts of climate. And I think one of the things that just to bring it to a very human level, I was listening to both of you speak and thinking a lot about imposter syndrome and self-doubt. And the more that we all across all of our different roles in this ecosystem and all of us working on climate, can surface the precedence for these types of cases, it will help the legal teams working on it make their case stronger, help them doubt themselves less feel. And they are creating whole new fields of law, just as wars of the past have informed the way in which we guide that Security Council and have established what is appropriate or inappropriate or legal or not legal to use more appropriate terms for this discussion. But, you know, I think that is one way that we can also bear witness to the wonderful things coming out of some of these and help service them also internally. You know, I do a lot of work with businesses, and there's questions around how can contracts and clauses that worked in one place be more widely shared, so that within companies you have a simpler route to smart policies through your own internal legal teams. And it's this on a much smaller case, and I think it's just a brilliant way of helping us all learn much more quickly through the collective mind.
Paul: [00:40:41] System change, not climate change
Fi McRaith: [00:40:42] Absolutely.
Christiana: [00:40:44] Okay. We have a question that came in from Julia in the UK via Spotify that I will read, but I actually want to suggest that we call our good friend Nigel Topping on this because this is one of his pet topics, so he's much better placed. So the question is, wouldn't it really help the narrative in the UK if electricity prices were less linked to gas prices? I'd love to hear your opinions on what the barriers to this are and what we can do to push for this change. It feels like it would be so positive. What can we do to accelerate a move in this direction from government?
Paul: [00:41:27] Phone a friend!
Christiana: [00:41:27] Shall we get Nigel in?
Nigel Topping: [00:41:30] So this is a great question. And the fact that in the UK, wholesale electricity prices are set by an auction every half hour, which means that they're set by the marginal cost of gas, because that's the most expensive, much more expensive than the renewable sources. It means that 98% of the time, the cost of electricity in the UK is set by the cost of gas, which is kind of weird. And the reason that's a problem, it's actually twofold. It's a narrative problem. Definitely, because it it's very easy to make the false comparison between the fact that the UK has got ambitious net zero targets and the fact that the UK has uncompetitive, expensive electricity. They're not linked. You know, the drive to renewables is reducing the level of the cost of electricity. It's the it's this historic link to gas prices driving the wholesale cost of electricity, which is the problem. So that that needs to be decoupled somehow. That's quite technical and the government's looking at it. But the bigger problem in a way, is what's called the spark spread, the difference between the electricity price and the gas price. That's also driven by the way that the electricity prices set. And the reason this is a problem is because one of the big bits of the next transition will be the move from using gas to heat homes to using electricity to hit homes, using them much more efficient heat pumps.
Nigel Topping: [00:42:43] They're about 400% efficiency, more than four times as efficient as gas. But right now in the UK, electricity is 24 per unit and gas is six per unit, so it's about 4 to 1. So it's very hard to save money even if the heat pumps four times as efficient. So what the what the government could usefully do and what people are asking the government to change would be rather than getting into all the technicalities, just address that ratio going from 4 to 1 to 2 to 1. So if electricity was £0.16 and gas was £0.08, that would be 2 to 1. Then all the transitions to heat pumps would be very much in the money, and the market would drive that. The government could do that by removing some of the policy burden that it's put on power prices and making it a level playing field by, for example, including a carbon price on the gas that is used to heat homes, as well as on the gas that's used to create electricity that is used to heat homes. At the moment, it's only put on the electricity. It's a bit like a policy designed by somebody who wants to perpetuate gas markets. So great question a need to link it. But you need to address the ratio between electricity and gas prices.
Christiana: [00:43:50] Super. Thanks, Nigel. We brought you in because we know that you have given that a lot of thought.
Paul: [00:43:56] Very good at explaining things, Nigel. Okay. Should we go on to the next question, which is from Lilla?
Listener Lilla: [00:44:02] Hi. Outrage and optimism. I have a question about a multi-polar world that we're living in. So now there are more countries with more equal power distributions than previously, like 20 years ago. So my question is, does that make multilateral agreements easier or harder? So is it easier to sign a treaty or to get to a cop negotiation when the people negotiating them represent countries that have more equal power status? Or does it make it harder? Thank you so much. Also for the podcast. I listen every week and it helps so much to understand what's going on.
