Clash of Geofutures and the Remaking of Planetary Order: Faultlines underlying Conflicts over Geoengineering Governance
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Clash of Geofutures and the Remaking of Planetary Order : Faultlines underlying Conflicts over Geoengineering Governance. / McLaren, Duncan ; Corry, Olaf.
In: Global Policy, Vol. 12, No. S1, 23.01.2021, p. 20-33.Research output: Contribution to journal › Journal article › Research › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Clash of Geofutures and the Remaking of Planetary Order
T2 - Faultlines underlying Conflicts over Geoengineering Governance
AU - McLaren, Duncan
AU - Corry, Olaf
PY - 2021/1/23
Y1 - 2021/1/23
N2 - Climate engineering (geoengineering) is rising up the global policy agenda, partly because international divisions pose deep challenges to collective climate mitigation. However, geoengineering is similarly subject to clashing interests, knowledge-tradi- tions and geopolitics. Modelling and technical assessments of geoengineering are facilitated by assumptions of a single global planner (or some as yet unspecified rational governance), but the practicality of international governance remains mostly spec- ulative. Using evidence gathered from state delegates, climate activists and modellers, we reveal three underlying and clash- ing ‘geofutures’: an idealised understanding of governable geoengineering that abstracts from technical and political realities; a situated understanding of geoengineering emphasising power hierarchies in world order; and a pragmatist precautionary understanding emerging in spaces of negotiation such as UN Environment Assembly (UNEA). Set in the wider historical con- text of climate politics, the failure to agree even to a study of geoengineering at UNEA indicates underlying obstacles to glo- bal rules and institutions for geoengineering posed by divergent interests and underlying epistemic and political differences. Technology assessments should recognise that geoengineering will not be exempt from international fractures; that deploy- ment of geoengineering through imposition is a serious risk; and that contestations over geofutures pertain, not only to cli- mate policy, but also the future of planetary order.
AB - Climate engineering (geoengineering) is rising up the global policy agenda, partly because international divisions pose deep challenges to collective climate mitigation. However, geoengineering is similarly subject to clashing interests, knowledge-tradi- tions and geopolitics. Modelling and technical assessments of geoengineering are facilitated by assumptions of a single global planner (or some as yet unspecified rational governance), but the practicality of international governance remains mostly spec- ulative. Using evidence gathered from state delegates, climate activists and modellers, we reveal three underlying and clash- ing ‘geofutures’: an idealised understanding of governable geoengineering that abstracts from technical and political realities; a situated understanding of geoengineering emphasising power hierarchies in world order; and a pragmatist precautionary understanding emerging in spaces of negotiation such as UN Environment Assembly (UNEA). Set in the wider historical con- text of climate politics, the failure to agree even to a study of geoengineering at UNEA indicates underlying obstacles to glo- bal rules and institutions for geoengineering posed by divergent interests and underlying epistemic and political differences. Technology assessments should recognise that geoengineering will not be exempt from international fractures; that deploy- ment of geoengineering through imposition is a serious risk; and that contestations over geofutures pertain, not only to cli- mate policy, but also the future of planetary order.
U2 - https://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12863
DO - https://doi.org/10.1111/1758-5899.12863
M3 - Journal article
VL - 12
SP - 20
EP - 33
JO - Global Policy
JF - Global Policy
SN - 1758-5880
IS - S1
ER -
ID: 247507933