As the United Kingdom prepares to go to the polls on 12 December 2019, this event, organized in conjunction with the BBC's show, The World Tonight, will give a Chatham House audience the opportunity to put their foreign policy questions to a panel of senior UK politicians.
 
Important Information About the Event
This event is hosted in collaboration with the BBC. It will be recorded and broadcast on BBC Radio 4 – The World Tonight. Given the BBC’s commitment to due impartiality during the election period, questions will be asked to be pre-submitted via email by audience members the day before the event. The BBC will then select a balanced and diverse range of questions from those submitted. The panellists will not receive the questions in advance of the event.
 
About the Ballot
Due to the expected popularity of this event, this event will be balloted. Please register your interest for the event by 11:59pm on Monday 25 November. Successful registrants – selected at random – will be notified on Tuesday 26 November and then invited to submit their questions. The BBC will contact directly those audience members whose questions they select.
 
As priority will be given to members, we are unable to register members’ guests for this event.

The new European Commission, headed by Ursula von der Leyen, assumed office on 1 December, and there are early signs that Africa will begin near the top of their foreign policy priorities. Policy towards Africa under the new EU administration is yet to be fully defined, but its contours are already visible in the selection of commissioners and assignment of portfolios.  

Although rumours of a dedicated commissioner for Africa were unfounded, the appointment of Jutta Urpilainen to the new role of commissioner for international partnerships – replacing the former post of development commissioner – is a strong signal of ongoing change in EU development thinking, away from bilateral aid towards trade and investment, including by the private sector. 

This may have significant consequences for the EU’s relationship with Africa. In her mission letter to Urpilainen in September, von der Leyen listed the first objective as a new ‘comprehensive strategy for Africa’. Urpilainen, Finland’s finance minister before being posted to Ethiopia as special representative on mediation, has also described her appointment as an opportunity to move on from traditional measures of aid delivery. 

Ambition or incoherence? 

However, this ambition may be at odds with other EU priorities and practices, notably managing migration and institutions and instruments for governing EU–Africa relations that remain rooted in a ‘traditional’ model of North–South development cooperation rather than equitable partnership.

Another newly created post will see Margaritis Schinas assume the role of vice-president for promoting the European way of life – formerly ‘protecting our European way of life’ before a backlash saw it changed – a reminder that migration will remain high on the EU’s foreign policy agenda. The new high representative for foreign and security policy and chief EU diplomat, Josep Borrell, has highlighted the need for bilateral partnership with countries of origin and transit, mainly in Africa. 

Negotiations also continue to stall on a replacement to the Cotonou Agreement, the 20-year partnership framework between the EU and the African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) group of states, which now looks certain to be extended for at least 12 months beyond its expiry in February 2020.

Ambiguities in the EU’s negotiating approach have certainly contributed to the delay: having pushed initially for a separate regional pillar for Africa that would be opened to the North African countries (who are not ACP members) and include a loosely defined role for the African Union, this would later be abandoned in favour of a dual-track process on separate new agreements with the AU and ACP respectively.

The EU also continues to pursue controversial economic partnership agreements under the aegis of Cotonou, despite their increasing appearance of incompatibility with the pathbreaking African Continental Free Trade Area (AfCFTA) – one of the clearest expressions to date of African agency.

The EU has so far attempted to gloss over this incoherence, claiming that EPAs can somehow act as the ‘building blocks’ for Africa-wide economic integration. But tensions are appearing between EU departments and within the commission, with the European External Action Service inclined to prioritize a more strategic continental relationship with the AU, while the Directorate-General for International Cooperation and Development remains committed to the ACP as the conduit for financial support and aid delivery.

And it is unlikely to get away with such incoherence for much longer. Change is now urgent, as numerous countries in sub-Saharan Africa continue to attract the strategic and commercial interests of the EU’s competitors: from established players such as China and potentially in future the UK, which is intent on remodelling its Africa ties post-Brexit, to emerging actors such as Turkey or Russia, which held its first Africa summit in October. 