Fi McRaith: [00:44:42] Great question. I suppose my question right back and posing to the two co-hosts I have here today, though Tom would have brilliant other co-hosts.
Paul: [00:44:51] Tom is a secret co-host.
Paul: [00:44:53] Which is kind of like part of your, you know, dinner table. Well, today I think i'm sorry.
Fi McRaith: [00:44:57] I suppose I wonder, is power spread more equally today than it was 20 years ago? And or has the center of where power is held? The seat perhaps just shifted, particularly with the US having left. If we're thinking about the UNF, triple C, having left the Paris Agreement, which of course didn't exist. Happy 10th birthday Paris Agreement. Or is it just shifting as the world evolves, as it always has and always will? And I think I want to give an honorary mention, of course, to coalitions of governments that enter negotiating together, which, as Christiana said earlier in answer to another question around when you negotiate, it is much more powerful to go in together. Much wiser. Used a different word that I can't recall. But I think that my take. And then, please, turning it over to my wiser colleagues here.
Christiana: [00:45:53] Hardly.
Fi McRaith: [00:45:53] Hardly is. I think it just looks unfamiliar where power is held right now. Both quietly or loudly. It can appear that it is more equal or more unequal, but in reality is just an unfamiliar era that we are entering after perhaps ten years since 2014 to 2024, for me, felt more like a familiar era of being guided by the Paris Agreement and getting that across the line. And it now feels like we're walking into something that is unknown. The future is always unknown, but it feels much more different. It feels like many things afoot are afoot and shifting quite a lot, but I would really wonder if it is genuinely becoming more equal.
Paul: [00:46:39] Thanks. I think that sets it out, and I would like to just dive in for a moment into what I think are two very, very significantly different definitions of power. And I want to start off describing what I'm going to call soft power. And this is something that, you know, democratic governments like to think that they have pioneered over the years. And the US was was often seen as a very significant hub or pole or leader of soft power. And the idea behind soft power is we build trading relationships, we build security relationships, we increase trade and flow and sharing of kind of technology and ideas, and we have freedom of expression and all the rest of it. And I'm sorry to, to to put a pin in it here, but I think Donald Trump has absolutely killed this idea of soft power. And if I can just quote him, he said in March to the joint session of Congress, of all people, with God's help over the next four years, we are going to lead this nation ever higher, and we're going to forge the freest, most advanced, most dynamic, and most dominant civilization ever to exist on the face of this Earth. I mean, it's kind of ludicrous, overblown rubbish, but it's this notion of dominant power, which I'm afraid is is actually beginning to increase. And I think we should be thinking about how there are exciting opportunities for soft power, the multilateral power, or as the Brazilians might call it, the multiracial power of us coming together for common cause.
Fi McRaith: [00:48:12] Just a response on Trump. I think that might be a, um, peacocking of dominant power, but it's really just loud.
Paul: [00:48:24] Yes. Sorry. I mean, I probably shouldn't give him the weight, but I just I felt he was trying to kill soft power, even though the US in many ways pioneered it.
Fi McRaith: [00:48:33] I would, I would just say, and there are brilliant analysts who study this much more than me, but I would say he wants it to look and he wants to. Again, I'll use the word peacock, but he wants to distract.
Paul: [00:48:47] Yes.
Fi McRaith: [00:48:48] From what soft power might be taking place. Because I guarantee you, and you too have both held more senior positions than I have. I guarantee you there are always conversations quietly happening, regardless of how loud or dominant the person who holds the presidency or highest chair is. There there. There are still teams of governments and staff that are negotiating things, having conversations in their own style that typically you were used. This is my point around unfamiliar territory, like we're used to seeing much more soft, humble power in that seat in the United States, except for the first term. And I say this as an American. There are other nationals across the world who would say, no, we're not. We are not used to that at all. But it is just I think perhaps what is desired is to distract you from what soft power may still exist.
