SELEO DIRIA DE NOTCIAS NACIONAIS

04/10/2015

SELEO DIRIA DE NOTCIAS NACIONAIS ....................................................... 1

BRASIL .................................................................................................... 2

The Economist - Brazils economic and political crises are reinforcing each other ............................................................................................. 2

AMRICA LATINA E CARIBE ...................................................................... 4

The Economist - Evo Morales backtracks on a promise not to seek power after 2019 .................................................................................. 4

ORIENTE MDIO ....................................................................................... 6

The Economist - The danger of Russias intervention in Syria, and Americas timidity in Afghanistan ......................................................... 6

The diplomat - Everything You Need to Know About Russia's

Intervention in Syria ............................................................................. 7

OMC ......................................................................................................... 9

European Journal of International Law - WTO la carte or menu du jour? Assessing the case for more Plurilateral Agreements ................. 9

European Journal of International Law - Flexibility or Gridlock? The

Promises and Perils of Popularizing Plurilateral Agreements at the WTO ............................................................................................................ 11

CHINA ..................................................................................................... 15

Post Western World - Why China is the greatest beneficiary of

geopolitical events in 2015 .................................................................. 15

MIGRAES ............................................................................................ 18

Post Western World - Entrevista: Brasil deveria receber 50 mil srios 18

MEIO AMBIENTE ..................................................................................... 22

The Economist - At climate talks in Paris later this year, negotiators

should ponder the damage already done ............................................. 22

BRASIL

The Economist - Brazils economic and political crises are reinforcing each other

From the print edition

JUST as animals can smell fear in humans, financial markets pounce when they sniff

government paralysis and division. So it was with Brazil in late September. In a

fortnight the real plunged from 3.8 to the dollar to 4.2. Only when the Central Bank

stepped in, offering dollars, was a semblance of calm restored. The immediate reason

for the mayhem was the decision last month by Standard & Poors, a rating agency, to downgrade Brazils credit rating from investment grade to junk. That in turn was the inevitable result of the governments fiscal adjustment coming apart at the seams. After Dilma Rousseff narrowly won a second term as Brazils president a year ago, she signalled a change of economic course. Loose fiscal policy had pushed public debt to

60% of GDP in her first term. So she brought in Joaquim Levy, a fiscal hawk, as

finance minister. He set a target of a primary surplus (ie, before interest payments) of

1.2% for this year (compared with a primary deficit of 0.6% in 2014) and of 2% next

year.

Muddled, yet united

The man who would be king

Hair apparent

Dilma in the vortex

Politics

Government and politics

World politics

Brazilian politics

Latin American politics

Mr Levy said he could achieve this merely by trimming discretionary federal spending

(on things like student and housing grants) and by abolishing some tax breaks. But he

underestimated the severity of Brazils recessionthe economy is set to contract by 3% this yearand the consequent fall in tax revenues. Fatally, instead of announcing stiffer spending cuts, Mr Levy loosened his targets. The economic team made a complete mess

of next years budget, saying at first that it would involve a deficit and backtracking only after the downgrade.

It is an open secret in Braslia that Mr Levy wanted harsher measures. But the president

declined to back him. She is at best a reluctant convert to austerity, and she lacks the

authority to impose it. She has lost control over Congress, which must approve the cuts

to legally mandated spending (on pensions and transfers, for example) which are now

required. Moreover, she is also deeply unpopular (see chart), for two reasons. The first

is a baroque corruption scandal in which politicians from her ruling Workers Party (PT) and its allies are accused of skimming some $4 billion from contracts awarded by

Petrobras, the state oil company. The second is that the recession is biting into living

standards. Brazil is losing 100,000 formal jobs a month, notes Eduardo Giannetti, an

opposition economist. He says that people are very fearful for the future.

Rather than sorting out the economy, Ms Rousseffs priority has become survival, week by week. Later this month the Federal Audit Court is likely to reject last years public accounts as irregular. And the electoral court is investigating whether her re-election

campaign in 2014 benefited from corrupt donations. Either issue could trigger an

attempt to impeach her. The opposition claims to have more than the simple majority of

votes in the lower house of Congress required to start the process, though not the two-

thirds needed for impeachment itself. So the presidents task this week is to prevent the PTs main coalition partner, the centrist Party of the Brazilian Democratic Movement (PMDB), from jumping ship, by offering it bigger jobs in a slimmed-down cabinet.

Ms Rousseff may yet be able to muddle through in this fashion until 2018. Both the

PMDB and the opposition are hesitant about inheriting the economic mess if they push

her out. But there is a real risk that in the coming months the president will find she can

no longer govern. Only a credible fiscal squeeze can restore confidence in the currency

and allow the Central Bank to cut interest rates, opening the way to recovery. But the

PT is openly critical of Mr Levys policies. And the centre-right opposition has hypocritically voted against austerity measures it believes in.

Ms Rousseff claims that impeachment would be a coup. That is false. At the least, it would be a recognition that she won her second term on a false prospectus of continued

welfare spending. The PT itself tried (and failed) to impeach Fernando Henrique

Cardoso, a former president, months after he won a second term. Yet barring clear

evidence of wrongdoing, impeachment would be deeply divisive.

Ms Rousseff also says that as a former urban guerrilla who survived torture, she would

never bow to pressure and resign. But if the economic crisis worsens, she may find

herself in an untenable position. One recent opinion poll by Ideia Inteligncia found that

of 20,000 telephone respondents, 64% said that the president would not complete her

term. Of these, 60% thought she would resign. It is starting to look as if they may be

right. Leia na ntegra: http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21669972-brazils-economic-and-political-crises-are-reinforcing-each-other-dilma-vortex?fsrc=rss|ame

AMRICA LATINA E CARIBE

The Economist - Evo Morales backtracks on a promise not to seek power after 2019

From the print edition

NEARLY a decade has passed since Evo Morales took office as Bolivias first indigenous president. During his re-election campaign in 2014, he promised not to seek

another term after this one. But the thin Andean air may be distorting lawmakers memories. During an all-night session on September 26th, Mr Moraless legislative super-majority passed a reform that would allow him to run for another five-year term,

which would expire in 2025.

If implemented, the change will reinforce a strong trend towards looser term limits, both

within Bolivia and in Latin America overall (see table). Under the countrys constitution of 2009, Mr Morales should by rights have been ineligible to run last year. However,

the government argued that his first term should not count since it occurred before the

new constitution was adopted. Bolivias pliant Constitutional Court, which the opposition accuses of being lackeys of the president, duly accepted this logic.

