Strategic priorities and contradictions of the BRICS states and the EU in the field of combating climate change (the case of the Arctic)

This article aims to identify the strategic priorities and contradictions of the BRICS states and the EU in the field of combating climate change (the case of the Arctic). The text uses systemic and comparative types of analysis. The author examines the specifics of the parties’ participation in the main international law initiatives, such as the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the first and second periods of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, and the 2015 Paris Agreement, while simultaneously comparing the differences in obligations for developed and developing countries with the current dominant contribution of the latter to global greenhouse gas emissions. Further, the problems and prospects for deriving common targets for the BRICS states, the consolidated opinion of the alliance on combating climate change, and its differences from the EU position are explained. Finally, using the Arctic as an example, the justifications underlying the strategic contradictions of the parties are presented. The author comes to the conclusion that they are primarily non-environmental. While the EU, which is experiencing an acute shortage of its own resources, is trying to achieve strategic autonomy and take a leadership position in the popular and noble topic, the BRICS states, in the context of sanctions, restrictions, and post-COVID recovery, have united and offered an alternative climate vision. Thus, despite the willingness to exchange data and research cooperation with the recognition of the prospects of green energy, they insist on the dominance of fossil fuels and the principle of technological neutrality, continuing to shift greater financial responsibility to developed countries. Climate change, which opens up better access to the Northern Sea Route and the Arctic shelf, mainly controlled by Russia, seems to be beneficial for the rest of the BRICS members. While the critical rhetoric of the EU on the resources to which they have access in the region is much more restrained. The author declares no conflicts of interests.

Keywords

Authors

References