Paul: [00:49:48] In defense of the position of the United States.
Fi McRaith: [00:49:51] That's a generous term for what I just did. I would not want to be defending that statement. I just nuanced it.
Paul: [00:49:59] Christiana has a wry look.
Christiana: [00:50:00] I wanted to come back to your insight of the shift that we're witnessing, and that makes us feel uncomfortable because we're not kind of not used to it. And I think that that is definitely what we're witnessing. And at several levels, I would argue there is evidence, although definitely not a guarantee, that we're seeing a shift of power from the global North to the global South, and that the global South is feeling much more empowered. Much sorry for saying so much wiser than the Global North. Definitely. And that they feel it's it's their turn to figure out what they want to do. I think they are, frankly, fed up with the Global North. Telling them what to do and imposing measures and, you know, policies, whatever that may be good for the global North, but not for the global South. So I think there's a shift from the global north to the global South. I think there's also a shift that has been ongoing, but that is accelerating, especially in the United States, from national governments to sub nationals. Yeah. And we saw that under the first Trump presidency. And we're seeing it now again, and not only in the United States. I think there is much more of a standing up of sub nationals of regions, provinces, cities saying this is our purview, this is what we're going to be doing. I think there's also a shift and maybe maybe that's related to national governance. And subnational is much more of a feeling of bottom up than top down.
Christiana: [00:51:48] I think we were very used to hierarchical structures in power, and somehow it doesn't cut it anymore. So Lila does say that we're seeing a multipolar world, that distribution of power among governments, but also within each country is also something that we're seeing much less tolerance, I would say, now for top down directives than for bottom up initiatives, much less tolerance. And finally, I think the other shift, to use your very good term fee is a shift from public to private. I do think, and we said this before, that the Paris Agreement was sort of the the high point of public power. And it is shifting. It is shifting now to to private and to the logic and the imperatives that private sector can actually bring to bear. As long as the public sector is supportive, not in the conditions in which the public sector is actually on a war path, which it is now, at least at the federal level in the United States. But if the public sector is supportive, collaborative in your terms, then I would say those who are actually pulling the card forward is the private sector. So many shifts at the same time. And and that's why maybe we feel disconcerted because it's not just that we're shifting one thing. It's like a whole bunch of different levels or shifting, and we feel somewhat disconcerted. I think it's great.
Paul: [00:53:31] I mean, just That's a brilliant description. One, one. You know, obvious. State the obvious. A very powerful country diplomatically, is the enormous great nation of China. And it is going to be avidly encouraging people to use renewable energy and electric vehicles, because it is the world's largest manufacturer of renewable energy, very soulless and electric vehicles. And we can see that, you know, it's not just Petro states pushing in one direction. It's the clean economy pulling in another v a visual.
Fi McRaith: [00:53:59] I'm a very visual person. So one of the things that I think about is there's a process that lakes organically take each year, which is when the water and the and the nutrients shift from the bottom to the top. And that is a critical process for the health of the ecosystem. And it results in quite a lot of sediment and sometimes decreased visibility. And, you know, much more is in the water moving around before it re re anchors itself into it settles. And I think I remind myself when I feel unsettled from this, that this is actually a very healthy thing to be going through. Yeah. For our world.
Paul: [00:54:41] To be very, very well made point. Well, there's been an extraordinary conversation absolutely full of, well, just diverse, rich pushing the debate forward. And we're only halfway through the questions.
Christiana: [00:54:51] Right. Yeah. Amazing, amazing. Really, really good to challenge ourselves to think across so many different topics. Thanks to the listener questions. Really fantastic.
Paul: [00:55:05] But I have a question for would you come back next week and do another episode? Would you.
Fi McRaith: [00:55:10] Mm. Only if you use the word brilliant to describe me at least four more times.
Paul: [00:55:14] I think you're absolutely brilliant. Brilliant, brilliant, brilliant.
Fi McRaith: [00:55:19] All right, I'm back.
Paul: [00:55:21] Okay, well, that's agreed. We're gonna do it next week. See you then. Bye for now.
Christiana: [00:55:24] Bye bye.