The need for delivery

If the EU is serious about its rhetoric on equal partnership, it must therefore move beyond convoluted hybrid proposals. Delivering on the Juncker administration’s proposal to increase funding for external action by 30 per cent for 2021–27 would mark an important first step, particularly as this involves streamlining that would see the European Development Fund – the financial instrument for EU-ACP relations – incorporated into the main EU budget.

The new commission should therefore continue to exert pressure on the European Council and European Parliament to adopt this proposal, as negotiations on this financial framework have been repeatedly subject to delay and may not be resolved before the end of the year. 

Beyond this, proactive support for the AfCFTA and for structural transformation more broadly must be prioritized ahead of vague promises for a continent-to-continent free trade agreement, as held out by Juncker in his final State of the Union address in 2018. 

The significance of internal EU reforms for Africa should also not be discounted. The EU’s Common Agricultural Policy, for instance, has placed the African sector at a particular disadvantage and has made it harder to compete even in domestic markets, let alone in the distant EU export markets. EU efforts to stimulate inflows of private investments into the African agricultural sector, abolish import tariffs and offer technical support for African producers to satisfy EU health and safety regulations will be of little use if they are undermined by heavy subsidies across Europe.

Ultimately, changes to job titles alone will be insufficient. The new commission’s rhetoric, while ambitious, differs little from that of the previous decade – Africa has heard the promise of a ‘partnership of equals’ and of ‘shared ownership’ since before the advent of the Joint Africa–EU Strategy in 2007. Now is the time for truly bold steps to implement this vision.

The president of Malta discusses the current security challenges in the Mediterranean region, reflecting on the role of international cooperation in addressing climate change, migration and refugee flows.

The Chagos archipelago in the Indian Ocean has garnered media attention recently after the UK failed to abide by a UN deadline to return the islands to Mauritius. The US has landed in the middle of the dispute as a 1965 agreement with the UK has allowed the US to establish a military base on one of the islands, Diego Garcia, which has since become instrumental in US missions in the Asia-Pacific and the Middle East. 

In February 2019, an Advisory Opinion of the International Court of Justice (ICJ) found that the Chagos archipelago was unlawfully dismembered from Mauritius, in violation of the right to self-determination and that the United Kingdom is under an obligation to end its administration of the Chagos archipelago ‘as rapidly as possible’. The UN General Assembly subsequently voted overwhelmingly in favour of the UK leaving the islands by the end of November 2019 and the right of the former residents who were removed by the UK to return. The UK does not accept the ICJ and UN rulings and argues that the islands are needed to protect Britain from security threats while Mauritius has made clear the base can remain.

Professor Philippe Sands QC, professor of law at University College London and lead counsel for Mauritius on the ICJ case on Legal Consequences of the Separation of the Chagos archipelago from Mauritius in 1965, will be joining Ambassador Richard Burt, US chief negotiator in the Strategic Arms Reduction Talks with the former Soviet Union for a discussion on the fate of the archipelago including the future of the military base and the right of return of former residents.  

Attendance at this event is by invitation only. 

As an important global actor, the UK gathers intelligence material that helps inform decisions on issues such as nuclear proliferation, terrorism, transnational crime and breaches of international humanitarian law. On the flip side, the UK was a major contributor to intelligence failures leading up to the Iraq war in 2003.

Using the UK as a case study and drawing on new research and interviews conducted by Dr Jamie Gaskarth, the panel will reflect on UK intelligence accountability in the context of 21st century politics. How can democratic governments hold intelligence and security agencies to account when what they do is largely secret? Should intelligence organizations create ethics committees allowing the public more input into intelligence decisions? And what has been the impact of technological and social changes, including the rise of artificial intelligence and social media, on the UK intelligence machinery?

This event will be followed by a drinks reception.

Secrets and Spies: UK Intelligence Accountability After Iraq and Snowden is part of the Chatham House Insights book series published jointly with the Brookings Institution Press. Secrets and Spies was the result of a project funded by the British Academy (SG151249). 