Muddled, yet united

The man who would be king

Hair apparent

Dilma in the vortex

Politics

Bolivia

World politics

Latin American politics

Bolivian politics

On its own, the new law does not pave the way for the president to spend two decades

in office. The proposal will now go to a referendum, currently pencilled in for February.

lvaro Garca Linera, the vice-president, is leading the governments campaign. His first salvo has been to question the commitment to democracy of the no side, arguing that they are denying voters the right to back Bolivias most popular politician. His rivals counter that term limits are necessary only to dethrone leaders who would

otherwise be re-elected indefinitely. Latin America has learnt to its cost what happens when presidents are allowed to perpetuate themselves in power, says scar Ortiz, an opposition senator. The presidents supporters also argue that many rich countries have no term limitsthough most are parliamentary democracies that do not have presidents. The opposition has an uphill climb. In a majority-indigenous nation, Mr Moraless unapologetically ethnic politics has given him an unbreakable majority. To make

inroads with the presidents base, the no side is likely to turn to Rafael Quispe, an indigenous Aymara lawmaker, who recently mocked the presidents imperial aspirations by taking his seat in the National Assembly wearing a cardboard Inca crown. He is campaigning on the slogan I also want to be king. This is far from a government of the indigenous, Mr Quispe says. The Aymara have a rule, taqi muyu.

It means alternating leadership. In our communities a leader is elected for two years,

three at most. They cannot come back again even if they beg us. Leia na ntegra: http://www.economist.com/news/americas/21669963-evo-morales-

backtracks-promise-not-seek-power-after-2019-man-who-would-be-king?fsrc=rss|ame

ORIENTE MDIO

The Economist - The danger of Russias intervention in Syria, and Americas timidity in Afghanistan

From the print edition

TO HEAR Vladimir Putin, Russia has become the leader of a new global war on

terrorism. By contrast Barack Obama seems wearier by the day with the wars in the

Muslim world that America has been fighting for more than a decade. On September

30th Russian jets went into action to support Bashar al-Assads beleaguered troops. It is setting up an intelligence-sharing network with Iraq and Iran. The Russian Orthodox

church talks of holy war. Mr Putins claim to be fighting Islamic State (IS) is questionable at best. The evidence of Russias first day of bombing is that it attacked other Sunni rebels, including some supported by America. Even if this is little more

than political theatre, Russia is making its biggest move in the Middle East, hitherto

Americas domain, since the Soviet Union was evicted in the 1970s. In Afghanistan, meanwhile, Americas campaign against the Taliban has suffered a blow. On September 28th Taliban rebels captured the northern town of Kunduzthe first provincial capital to fall to them since they were evicted from power in 2001.

Afghan troops retook the centre three days later. But even if they establish full control,

the attack was a humiliation.

Dominant and dangerous

Act before the tyrant dies

Welcome to New London

Putin dares, Obama dithers

Museum pieces

Bashar Assad

Afghanistan

Vladimir Putin

Middle East

Syria

Both Kunduz and Russias bombing are symptoms of the same phenomenon: the vacuum created by Barack Obamas attempt to stand back from the wars of the Muslim world. Americas president told the UN General Assembly this week that his country had learned it cannot by itself impose stability on a foreign land; others, Iran and Russia included, should help in Syria. Mr Obama is not entirely wrong. But his

proposition hides many dangers: that America throws up its hands; that regional powers,

sensing American disengagement, will be sucked into a free-for-all; and that Russias intervention will make a bloody war bloodier still. Unless Mr Obama changes course,

expect more deaths, refugees and extremism.

Having seen the mess that George W. Bush made of his war on terror, especially in Iraq, Mr Obama is understandably wary. American intervention can indeed make a bad

situation worse, as odious leaders are replaced by chaos and endless war saps Americas strength and standing. But Americas absence can make things even more grim. At some point, extremism will fester and force the superpower to intervene anyway.

That is the story in the Middle East. In Iraq Mr Obama withdrew troops in 2011. In

Syria he did not act to stop Mr Assad from wholesale killing, even after he used poison

gas. But when IS jihadists emerged from the chaos, declared a caliphate in swathes of

Iraq and Syria, and began to cut off the heads of their Western prisoners, Mr Obama felt

obliged to step back indesultorily. In Afghanistan Mr Obama is making the same mistake of premature withdrawal. As NATOs combat operations wound down into a mission to train, advise and assist, Mr Obama promised that the last American troops would leave Afghanistan by the end of 2016. The date had no bearing on conditions in

Afghanistan but everything to do with when Mr Obama leaves the White House.

What can Mr Obama do? In Afghanistan, rather than pull out the 9,800 remaining

American troops, he should reinforce them and make clear that he puts no date on their

withdrawal. The rules of engagement must expand so that NATO forces can back

Afghan ones. Attack aircraft should support them as needed, not just in extremis. He

needs to knock heads together in Kabul, where the unity government forged last year between President Ashraf Ghani and his rival, Abdullah Abdullah, is dysfunctional

enough to lack a defence minister. This was Mr Obamas good war: he risks losing it. In Syria Mr Obamas dithering means his options continually grow harder and riskier. Mr Putin is unabashedly defending a tyrant and deepening the regions Sunni-Shia divide. America must hold the line that Mr Assad will not remain in power, and set out

a vision for what should follow. It needs to do more to protect the mainly Sunni

population: create protected havens; impose no-fly zones to stop Mr Assads barrel-bombs; and promote a moderate Sunni force. That may well mean staring down Russian

jets.

As a judoka, Mr Putin knows the art of exploiting an opponents weakness: when America steps back, he pushes forward. Yet being an opportunist does not equip him to

fix Syria. And the more he tries to save Mr Assad the more damage he will cause in

Syria and the regionand the greater the risk that his moment of bravado will turn to hubris. Given the enduring strength of America, there is much that it can still do to

contain the spreading disorderif only Mr Obama had a bit more of Mr Putins taste for daring. Leia na ntegra: http://www.economist.com/news/leaders/21669950-danger-russias-intervention-syria-and-americas-timidity-afghanistan-putin-dares?fsrc=rss|lea

The diplomat - Everything You Need to Know About Russia's Intervention in Syria

Benjamin David Baker

As reported worldwide last week, Russia has started bombing a range of targets in

Syria. The main purpose of this intervention is to prop up Bashar al-Assads flagging regime, which has been under siege by the Islamic State, western-backed rebels, and al-

Qaeda- affiliated groups, such as the al-Nusra front. Looking at Bellingcats report and images of the Bassel al-Assad airbase at Latakia, we can discern that Moscow has

deployed at least 12 fighter-bombers (SU-25 Frogfoot.) (The BBC claims that at least

20 jets have been deployed to Syria.) Dave Majumdar at The National Interest also

reports that Russia has deployed 10 SU-24M2 Fencer and four SU-34 Fullback.

According to the Russian government, these planes are supposed to provide close air

support for Assads troops fighting IS. However, Washington has accused Moscow of also striking rebel groups affiliated with the western-backed Free Syrian Army. (The

Russian Ministry of Defense has released drone videos showing airstrikes against IS;

you can see them here.)

Russia has apparently also deployed attack helicopters to Syria. According to an

unconfirmed photo, this includes one of Russias most heavy-hitting choppers, the Mi-24, nicknamed the flying tank. Dmitry Adamsky just published a great article in Foreign Affairs laying out what this might mean for Russias foreign policy. Interestingly, the Bellingcat photos also show that Russia appears to have deployed

several SU-30M Flankers. These aircraft can be used for air-to-ground attack missions,

but are also superb air superiority fighters. As none of Assads enemies have aircraft of their own, the question is whether these planes are there as a deterrent against a

deepening U.S. involvement in the conflict. Future information on whether the Flankers

in Latakia are equipped with air-to-air weaponry will be of great interest.

