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The so-called "Danish Text"
There has been a bit of a row about some leaked draft agreement language. The Guardian UK published an article yesterday that was highly critical of the draft, portraying it as rich countries marginalizing developing countries by doing away with the Kyoto Protocol and establishing unequal obligations biased against developing countries, among other things. The Guardian also portrayed this as something being done in secret.
As is often the case with leaks like this, I'm sure this is not even close to the entire story. My experience tells me that there are multiple drafts being circulated among various groups of nations for the purposes of discussion. In my work in Congress, it is often the case that groups of Members (or Members' staff) will circulate proposed text among themselves in order to present a concrete proposal to a larger body, be it a committee or the House (or Senate) as a whole. Sometimes, they will involve the committee chair, or a member of the chair's staff in these discussions. In some cases, the chair will propose a starting text to the group. These discussions are generally not public, as the proposals are still in flux - releasing a half-baked proposal simply makes the situation more complicated and the process of resolving differences more difficult. A proposal it put up for public discussion when it is at a point where it is settled enough to have a coherent discussion.
In this case it would not surprise me in the least if there are multiple discussion drafts being worked on by the Danes and others, and multiple drafts of each text. The one in the Guardian is the only one that got out (or the only one the Guardian chose to write about.) Denmark is the host nation and President of COP15, and it is the Danes' job to pursue a successful COP by working with all of the various groups of nations. (They go by various names - the G77+China, AOSIS, the Environmental Integrity Group, the Umbrella Group, the European Union, etc.) These discussions are all occurring simultaneously in the hopes of coming to an agreement.
I've skimmed the text on the Guardian website, and it appears to be a reiteration of the position taken by several developed countries. There is no indication of where in the process this text is coming from, so there is a reasonable possibility that this was a starting text or early working text proposed by a group of developed countries. There are still several days of negotiations remaining, and progress is being made very quickly. It is definitely premature, and perhaps irresponsible, to be drawing conclusions about an ultimate agreement from a text leaked on the second day of negotiations.
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Posted By: Thomas Lee @ 10:27 AM |