COVID-19
This event is proceeding as scheduled, as are other Chatham House events, in accordance with the advice from the UK Government, Foreign and Commonwealth Office and Public Health England. However, we are closely monitoring the spread of COVID-19 and will send updates to attendees as the situation warrants. 
In the meantime, in line with the official advice for returning travellers or visitors to the UK from specified countries and areas (see guidance here), we ask that:

• If you have travelled from Category 1 countries/areas, you refrain from attending the event even if asymptomatic (i.e. even if you are showing no symptoms);
• If you have travelled from Category 2 countries/areas, you refrain from attending the event should you develop symptoms.

If you fall under one of these affected categories and have any questions, please call +44 (0)207 314 3638 or email lbedford@chathamhouse.org.
 

This event is open to Chatham House Corporate Members only. Not a member? Find out more.

For further information on the different types of Chatham House events, visit Our Events Explained.

After a summer of regional tensions and continued uncertainty regarding the future of the JCPOA, the Chatham House MENA Programme held a closed workshop to examine the impact of the Trump administration’s maximum pressure campaign.

Discussions focused on the domestic developments and challenges inside Iran, prospects for new negotiations with Iran, and the regional issues facing the country. Participants also considered the differences between American and European approaches towards Iran.

Summary

• There is a widespread sense that liberal democracy is in crisis, but little consensus exists on the specific nature and causes of the crisis. In particular, there are three prisms through which the crisis is usually seen: the rise of ‘populism’, ‘democratic deconsolidation’, and a ‘hollowing out’ of democracy. Each reflects normative assumptions about democracy.
• The exact role of digital technology in the crisis is disputed. Despite the widely held perception that social media is undermining democracy, the evidence for this is limited. Over the longer term, the further development of digital technology could undermine the fundamental preconditions for democracy – though the pace and breadth of technological change make predictions about its future impact difficult.
• Democracy functions in different ways in different European countries, with political systems on the continent ranging from ‘majoritarian democracies’ such as the UK to ‘consensual democracies’ such as Belgium and Switzerland. However, no type seems to be immune from the crisis. The political systems of EU member states also interact in diverse ways with the EU’s own structure, which is problematic for representative democracy as conventionally understood, but difficult to reform.
• Political parties, central to the model of representative democracy that emerged in the late 18th century, have long seemed to be in decline. Recently there have been some signs of a reversal of this trend, with the emergence of parties that have used digital technology in innovative ways to reconnect with citizens. Traditional parties can learn from these new ‘digital parties’.
• Recent years have also seen a proliferation of experiments in direct and deliberative democracy. There is a need for more experimentation in these alternative forms of democracy, and for further evaluation of how they can be integrated into the existing institutions and processes of representative democracy at the local, regional, national and EU levels.
• We should not think of democracy in a static way – that is, as a system that can be perfected once and for all and then simply maintained and defended against threats. Democracy has continually evolved and now needs to evolve further. The solution to the crisis will not be to attempt to limit democracy in response to pressure from ‘populism’ but to deepen it further as part of a ‘democratization of democracy’.

In the last 100 years, global economic crises from the Great Depression of the 1930s to the 2008 financial crash have contributed to significant political changes in Europe, often leading to a rise in popularity for extremist parties and politics. As Europe contends with a perceived crisis of democracy - now compounded by the varied responses to the coronavirus outbreak - how should we understand the relationship between externally-driven economic crises, political upheaval and democracy?

The panellists will consider the parallels between the political responses to some of the greatest economic crises Europe has experienced in the last century. Given that economic crises often transcend borders, why does political disruption vary between democracies? What can history tell us about the potential political impact of the unfolding COVID-19-related economic crisis? And will the unprecedented financial interventions by governments across Europe fundamentally change the expectations citizens have of the role government should play in their lives?

This event is based on a recent article in The World Today by Hans Kundnani and Pepijn Bergsen who are both researchers in Chatham House's Europe Programme. 'Crawling from the Wreckage' is the first in a series of articles that look at key themes in European political discourse from the last century. You can read the article here. 