Russian unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) have apparently also been deployed to Syria.

According to the Daily Beast, U.S. officials have confirmed that Russian UAVs

operating from Latakia are conducting reconnaissance missions in preparation for air

strikes. Furthermore, photos apparently taken by members from the al-Nursa front in

Idlib Province show UAVs consistent with the outline of the Pchela-1T, or its similar

predecessor, the Shmel-1.

There is also some evidence that Russian ground troops are joining the fight. Although

Moscow has officially denied that it has deployed ground troops into combat zones,

there is an increasing amount of evidence suggesting that this is the case. (Officially,

Russia does have a small number of personnel stationed at its naval depot in Tartus.) An

increasing number of pictures, including selfies, that seem to have been posted by

Russian troops in Syria, are being shared on social media sites such as Facebook and the

Russian site Vkontakte. According to these profiles, compiled by Russian blogger

Ruslan Leviev, these personnel are members of the crack 810th Independent Marine

Brigade, based in Sevastopol.

Many of these pictures are geolocated. That means that the location showing where a

picture is taken is tagged to the picture itself. Several pictures were geolocated to the

Russian installation in Tartus, which would be in line with official Russian policy. (It

should be noted that Russian government spokesmen have previously claimed that all

Russian personnel had been evacuated from Syria when the fighting intensified in 2012,

and that the base was not important.) However, several pictures were geolocated to Homs, a province which has seen much fighting between the Free Syrian Army, the al-

Nusra Front, and Assads forces. Furthermore, there has been some interesting leaked YouTube footage. In one particular

clip, showing fighting north of Latakia, what sounds like Russian voices can be heard.

(However, due to the bad sound quality of the clip, this hasnt been confirmed.) The same clip contains footage of a Russian BTR-82A IFV armed with a 30mm 2A72

autocannon. While Assads forces have been supplied with large amounts of Russian kit, this IFV/cannon combination is a rare sight even in the Russian military.

Furthermore, the vehicle is marked with Russian military markings, which is not normal

for the standard BTR-80s previously delivered to Assads forces. This evidence might be circumstantial. There is no hard evidence that Russian troops

have participated in ground combat operations just yet. Even if the voices heard in this

clip were proven to be Russian, it is still possible that these are mercenaries fighting for

Assad. This has been the case previously, although the extent to which these

mercenaries have Moscows blessing and backing is uncertain. What is certain is that Russia is raising the stakes in Syria, big time. Leia na ntegra: http://thediplomat.com/2015/10/everything-you-need-to-know-about-russias-intervention-in-syria/

OMC

European Journal of International Law - WTO la carte or menu du jour? Assessing the case for more Plurilateral Agreements

Bernard Hoekman & Petros Mavroidis

Editors Note: This is the first in a series of posts discussing the article in the current issue of EJIL Vol. 26 (2015) No 2, by Bernard Hoekman and Petros Mavroidis. There

will be subsequent posts discussing the article, over the next couple of days, by Junji

Nakagawa, Diane Desierto, and Geraldo Vidigal.

The WTO and clubs The long-running Doha Round deadlock illustrates how difficult it has become to get

agreement on new rules of the game among 161 WTO Members. The Agreement on

Trade Facilitation that was negotiated at the 2013 WTO Ministerial meeting in Bali

demonstrated that this is possible, but the proliferation of preferential trade agreements

(PTAs) illustrates that many countries have been moving away from using multilateral

trade agreements to liberalize international commerce and agree to new policy

disciplines. Recent examples of PTAs that involve major trading nations include the

agreements signed by Korea with the EU and the US and the ongoing Trans-Pacific

Partnership (TPP) and Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP)

negotiations. It may be that one of the consequences of the Doha deadlock has been to

give countries greater incentives to engage in PTAs. But there may be a reverse

causality effect as well: the existence of the PTA option may reduce the incentive to

agree on rules on a multilateral basis. Whatever the case may be, the proliferation of

PTAs results in fragmentation of the global trading system and generates substantial

information and transactions costs for traders.

There has been some action in the WTO on market access issues. This has taken the

form of so-called critical mass agreements, under which concessions negotiated among

a subset of countries are extended to all WTO Members a nondiscriminatory, most-

favoured-nation (MFN) basis. Examples include ongoing negotiations to liberalize trade

in environmental goods and the effort to extend the coverage of sectoral initiatives to

liberalize trade, most notably the 1997 Information Technology Agreement (ITA).

Critical mass agreements have always been an important mechanism in the

GATT/WTO setting: if enough large players participate in a liberalization exercise they

need not worry about free riding by other countries that do not want to participate.

In practice there are many more extant preferential trade agreements (PTAs) and

ongoing PTA negotiations than there are efforts to conclude critical mass-based

liberalization agreements. Free riding concerns are one reason for this. But another

reason is that as tariffs have become less relevant, the focus of trade integration efforts

shifts to regulatory barriers. When it comes to regulatory policies, deals on new rules of

the game are easier to agree if they are limited to a sub-set of the WTO Membership

that have similar preferences or concerns and that have similar institutional capacities to

implement whatever is agreed in a given policy area. Many countries are not interested

in or unwilling to agree to disciplines that constrain their ability to pursue certain types

of policy. Thus, to date it has not proven feasible to launch negotiations on investment

or competition policy disciplines in the WTO, or to pursue far-reaching liberalization of

trade in services. Many of the recent vintage PTAs cover these policy areas.

PTAs and critical mass agreements are not the only game in town when it comes to

negotiating policy commitments among a club of countries. The WTO offers another mechanism for Members to do so: conclusion of a Plurilateral Agreement (PA) under

Art. II.3 of the Agreement Establishing the WTO. This provision permits sub-sets of the

WTO Membership to agree to new disciplines applying to signatories only. In contrast

to a PTA, which must cover substantially all trade in goods (Art. XXIV GATT), and/or

have substantial sectoral coverage of services (Art. V GATS), PAs can be issue-

specific. At present there are two PAs in force in the WTO, the Agreement on

Government Procurement (GPA), and the Agreement on Civil Aviation.

PTAs and PAs both permit discrimination and both can involve binding commitments:

they liberalize trade or define rules of the game only for a sub-set of the WTO

Membership that shares similar views. While PTAs in practice often go beyond the

current WTO mandate, in principle, PAs that cover areas not falling under the current

WTO mandate could be used as substitute for PTAs, thus offering a mechanism for

countries to pursue greater cooperation under the umbrella of the WTO as opposed to

outside it.

