Climate Change Governance

Greetings from the Australian National University in Canberra, where Dr Tim Cadman, Research Fellow, Griffith University is speaking on "The global climate change regime complex: institutions and governance". Dr Cadman is the editor of the book "Climate Change and Global Policy Regimes: Towards Institutional Legitimacy". He mentioned the book was on special at $80, but Amazon.com has it at a lower price. Dr Cadman discussed current international initiatives for combating climate change and what might be done in the future. One issue he raised was the potential for the spread of tropical diseases, such as Dengue fever. It happens I gave a talk in Colombo to an audience of tropical disease experts in Colombo about "Mobiles and e-learning for PandemicFlu Response".  It turned out that there were a number of epidemiologists in the audience and the issue was  Dengue fever not flu.

Dr Cadman argued that a participative process was required for development of climate change policy. The participation is required to give the process legitimacy. It would be useful to revise international policy processes to provide for more participation, I am not sure that it is feasible to do this just for the climate change issue, nor will this necessarily lead to a general consensus. However, some form of on-line deliberative democracy might be used. But in the end it is likely that decisions will be made based on international power balances. In brief the issue is: what will China, USA and Europe do?

Dr Cadman called for quality of governance standards across the climate change regime. At one level there could be development and implementation of governance standards. Such standards exist for IT, with ISO/IEC 38500  Corporate governance of information technology. However, similar standards at the policy level would be  much more difficult.

A more direct way academics can  influence climate change measures is in their role as educators. In the course "ICT Sustainability" I set students the task of preparing a sustainability strategy for IT in an organization. where the student has a relevant job I encourage them to get the agreement of their boss to write a real report and submit it to the organization, as well as for assessment. This way there is no need to wait for the student to graduate for their education to have an impact. Some students who have written official reports for their management have worked for large multinational corporations, as well as local, national and international government bodies.

Seminar The global climate change regime complex: institutions and governance

Since the creation of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, media and public attention has been focused on the global negotiations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Little attention has been paid to the institutions that are charged with the responsibility of developing effective responses. These are often remote from the public, and communities most threatened by global warming are often excluded from decision-making. In this lecture, Dr Tim Cadman introduces and discusses the wide range of institutions within the ‘climate change regime complex’ and their respective roles in global climate change governance, while Dr Jamie Pittock explores governance pertaining water supply and management. About the Speakers Dr Cadman is a research fellow in the Key Centre for Ethics, Law, Justice and Governance at Griffith University, Queensland, Australia. He is also a research fellow in the international Earth Systems Governance Project and specialises in the governance of sustainable development, natural resource management, climate change and forestry, and responsible investment. His first book “Quality and Legitimacy of Global Governance: Case Lessons from Forestry” was published by Palgrave Macmillan in 2011. Dr Pittock is a Senior Lecturer in the Fenner School of Environment and Society at The Australian National University. He has been Director of International Programs for the UNESCO Chair in Water Economics and Transboundary Water Governance and also Program Leader of the Australia and United States Climate, Energy and Water Nexus Project for the US Studies Centre and ANU from 2010. Dr Pittock worked for non-government environmental organisations in Australia and internationally from 1989-2007, including as Director of WWF’s Global Freshwater Programme from 2001-2007. His research focuses on better governance of the interlinked issues of water management, energy and food supply, responding to climate change and conserving biological diversity. Speaker/Host: Dr Tim Cadman, Research Fellow, Griffith University and Dr Jamie Pittock, ANU Venue: Frank Fenner Seminar Room Date: Friday, 7 June 2013 Time: 12:00 PM - 1:00 PM Website: http://climategovernance.eventbrite.com/ Enquiries: Adhityani Putri on 6125 6599