This event is open to Chatham House Members. Not a member? Find out more.

• Meeting future global food security requirements is not just about quantity; it is also about meeting growing needs in a way that safeguards human as well as planetary health. But national priorities and policies often remain out of sync with aspirations for more sustainable and healthy food systems.
• International trade and trade policies play an ambiguous role in the current food system. With 80 per cent of the world’s population depending on imports to meet at least part of their food and nutritional requirements, trade has a unique function in offsetting imbalances between supply and demand. However, in the absence of effective regulatory frameworks or pricing frameworks that internalize environmental, social or health costs, trade can exacerbate and globalize challenges associated with food production and land use trends such as deforestation, land degradation, greenhouse gas emissions, biodiversity loss and the shift to unhealthy diets.
• Over the last two decades, trade in agricultural products (excluding intra-EU flows) has more than tripled in value, to reach $1.33 trillion. The geography of global food trade flows has also shifted, primarily towards South–South trade, which now accounts for roughly a quarter of total agricultural trade flows. The nature of global trade has changed drastically, with traditional exports such as wheat and coffee growing slowly at around 2 per cent per year, while products such as palm oil, fruit juice, soft drinks and other processed products have grown at 8 per cent or more annually.
• This overall increase in trade in agricultural products raises questions about the growing utilization of resources, such as water or soil nutrients, that are embedded in those products through production and processing. Trade itself also causes negative environmental impacts, starting with greenhouse gas emissions associated with transport and storage. If the environmental cost associated with production and trade is not reflected in the final price of goods, trade may accelerate the depletion of resources or their unsustainable use.
• It is critical to ensure that trade policy options pursued by producing and consuming countries alike will support a transition to more sustainable and healthier food and land use systems. The first step in addressing trade-related food systems challenges must involve rebuilding trust among policy actors. There is a need for new spaces for informal dialogue among actors, and ‘soft’ governance mechanisms that can help rebuild consensus on the best ways forward. Meeting these challenges also requires an appreciation of the complex interactions between sectoral policies (e.g. on water, land, food, etc.) and their multiple interfaces with trade policies. 
• Conditioning the use of subsidies on their sustainability and/or health impacts encourages the delivery of essential public goods in ways that are consistent with sustainability and health goals. A first step therefore is the removal of perverse incentives (e.g. subsidies encouraging the overuse of fertilizers or pesticides or the overproduction of certain commodities, as well as certain biofuels subsidies) and replacing them with market-correcting subsidies.
• Trade facilitation measures for fruits and vegetables that are aimed at easing transit at the border, by cutting unnecessary bureaucracy and reducing waiting times, can improve their availability, reduce costs and improve food quality and safety for consumers. Similarly, measures aimed at improving sustainable cold storage and upgrading value chains can support better diets and consumption by increasing the availability of fresh produce on markets, especially in developing countries.
• A global food stamps programme developed through the G20 and facilitated by the UN’s food agencies could address purchasing power imbalances and tackle malnutrition in developing countries. If carefully designed, such ‘safety net’ schemes can not only contribute to improving calorific intakes but also help deliver more balanced and healthier diets. Careful attention must be given to how such a scheme would work in practice, building on experience to date with similar initiatives.
• Integrating the notion of sustainable food and inputs trade in the post-2020 global biodiversity framework can help to deliver more sustainable and healthier food and land use systems. This could be achieved by likeminded countries introducing a set of goals or targets aimed at mitigating the role of trade in placing indirect pressure on biodiversity, and to encourage trade in biodiversity-based products including natural ingredients produced ethically and following sustainability principles and criteria.
• An SDG-oriented agenda for agricultural trade is needed. It could be formed by countries seeking to remove perverse incentives, guaranteeing a safe harbour for market-correcting measures, clarifying existing rules and establishing plurilateral negotiations among subsets of the WTO membership, or sectoral approaches, to address specific challenges.
• Greenhouse gas emissions resulting from trade need to be addressed. Governments could seek to achieve this through ensuring the carbon neutrality of existing and new trade deals, either by connecting carbon markets among contracting parties or by developing joint initiatives to tax international maritime and air transport emissions.