Some analysts have long called for greater use of PAs as a way of allowing sub-sets of

countries to move forward on an issue where it is clear that there is no consensus among

the WTO membership as a whole. Recent developments in the world economy such as the ever greater prevalence of international value chains and production, as well as the

much greater intensity with which governments are turning to PTAs, most notably the

US and EU, but also economies in the Asia-Pacific region suggest to us that greater use of PAs should be considered. Agreement on cooperation on regulatory matters

among 161 WTO Members will in most cases be difficult, if not impossible. Even the

EU, a regime with arguably substantial homogeneity, allows for the establishment of

PAs across a sub-set of its membership, the most notorious being the EMU, the

European Monetary Union. Besides the EMU, so-called Enhanced Cooperation

Agreements are possible for a sub-set of the EU Membership (Art. 20 TEU). Although

so far practice is scarce, arguments have been made that these could be an instrument

that could propel further European integration among countries that are interested in

doing so.

Advantages of greater diversity in club formation

In our view clubs are bound to proliferate when it comes to regulatory matters and

related rule-making, but there is no good reason why the WTO membership should

simply accept that such clubs will have to be limited to PTAs. As argued at greater

length in our EJIL article, there are good reasons for privileging PAs over PTAs.

PAs are Pareto-sanctioned in that their content is approved by the WTO Membership.

PTAs are reviewed by the WTO, but there is no sanctioning of their content. Since 2006

there is no longer an assessment by the relevant WTO body as to whether a new PTA

complies with WTO rules. Post 2006, WTO review is simply limited to the supply of

information.

This information provision stops at the moment a PTA has been reviewed. There is no

obligation to continue to supply information to WTO after that. In contrast, PAs involve

regular reporting on activities to the WTO Membership as a whole.

The plethora of PTAs results in significant dispersion in rules and approaches and thus

transactions costs and trade diversion Jagdish Bhagwatis famous spaghetti bowl analogy. Multiple PTAs deal with the same subject-matter, so that rules of the game for

firms from a country often differ for the same issue depending on the PTA that applies

for a given trade flow. In the case of a PA there will only be one regime regulating a

given subject-matter.

PTAs are mostly closed to accession by new members in the sense that the PTAs make

no provision for accession. PAs in contrast are required to be open.

PTAs often have their own dispute settlement procedures. As dispute settlement is a

frequently used form of contract completion, the result is that the WTO misses out on important information. In contrast, PAs must use WTO dispute settlement mechanisms.

Building bridges to new clubs

The overall conclusion we draw is that a major advantage of PAs is that they keep the

umbilical cord with the WTO tight, while offering a vehicle for countries to cooperate

on new issue areas that are not subject to WTO rules. There are many possible areas

where PAs can help governments experiment and learn without implicating the whole

WTO membership. For example: some governments may want to create a mechanism to

harmonize approaches to product classification and to share data on advance rulings by

Customs agencies; develop a vehicle for cooperation on policies affecting digital trade

and data flows; competition policy; regulatory cooperation; private standards, and so

forth.

An important impediment to negotiating new PAs is the requirement that proposed

agreements be approved by the whole WTO membership: PAs require consensus. This

means that countries that have no interest in joining can nonetheless block approval of a

new proposed PA. The prospects of achieving the required consensus could be

enhanced by launching a process to agree on a code of conduct for new PAs. Provisions

of such a code might include or address the following elements:

membership in any PA is voluntary;

that the subject must be a trade-related issue;

those participating in negotiations should have the means, or be provided with the

means as part of the agreement, to implement the outcomes;

the issue should enjoy substantial support from the WTOs Membership; and application of the subsidiarity principle to minimize the intrusion of club rules on national autonomy.

Summing up

Clubs are the hothouse of future trade regulation. The WTO does not lose its relevance

because of their advent. It is the guardian of past liberalization that paved the way to

deeper integration initiatives that are easier to pursue in a club context. Such clubs need not be limited to PTAs that do their business independently of the WTO.

Supporting more club formation under the umbrella of the WTO can help ensure the

continued relevance of the multilateral trade regime in the 21st century. Leia na ntegra: http://www.ejiltalk.org/wto-a-la-carte-or-menu-du-jour-assessing-the-case-for-more-plurilateral-agreements/

European Journal of International Law - Flexibility or Gridlock? The Promises and Perils of Popularizing Plurilateral Agreements at the WTO

Diane Desierto

Editors Note: This post responds to Bernard Hoekman and Petros Mavroidis article in the current issue of EJIL Vol. 26 (2015), No. 2, titled WTO la carte or menu du jour? Assessing the case for more Plurilateral Agreements. For a post by the authors of the article, introducing their piece, see here. For other comments see here.

Professors Bernard Hoekman and Petros Mavroidis EJIL article WTO a la carte or menu du jour? Assessing the Case for More Plurilateral Agreements provokes much thought on opportunities for achieving better flexibility and neutralizing gridlocks at the

WTO. The article was published soon after WTO Director General Roberto Azevedo

lamented the organizations failure to reach a work programme under the Doha Development Agenda (DDA) under its 31 July 2015 deadline, which could conceivably

impede trade negotiations at the next WTO Ministerial Conference at Nairobi in

December 2015. Professors Hoekman and Mavroidis provide a brilliant exposition of

the factors to be considered in using the plurilateral agreement (PA) route while

attempting to build multilateral agreement on more frontiers of world trade.

While I completely agree with Professors Hoekman and Mavroidis that more variable geometry is needed now to breathe life into the trade negotiations mandate of the WTO, I do wonder whether devoting organizational resources at this stage to develop a

PA code of conduct with transparent terms on the mode of negotiating issue-specific PAs, is something that the WTO can politically afford at this stage of institutional

stagnation and negotiations inertia over the DDA. A PA duly approved by the WTO

membership under Art. X.9 of the WTO Agreement could indeed be a viable path to

achieve harmonization and discipline over non-tariff measures, but how could this be

harnessed to incentivize reaching a multilateral agreement among WTO members? If

the two remaining PAs to date on civil aircraft and government procurement have not been universally ratified or widely opted into by WTO members to date, how can

this be done under a strategically-crafted PA (as Hoekman and Mavroidis appear to

suggest in proposing more usage of this route under an upfront code of conduct

addressing the scope of coverage, e.g. an issue for WTO Plus, or a WTO Minus X issue

on regulatory policy cooperation)?

If we go back to the voluminous literature explaining the 15 years of deadlock to date

under the DDA, there are promises and perils in going down the PA route to save the

WTO from gridlock. For one, an issue-driven PA might not be the most efficient

instrument for articulating and negotiating already very diverse and evolving

configurations of developing country interests, with the BRICS countries possibly

having different trading interests as other Middle Income Countries/MICs, and other

regional developing country groupings such as the MERCOSUR, ASEAN, ACP,

COMESA countries. Because the PA ultimately has to obtain approval from the entire

WTO membership, this makes the PA approval process vulnerable to similar

negotiating gridlocks as with the DDA to date. As Paul Collier rightly argued a decade

ago, with WTO membership being largely composed of developing countries, [t]he concept of policy coherence, and its implication that an appropriate objective of trade

policy should be to promote development, is not consistent with the use of trade policy

purely for self-interest. Hence the GATT bargaining model of reciprocated concessions

is no longer entirely appropriate. Manfred Elsig and Cedric Dupont specifically point out that for Doha, the gridlock and division between and among the United States, the

