Climate change is a ‘commons problem’. The unusually high number of major natural disasters in recent years is a stark reminder of the proverbial ‘tragedy of the commons’.
One of the major failures of the negotiations on the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change has been the failure of developed countries to meet their commitments to transfer finance and technology to developing countries, and to do enough to sequester their cumulative past carbon emissions. Developing countries, relatively more vulnerable to the impacts of climate change, have been largely left behind. With time running out, these economies