One year ago, during the last annual Conference of Parties (COP) held in Katowice, the Polish government launched a Solidarity and Just Transition Declaration, signed by 56 governments including the UK, making the case for why the green transition must be just.

Three years earlier in 2015, the landmark Paris Agreement also included provisions for a just transition where it stated that the decarbonization process should be ‘Taking into account the imperatives of a just transition of the workforce and the creation of decent work and quality jobs in accordance with nationally defined development priorities’. In practice, however, the concept of a just transition has not yet been implemented and has not been sufficiently considered by governments or corporations around the world.

The social unrest that has erupted in Chile’s capital Santiago over the past month, which has forced the Chilean government to ask to move this year’s COP to Madrid, is a case in point. This discontent clearly shows that climate action cannot be separated from social justice concerns. There has not been a real commitment by governments to ensure a just transition based on social dialogue from the local to the national level. This was seen in France with the gilets jaunes protests in November 2018 – one month after President Emmanuel Macron ended the so-called ‘fortune tax’ and instead introduced taxes on diesel fuel as part of an effort to transition to green energy – and the current situation in Chile has some striking parallels. 

Sustainability transitions are a complex web of political choices and investment decisions which affect countries and societies in many different ways. Questions of social justice are everywhere, but in most cases, poorly understood by decision-makers. For example, although poverty has been reduced significantly over the last decade, Chile has one of the worst rates of inequality in Latin America and the highest Gini index in the OECD. The decisions taken in 2017 to power Metro de Santiago with solar photovoltaics and wind energy are commendable from a climate perspective, however, it led to students and young people protesting against rises in subway fares in October 2019.

They were joined by Chileans who are frustrated with rising living costs and by workers and trade unions struggling with low wages. As reported by the Chilean Human Rights Commission (INDH), so far more than 4,200 people have been arrested and more than 1,300 injured and hospitalized.

Climate negotiations beyond technicalities

This time there is also another important dimension to the protests: social unrest as a reaction to worsening inequality has the potential to derail multilateral cooperation on climate change and other global issues. Since tackling climate change is a race against the clock, the world faces the challenge of addressing both urgency and equity. The world cannot afford delays and needs to move fast but decision-makers need to take time for deliberation and civic participation to avoid rapid and ill-conceived transitions which eventually meet public resistance.

Many technical experts and negotiators, who often unintentionally divorce climate policy and technical discussions about emission reductions from social justice concerns, have been caught by surprise by the cancellation of the negotiations. For this year’s COP, one important focus of the official negotiations are the so-called 'Article 6 Rules' – the accounting mechanisms and modalities for a new form of international interaction on carbon markets and off-setting to ensure carbon markets can support countries in enhancing the ambitions of their stated climate action, known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). 

What is becoming much more obvious now is that just transitions are at least equally important for achieving NDCs and other long-term mitigation strategies.

In order to meet the 1.5 degree target, stated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the world will have to invest an average of around $3 trillion a year over the next three decades in transforming its energy supply systems. But how can we ensure that these investments benefit low-income communities? Will they further increase everyday living costs? The climate finance related discussions focussing on commercially-oriented investments for low-carbon energy systems in most cases only consider the aspect of affordability, but not the other important principles of alternative ‘just’ energy finance, such as good governance, due process, intra-generational equity, spatial equity and financial resilience. Investments to support just transitions need to ensure investments, not only for large energy infrastructure, but also in the jobs, skills and work vital to both adaptation and mitigation.

Just transitions for a circular economy

The just transition concept is also the entry point to broader discussions about inclusive economic transformations, questioning the dominant paradigm of consumerism and ending the wasteful use of critical resources. The current linear economic model of take-make-throw away – in Chile epitomized by the linear extractive model of the mining sector that has contributed to widening inequality – the linear extractive model is not only destructive on the natural environment but also destructive for social cohesion.