European Union, Brazil, and India have hindered progress and contributed to the lowering of overall ambitions as to the market-liberalizing outcome. Second, as noted by Professors Hoekman and Mavroidis, there may well be

corresponding burdens on the WTO Secretariat over the administration of new PAs,

which could also disincentivize their adoption. While the WTOs vast funding from contributions of its membership should not make resource allocation on different tracks

of parallel negotiations (plurilateral and multilateral) that much of a concern, as

Professors Hoekman and Mavroidis acknowledged in earlier work in regard to the

Agreement on Government Procurement (AGP) [Petros Mavroidis and Bernard

Hoekman, The World Trade Organizations Agreement on Government Procurement: Expanding Disciplines, Declining Membership?, World Bank Policy Research Papers,

1999], fewer countries had the technical capacity and domestic wherewithal at that time

to join the AGP in a multilateralized setting. Even to this day, the AGP accession

among the rest of the WTO membership remains very much a glacial affair. The WTO

Secretariats ongoing technical assistance and capacity-building to WTO members for purposes of facilitating accession to the AGP, will have to be replicated for any and all

PAs in the future, with no guarantees that the PA will indeed expeditiously achieve the

desired multilateral outcome.

Finally, even if PAs may be argued as not necessarily being trade-diversionary in the

way that preferential trade agreements (PTAs) could arguably be, I am somewhat less

skeptical of the promising use of PAs than Stephen Woolcocks position that we should take the PTA route, rather than the PA route, because of the latters low probability of being accepted by the WTO membership. Market demand will always find (and already

did, in the past) a way of incentivizing enough critical global players to reach agreement

on an issue-based basis, as recently seen from the United States leading role in securing cooperation from 50 trading partners to agree on the landmark expansion of the

Information Technology Agreement to phase out tariffs in more technology export

lines. Professors Hoekman and Mavroidis rightly point out in their EJIL article that

[w]hat is needed are clear ex ante rules on PAs that ensure that such agreements are not vehicles for some countries to escape their general or specific WTO obligations and that

the interests of small/poor countries are protected. The devil will be in the details and how to muster the political support and equal representation necessary to ensure that a standardized way of negotiating and creating

PAs following a Code of Conduct will ensure legitimate and universal acceptance from, as well as frequent use by, the WTO membership. Professors Hoekman and

Mavroidis sketch several factors to consider in devising such a code of conduct (such as

a proviso that any WTO member opposing a PA be made to explain reasons for

opposition), but I would suggest that disparities in policy, institutional, resource,

politics, and legal factors behind the current DDA deadlock also be taken into account

in designing the appropriate Code of Conduct to move forward with PAs. Issue-based

PAs are no less immune to the same challenge of relevance to changing WTO

constituencies as the multilateral negotiations under the DDA, and one can expect the

same clamor for more equitable and democratic representation of developing countries

in drawing up the global trade agenda to likewise infuse a PA circumscribed to specific

issues. Perhaps it will be quicker, indeed, to reach an agreement on an issue-by-issue

basis under the PA route than through the single undertaking path of reciprocal

concessions fostered under multilateral trade negotiations. Certainly there is less of a

fear that a WTO-membership approved PA will have the effect of diverting global trade,

as opposed to PTAs which could potentially do so for specific regions, clubs of States,

or geographic clusters.

If there must be a WTO 2.0 whether this is done multilaterally, or by PA, or by PTA its new DNA has to internalize that the historic postwar global market dominance of the Quad (the US, Europe, Canada, and Japan) now has given way to calibrating

interests of the G20, the BRICS nations (Brazil, India, China, South Africa), the

developing country membership of the WTO and the increasingly resonant emerging

market voices all urging development as the ultimate point and objective of wealth

creation through global trade. Green Room politics (e.g. GATT-style negotiations limited to smaller elite groupings at the discretionary invitation of the WTO Director-

General and the influence of the Quad) would have to be abandoned for another

negotiating model that does not sidestep the new voices and emerging market players in

world trade. The WTOs Committee on Trade and Environment and Committee on Trade and Development, along with other trade-and working groups (e.g. trade and

technology transfer; trade, debt and finance, among others) might have to take broader

and deeper functional and operational roles to assist in facilitating and reconciling

developing country concerns in the lead-up to drawing up the WTOs work programme for multilateral trade negotiations.

Such structural or institutional reforms that deepen developing country engagement

could, perhaps, be pilot-tested under a PA Code of Conduct that draws more inputs from the WTO membership to ensure its even-handedness, transparency, and legitimacy

on issue-based trade regulation. Certainly Professor Hoekman and Professor Mavroidis cogent article on the potentials and pitfalls to PAs is one critically important step to

rethinking and reimagining the contemporary dynamics and structures of international

trade negotiations. Leia na ntegra: http://www.ejiltalk.org/flexibility-or-gridlock-the-promises-and-perils-of-popularizing-plurilateral-agreements-at-the-wto/

CHINA

Post Western World - Why China is the greatest beneficiary of geopolitical events in 2015

Oliver Stuenkel / 0 Comments /

Why China is the greatest beneficiary of geopolitical events in 2015

One of the decisive challenges when seeking to predict the future of global order is

understanding the economic costs and benefits of being a hegemon. That matters

because unless leading and underwriting international order is, all things considered,

economically beneficial, all hegemonic powers will eventually be challenged by rising

powers that grow faster. In War and Change in World Politics, published in 1983,

Robert Gilpin argued that differential rates of growth (due to cyclical diffusion of

technology and production) among states assure that no power will be on top forever. In

addition, non-hegemonic states tend to to better economically as they face little

incentive to support the hegemon's travails and make expensive global public

contributions, i.e., they free-ride.

If the economic impact of exercising hegemony are, overall, negative, the lifespan of

each hegemonic system are, per definition, limited. The threatened hegemon then may

either try to resist the rising power (and be eventually overthrown) or voluntarily hand

the reigns to the newcomer, recognizing that the economic burden of global leadership

has become to great to shoulder. Applied to contemporary international affairs, Gilpin's

insights suggest that the days of US global leadership are numbered because global

leadership is not economically sustainable.

Even those in favor of perpetuating US hegemony recognize that doing so comes at an

economic cost for Washington. Perceived wrongdoers must be punished even if there is

no direct economic advantage of doing so, as was the case with the NATO intervention

in Libya, which was essentially carried out by the United States alone. Despite China's

growing contribution, the bulk of resources spent on maritime security is still paid for

by the United States. The same goes for many other areas that provide the basic

infrastructure of today's global governance. Not all hegemonic order are the same, of

course, and both Pax Britannica and Pax Americana were shrewdly built with a concern

for economic sustainability. Indeed, in many instances, US hegemony functions on the

basis of the threat of coercion, which is far cheaper than coercion itself. It is also more

mutually beneficial than previous orders, thus reducing the incentive to openly

challenge the status quo. Still, US defense spending makes up 5% of its GDP, far more

than that of other powers such as China, Japan or Germany.