In Chile, the commodity boom in copper production – the country accounts for about 30 per cent of the world’s output – and more recently lithium – which is used in batteries for mobile phones, laptops and electric cars – have generated enormous prosperity in Chile. But the wealth has been unequally distributed and has not been used to lay the foundation for raising the overall level of incomes.

A socially embedded and inclusive circular economy can, therefore, be a way forward from the current situation the Latin American country finds itself in. The circular economy was intended to feature prominently during the 25th COP and Chile’s policies – from the Ministry of Environment and Chile's Production Development Corporation (CORFO) – have played an important role in supporting the development of a circular economy, launching in 2018, the first public circular economy programme in Latin America. 

The government’s support for start-up companies and entrepreneurs to develop inclusive circular economy business models is the right approach to addressing the issues of waste, employment, services for low-income communities and local economic development. These are solutions that need to be scaled up having the potential to reduce Chile’s economic reliance on the dominant extractive model.

As a global community, it is necessary to address the environmental and social objectives equally as not addressing social objectives will become an obstacle in achieving climate mitigation and solving other environmental issues. 

The Chilean protests are a wake-up call and present an opportunity for the global climate change community – which includes governments – to ensure just transitions are implemented in practice.

A ground-breaking research project from Chatham House, supported by The Power of Nutrition, is exploring the business case for tackling undernutrition, micronutrient deficiencies and overnutrition. Companies across all sectors hold huge, transformative power to save countless lives and transform their own financial prospects. To act, they need more compelling evidence of the potential for targeted investments and strategies to promote better nutrition and create healthier, more productive workforces and consumers.

At this workshop, Chatham House will engage business decision-makers in a scenario exercise that explores different nutrition futures and their commercial prospects in each before examining what different strategies business can pursue to maximize future profitability through investments in nutrition.

Attendance at this event is by invitation only.

The UK will host the 26th Conference of the Parties (COP26) in November 2020 in Glasgow. In the run up, Chatham House is organizing a monthly briefing series targeted to:

• The diplomatic service based in London, in particular, staff of the London embassies who are reporting on climate change issues.
• Senior UK government civil servants, officials and politicians engaged in climate change.
• Academics, experts, business representatives and NGOs.

The first briefing in the series focuses on the results from COP25 held in Madrid in December 2019 and what this means for 2020.

This briefings series offer an opportunity to discuss, in an informal setting, the most pressing and complex climate issues of the day with UK and international government officials and experts.

The circular economy, that minimizes waste and keeps materials and products in circulation for as long as possible, is increasingly regarded as a promising model for driving sustainable and resilient economic growth in both developed and emerging economies. To successfully scale circular practices and ensure the transition from a linear to a circular model leaves no one behind, an inclusive and collaborative approach is required.

• Inclusive policy approaches for solving the global waste crisis.
• Financing the circular economy and closing the investment gap.

• Trade in the circular economy: closed local economies or global collaborating systems?

During the second day of the conference, more specific circular economy themes are discussed in virtual panels including the following topics:

• Beyond plastic recycling: innovations for sustainable packaging.
• Advancing multilateral action on marine plastic pollution.
• Industry 4.0 and circular economy: identifying opportunities for developing countries.

The Chatham House Circular Economy conference forms part of the programme of events to celebrate the Chatham House Centenary highlighting the main goals for the institute’s second century.

The seventh annual meeting of the New Petroleum Producers Discussion Group brings together people from the group's member countries. The meeting includes an international discussion, a national seminar and a range of policy-relevant courses which have been specially tailored to the priorities of the group. This year’s international discussion focused on ‘Building Capacity and Institutions’.

The New Petroleum Producers Discussion Group was first established in 2012 and provides a unique forum which brings together governments from over 30 new and prospective oil and gas producers to share their ideas and experiences. The group is jointly coordinated by Chatham House, the Commonwealth Secretariat, and the Natural Resource Governance Institute (NRGI).