In The Politics of Unipolarity, Nuno Monteiro argues that whether emerging powers

such as China will continue to balance past the point at which their survival is ensured

by a robust nuclear deterrent -- i.e., how long they will accept US hegemony -- depends

on whether the unipole accommodates their economic growth. If that is the case, rising

powers have no incentive to continue balancing past that point. If, on the other hand, the

unipole takes actions that contain the economic growth of potential competitors, then

the latter have an incentive to continue balancing, ultimately leading to the end of

unipolarity. Put differently, unipolarity is durable if the hegemon wants to.

That assumes that the United States will never voluntarily abdicate (or at least slightly

reduce) its global leadership role because the costs are thought to exceed the benefits.

Yet if -- say, in two decades -- the United States' GDP and economic influence in global

affairs were be significantly smaller than that of China, how will policy makers in

Washington, D.C. convince voters worried about health care, education and

infrastructure to support maintaining more than 1000 military facilities scattered over

more than 140 countries, in which more than 200,000 military personnel are stationed?

What will they respond to those who argue for systematic retrenchment (as already

happens now), or those who say that China should finally "step up to the plate" and start

providing international security? What is the economic rationale of paying for military

bases in regions that are economically dependent on China? Even though there are past

examples of global hegemons who were inferior economically to others, such a scenario

only works for so long. In fact, US inaction in Syria could, by some, seen as an early

sign of hegemonic fatigue in Washington.

At the same time, William Wohlforth rightly points out that voluntarily giving up a

global leadership position is fraught with risks. Retreating in some areas may turn out to

be a slippery slope, causing others to doubt US security commitments. Indeed, the

causal connections between military expenditures, small-scale wars and economic

growth are contested, even though it seems likely that the expenditures related to the

Iraq War added to concerns about the United States' budget. Finally, of course, US

hegemony provides ample benefits for the US economy, for example by defending its

key interests without asking for a permission slip -- a privilege no other country enjoys.

Geopolitical events in 2015, alas, seem to support Gilpin's thesis. The United States is

dedicating a considerable amount of resources to containing the conflict in Afghanistan,

Yemen and Iraq, and, more importantly, it faces two major challenges in Syria and

Ukraine, likely to absorb most of President Obama's attention dedicated to foreign

policy in his final months in office. That takes away diplomatic and economic resources

from the far more important long-term challenge: China's growing influence in its

neigborhood, which will require a sophisticated US strategy to build a coalition willing

to balance against China.

There are few signs that technology will do away with the messy, expensive and bloody

conflicts the United States engaged in in Iraq and Afghanistan during the past decade. In

fact, these two wars may very well continue for another decade, forcing the US to

remain engaged. From a Chinese perspective, events in 2015 (and since 2003 in

general) so far have been ideal, assuring that policy makers in Washington regard the

rise of China as only one challenge among many, unable to devise a clear and coherent

response to open provocations such as large-scale cyber attacks and island-building in

the South China Sea. This inability to solely focus on what truly matters is a problem

only hegemons face, as they constantly feel the urge to solve problems across the globe,

and as they are called upon to solve a far broader range of problems than other actors.

That may explain China's reluctance to play a constructive role to help bring the

conflicts in Ukraine and Syria to a close -- precisely what Gilpin predicted in 1983.

Read also:

Book review: Theory of Unipolar Politics by Nuno P. Monteiro (New Global Studies) The Refugee Crisis Presents a Chance for Emerging Countries Like Brazil to Be Players

(New York Times)

Why China would benefit from Western SWIFT sanctions against Russia

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Leia na ntegra: http://www.postwesternworld.com/2015/10/03/greatest-beneficiary-geopolitical/

MIGRAES

Post Western World - Entrevista: Brasil deveria receber 50 mil srios

Oliver Stuenkel / 0 Comments /

Entrevista: Brasil deveria receber 50 mil srios

Ruth Costas

Da BBC Brasil em So Paulo

http://www.bbc.com/portuguese/noticias/2015/09/150924_oliver_stuenkel_ru

A presidente Dilma Rousseff deve aproveitar seu discurso na ONU nesta segunda-feira

para abordar o tema dos refugiados srios, que ganhou projeo com a comoo causada

pela morte do menino Alan Kurdi, de trs anos, afogado quando sua famlia tentava

atravessar o Mar Mediterrneo para chegar Europa.

Dilma provavelmente lembrar que o Brasil o pas que mais recebeu srios na Amrica

Latina. Segundo o Conare (Comit Nacional para os Refugiados), foram 2.077 de 2011

at agosto. Para o professor de Relaes Internacionais da FGV Oliver Stuenkel, porm,

o pas poderia receber muito mais.

Em um artigo recente para o jornal norte-americano The New York Times, ele defendeu

que o Brasil deveria acolher 50 mil refugiados srios. "Depois disso, recebi emails que

me acusavam de querer importar o terrorismo para o Brasil. Mas essa acusao fruto

de ignorncia e desconhecimento", diz.

Stuenkel coordena a Escola de Cincias Sociais da FGV e o MBA em Relaes

Internacionais da instituio, alm de ser membro do Global Public Policy Institute, em

Berlim.

Em entrevista BBC Brasil, ele explicou por que acredita que receber dezenas de

milhares de srios poderia trazer benefcios polticos e econmicos para o Brasil e

sugeriu que a conta do apoio aos refugiados poderia ser paga por pases que mantm

suas portas fechadas. Confira:

BBC Brasil - O Brasil o pas que mais recebeu refugiados srios na Amrica Latina.

Segundo o Conare, foram 2.077 at agosto. Em um artigo recente no New York Times o

sr. defendeu que poderamos receber 50 mil. Por qu?

Stuenkel - Aceitar refugiados contribuir na proviso de um bem pblico global. Essa

crise de refugiados provavelmente a mais severa desde a Segunda Guerra Mundial.

Alm disso, haveria vantagens para o Brasil. Para comear, assumir um papel de

liderana nessa rea daria destaque ao pas no cenrio global.

Quando a economia brasileira ia bem, o pas ganhou destaque negociando at acordos

de paz no Oriente Mdio. Com a crise interna, praticamente sumiu. Isso deixou na

comunidade internacional a impresso de que o Brasil pode ser um ator global quando

as coisas vo bem internamente, mas desaparece quando vo mal.

Uma atuao clara na crise dos refugiados poderia ajudar a reverter isso. E a um custo

relativamente pequeno. Sendo um pas de 200 milhes de habitantes, seria fcil absorver

essas 50 mil pessoas. Tambm h algo que nem sempre considerado nesse debate:

receber esses refugiados poderia gerar um impacto positivo no mdio longo prazo na

economia do pas.

BBC Brasil - Como assim?

Stuenkel - A Sria era uma economia relativamente bem desenvolvida antes der ser

arrasada por esse conflito. E os refugiados do pas so pessoas bem qualificadas, que

podem contribuir em um momento em que a economia brasileira precisa de gente

empreendedora e com capacidade de inovar.

O Brasil um dos pases mais fechados do mundo quando o tema imigrao. S 0,3%

das pessoas que vivem aqui nasceram em outros pases. E desse contingente, metade

est aposentado.

Em pases da Europa os estrangeiros representam entre 7% e 20% da populao. Nos

EUA, o percentual de mais de 10%. No Canad e Austrlia, 20%. Em todos esses

pases, os imigrantes e seus descendentes tm ajudado a impulsionar a inovao, o

empreendedorismo e o crescimento econmico.

BBC Brasil - H quem argumente que, se precisamos de trabalhadores qualificados,

seria interessante educar mais os brasileiros em vez de trazer gente de fora Stuenkel - Investir em educao crucial. Mas para se aumentar a qualificao e

capacidade de inovao das pessoas precisaremos de mais de uma dcada. Os dois

processos podem correr em paralelo. At porque s aumentar a imigrao no resolve o

problema, dada a dimenso do pas. No caso dos srios, ento, 50 mil seria uma gota no

oceano.

Mas preciso lembrar que os imigrantes tambm podem criar empregos. Eles chegam

no pas dispostos a arriscar e empreender. E no tem acesso ao setor pblico, onde o

ndice de inovao baixo. Nos EUA, h muitos exemplos de grandes empresas

fundadas por imigrantes ou seus filhos: Apple, Google, Budweiser, Colgate, eBay,

McDonald's, Walt Disney, Oracle, entre outras.

BBC Brasil - O governo brasileiro no impe nenhum limite a vinda de srios. Por que

os nmeros no so maiores?

Stuenkel - No estou "cutucando" o governo brasileiro. De fato, esse limite no existe.

A presidente deu um passo importante ao publicar, recentemente, um texto sobre o tema

no jornal Folha de S.Paulo (em que defendeu a necessidade de medidas urgentes de

solidariedade para ajudar os srios e prometeu ampliar os esforos do Brasil para acolher

refugiados).

Mas se ela se dirigir imprensa e ao pblico internacional o impacto ser maior. Dilma

pode, inclusive, cobrar pases ricos para que tambm recebam mais srios.

No caso do Brasil, sabemos que o problema no o preo da viagem, que muitas vezes

custa metade do que as redes criminosas cobram para levar os srios para a Europa.

claro que o fato de a Europa ser mais rica e oferecer mais apoio aos recm-chegados

influencia a deciso dos refugiados.

Mas acho que tambm falta uma comunicao mais clara para informar aos srios que

eles podem vir ao Brasil. A maioria no sabe disso, segundo relatos que ouvimos dos

que chegaram aqui. E tambm necessrio melhorar as estruturas para receber e apoiar

essas pessoas no Brasil.

BBC Brasil - O que ainda precisa ser feito?

Stuenkel - Os lugares oferecidos pelo governo para abrigar os srios so os mesmo

usados pelos moradores de rua. No acho que o governo deveria necessariamente

custear algo melhor para os refugiados, especificamente, isso complicado.

Mas eles precisam que haja uma maior agilidade na proviso de documentos para

trabalhar, por exemplo, porque muitos chegam ao pas com pouco recursos. Deixam

tudo para trs e tem de trabalhar o mais rpido possvel para sobreviver.

BBC Brasil - Os lugares nos abrigos pblicos no seriam suficientes. Quem pagaria a

conta do apoio aos 50 mil refugiados? Em um momento em que o pas faz um ajuste

fiscal, isso no seria complicado?

Stuenkel - Sim. Por isso o governo brasileiro poderia propor um projeto de cooperao

trilateral com pases com meios financeiros que no querem receber refugiados. China,

Japo, e, sobretudo, os pases do Oriente Mdio que se recusam a receber refugiados,

como Arbia Saudita e Catar, poderiam criar um fundo para financiar esse apoio.

J temos exemplos de esquemas de cooperao trilateral desse tipo. Em Moambique,

por exemplo h projetos que recebem financiamento do governo japons e aproveitam o

conhecimento de especialistas brasileiros em agricultura e sade pblica, j que os

moambicanos enfrentam desafios semelhantes aos nossos.

BBC Brasil - Qual o risco do crescimento da xenofobia no Brasil?

Stuenkel - Tivemos o ataque aos haitianos (um motorista atirou contra um grupo de

haitianos no Glicrio, regio central de So Paulo), mas esse foi um caso isolado. No

acho que haja o risco de uma onda de xenofobia no Brasil. Aqui no h xenofobia

institucionalizada. No temos partidos contra imigrantes, por exemplo.

Temos um problema grave de desigualdade e racismo, que pode afetar refugiados do

Haiti e frica, mas tambm temos um histrico interessante de integrao de grupos

diferentes em nossa sociedade. At os anos 30, por exemplo, o italiano era amplamente

falado em muitas regies de So Paulo.

No caso dos srios, tambm acho que o fato de termos muitos descendentes de

imigrantes do Oriente Mdio no pas e em todos os nveis da sociedade facilita a integrao. Em So Paulo, prefeito e governador so descendentes de rabes. Alguns

refugiados srios que eu conheci j esto falando portugus em trs ou quatro meses.

Aps publicar meu artigo no NYT, recebi emails que me acusavam de querer importar o

terrorismo para o Brasil. Mas essa acusao fruto de ignorncia e desconhecimento.

Na realidade, esses refugiados esto fugindo dos grupos radicais. E a integrao e

incluso dos refugiados o que ajuda a impedir a radicalizao.

Hoje temos uma concentrao dos refugiados em poucos pases que no conseguem

lidar com o problema. Turquia, Iraque, Jordnia e Lbano tm 3,6 milhes de refugiados

que, muitas vezes, vivem em pssimas condies. Nesses lugares h, de fato, o risco de

que se forme uma "gerao perdida", jovens que passem por exemplo, dos 20 aos 30

anos sem trabalhar. E isso que pode aumentar a chance de radicalizao.

BBC Brasil - Qual a possibilidade de uma ao internacional coordenada na Sria?

Stuenkel - O problema que lado apoiar. No conflito srio no h um lado "bom". De

um lado temos o presidente Bashar al-Assad, responsvel por um nmero grande de

mortes de civis. Do outro, o Estado Islmico. Nesse contexto, receber refugiados a

nica coisa a se fazer. No resolver o conflito, mas ajudar a melhorar a situao de

milhares de civis.

BBC Brasil - Dilma foi acusada de se omitir em grandes temas internacionais e reduzir

o perfil do pas no cenrio global. Houve mudana no segundo mandato?

Stuenkel - O Brasil continua com pouca visibilidade e expresso. S que agora o

problema j no mais a inrcia da presidente para temas internacionais, e sim a dvida

sobre ela conseguir se manter no cargo.

Isso pode afetar a capacidade de Dilma mediar o conflito interno da Venezuela, por

exemplo, ou assumir a liderana em temas internacionais mais complexos. Como ela vai

iniciar uma conversa global sobre qualquer assunto mais espinhoso se h dvidas sobre

se estar no poder em um ano para acompanhar esse processo?

Leia tambm:

Rumo instabilidade global?

Nelson Jobim: Misso impossvel em Caracas?

hora de o Brasil endurecer com Nicols Maduro

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Leia na ntegra: http://www.postwesternworld.com/2015/09/28/entrevista-deveria-receber/

MEIO AMBIENTE

The Economist - At climate talks in Paris later this year, negotiators should ponder the damage already done

From the print edition

SAVING the planet is now a matter of a few clicksat least on a small scale. On September 22nd the UNs Climate Change Secretariat launched Climate Neutral Now, a website that estimates an individuals carbon footprint based on whereabouts, recycling habits, energy use and so on. Offsetting any resulting guilt is easy: the site takes

donations to fund clean development projects. Your correspondent paid $24 to a facility

capturing methane from pig dung to cover the carbon-dioxide emissions she had caused

during the past year.

The initiative is one of many intended to spur action on greenhouse-gas emissions in the

run-up to climate talks in Paris at the end of the year. Some seem quite successful: in

recent weeks around 2,000 individuals and 400 organisations have committed to stop

investing in firms that produce fossil fuels. More important, countries have responded to

a shift in climate-change policy after the failure of negotiations in Copenhagen in 2009:

rather than trying to agree on mandatory emissions reductions, they were asked to say

by October 1st what they were willing to do.

Its getting hotter Low-hanging dirt

Alaska

United States

China

Earth science

Science and technology

Americas Clean Power Plan, announced in August, could reduce carbon-dioxide emissions from power stations by 870m tonnes by 2030a cut of almost a third from 2005 levels and the equivalent of taking 166m cars off the road. China has promised

that its emissions will peak in 2030, if not before. And on September 25th Xi Jinping,

the countrys president, announced that China would launch a national carbon-trading scheme in 2017 (see article). A few days later Brazil pledged to cut greenhouse-gas

emissions by 43% by 2030 compared with levels in 2005.

On closer scrutiny, though, some of the pledges look less impressive. America is

already most of the way to reaching its new target; China will see carbon emissions fall

anyway as its economy continues to shift from manufacturing to services. And when

negotiators meet in Paris, they need to keep in mind that the world is already suffering

from the effects of global warming. Global carbon emissions were 58% higher in 2012

than they were in 1990. The atmospheric concentration of carbon dioxide has risen from

just under 340 parts per million in 1980 to 400 today (see chart).

To stand a fair chance of keeping warming to just 2C by the end of the centurythe de-facto goal of global climate policythe stock of atmospheric carbon dioxide must be kept under 1 trillion tonnes. Estimates vary but, according to the Intergovernmental

Panel on Climate Change, the total had hit 515 billion tonnes by 2011. Climate

Interactive, a research outfit, reckons that if emissions continue on their present course

around 140 billion tonnes of greenhouse gases will be released each year and

temperatures could rise by 4.5C by 2100. And even if countries fully honour their

recent pledges, temperatures may still increase by 3.5C by then.

The world is already 0.75C warmer than before the Industrial Revolution. A recent

study published in Science suggests that a much-debated hiatus in global warming

between 1998 and 2012 in fact never happened: the cooler readings were caused by a

switch to measuring ocean temperatures from buoys rather than ships. Another study,

published in Climatic Change, another journal, finds that the statistical tools used to

demonstrate the apparent slowdown were not up to the task. And though the science

linking weather events to long-term climate change is still tentative, some researchers

see the effects of climate change in the fact that July 2015 was the warmest month

globally since records began. The year is likely to break records, too. This summer

47,000 people went to hospital after unusually hot days in Japan, and more than 1,000

died in both Pakistan and India during heatwaves.

Boiling the oceans

The oceans are absorbing almost all the heat added to the climate system. Summer sea-

ice cover in the Arctic has declined more than 40% over the past four decades as a

result. Walruses used to rest and feed on the ice; now they often do so onshore. Over

35,000 gathered recently near Point Lay in Alaska (pictured above).

Melting glacier ice, and the fact that warmer water has a larger volume, mean higher sea

levels: they have already risen by roughly 20cm since 1880 and could rise another metre

by 2100. That is perilous for low-lying islands and flat countries: the government of

Kiribati, a cluster of tropical islands, has bought land in Fiji to move residents to in case

of flooding. Giza Gaspar Martins, a diplomat from Angola who leads the worlds poorest countries in the climate talks, points out that they are particularly vulnerable to

the effects of a warming planet. Money alone, he argues, will not fix their problems.

Without steps to reduce emissions, he predicts, there will be nothing left to adapt for. Fresh water is less dense than salt water, meaning that melting ice sheets also disrupt

oceanic circulation patterns. The impact on the Atlantics meridional overturning circulation, which drives cold saltwater into the deep ocean while drawing warm water

northward, may make Europes climate cooler. Changing ocean currents also seem to be shifting jet streams and altering storm patterns. Some blame the severity of Californias drought on an unusual ridge of high atmospheric pressure off its coast which appears to

block winter storms from reaching the state.

For every 0.6C rise in temperature, the atmospheres capacity to hold water grows by 4%, meaning storms will pour forth with greater abandon. The rains of the Indian

monsoon could therefore intensify, cutting yields of cereals and pulses. Elsewhere

unusual deluges are already disrupting daily life: more than 170 extreme-weather events

struck America between 1980 and 2014. Winter storms are more frequent and intense

now than at any time in the past six decades.

Climate change seems also to be making dry places drier, killing crops and turning

forests into kindling. Forest fires in Indonesia, more likely thanks to the current El Nio

weather phenomenon, could release 2 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide, about 5% of

annual emissions due to human activity, says Simon Lewis of University College

London. In recent months fires have swallowed more than 2.4m hectares of American

forests. Alaska suffered 80% of the damagea particular problem because the soot released in these blazes darkens the ice, making it less able to reflect solar radiation

away from the Earth.

Developments in the Arctic are worrying for other reasons, too. The region is warming

twice as fast as the rest of the world, a trend that could start a vicious cycle. Around

1,700 gigatonnes of carbon are held in permafrost soils as frozen organic matter. If they

thaw, vast amounts of methane, which is 25 times more powerful as a global-warming

gas than carbon dioxide when measured over a century, will be released. One

hypothesis suggests that self-reinforcing feedback between permafrost emissions and

Arctic warming caused disaster before: 55m years ago temperatures jumped by 5C in a

few thousand years.

In a recent paper in Nature Climate Change researchers from Cambridge University and

the University of Colorado use standard environmental models to estimate the economic

impact of carbon dioxide and methane being released from permafrost. By 2200, when

these emissions are expected to peak, the cost could be 0.7% of global GDPalbeit with a very high level of uncertainty. And on September 29th Mark Carney, the

governor of the Bank of England, warned that though measures to avoid catastrophic

climate change are essential, not least for long-term financial stability, in the shorter

term they could cause investors huge losses by making reserves of oil, coal and gas

literally unburnable. But there is no agreement on who should pay the bill for reducing emissions, whatever

it turns out to be. Arguments already rage over how to find $100 billion annually for a

climate fund from 2020 to compensate poor countries, which did little to cause global

warming. Action is needed immediately, says Christiana Figueres, a Costa Rican

diplomat who is overseeing the Paris talks. We are not treading lightly enough on the planet. Leia na ntegra: http://www.economist.com/news/international/21669885-climate-talks-paris-later-year-negotiators-should-ponder-damage-already?fsrc=rss|int