This event was hosted by the Ministry of Energy of Uganda.

The 2019–20 fire season in Australia has been unprecedented. To date, an estimated 18 million hectares of fire has cut swathes through the bush – an area greater than that of the average European country and over five times the size of blazes in the Amazon.

This reflects previous predictions of Australian science. Since 2008 and as recently as 2018, scientific bodies have warned that climate change will exacerbate existing conditions for fires and other climatic disasters in Australia. What used to be once-in-a-generation fires now re-appear within 10–15 years with increased ferocity, over longer seasons.

In a country known for climate denial and division, debate has erupted around bushfire management and climate change. One of these is whether controlled burns are the answer to Australia’s climate-affected fire conditions.

There is no single risk reduction strategy. Controlled burning remains key, if adapted to the environment and climate. 

But when three out of four seasons in a year can support destructive bushfires, there are clear limits to what controlled burning and other fire management techniques can achieve. Other ‘adaptation’ measures are also likely to provoke intense debate – including bush clearance. As one Australian expert offered to highlight where Australia has got to, families should probably not go on holiday to bush and beach during the height of summer when temperatures and fire risk peaks. 

So, unless Australia is prepared to debate radical changes to where people live and how land is used, the limits to adaptation imply the need for mitigation. This means supporting ambitious global greenhouse emissions reductions targets. As research from Victoria, one fire-prone state in Australia, highlights, ‘the emissions pathway we follow is the largest determinant of change to many variables [such as temperature] beyond the next few decades.’

Can Australia become a more active global partner on emissions?

Australia accounts for just over one per cent of global emissions, so reducing domestic emissions – even though on a per capita basis they are the highest in the world – will not reduce Australia’s climate risk. Showing international leadership and supporting a powerful coalition of the willing to tackle climate change is the only way ahead. By showing a willingness to adopt climate ambition, Australia can help more constructive worldwide action, and thereby reduce its own risk exposure. 

Leading by example is a politically difficult issue for Australia. Prime Minister Scott Morrison was re-elected in May 2019 on an economic stability platform, and a promise not to imperil employment growth through climate action. Australia has contested UN estimates that it will not meet its existing modest goals for domestic emissions, by seeking to rely on carryover credits from action under the Kyoto Protocol as proof of progress.

It has also distanced itself from concerns over global supply and demand in fossil fuels. Australia remains a global supplier for fossil fuels, including coal – the nation’s coal exports accounted for $67 billion in revenues in 2019 in an expanding but changing Asian market, supplying ‘some of the cheapest electricity in the world’.

Possible influencers of change

With Australians experiencing first-hand the risks of climate change, there is already pressure to do more. Many are sceptical this will translate into domestic targets or export policies that give Australia the moral authority to ask for more action on the global stage.

Here, diverse groups who share a common interest in seeing Australia recover from the bushfires and address future climate risks could be key.

Importantly this includes rural and urban-fringe communities affected by the bushfires. They were part of Morrison’s traditional supporter-base but are angry at the government’s handling of the crisis and increasingly see how tiptoeing around emissions (including exports) has also ‘buried’ open discussion at home on climate-readiness.

Australian states could also find themselves taking a lead role. Virtually all jurisdictions have now committed to their own goals, most based on zero-carbon goals by 2050 (as has New Zealand). These can support modelling for Australia’s energy transition from coal, through gas, to market competitive renewables, while also help to ensure this reflects community expectations on jobs, electricity prices and other costs. 

Other emerging voices include the insurance and banking sectors (the Reserve Bank of Australia warned of the long-term financial stability risks of climate change before the fires) and indigenous Australians (one group of Torres Strait Islanders have filed a complaint to the UN Human Rights Committee which, if heard, will place Australia’s emissions record under the spotlight again). Their challenge now is finding a common language on what a cohesive approach to addressing climate change risk looks like. 

The international picture is mixed. The United States’ poor federal climate policy is a buffer for Australia. French President Emmanuel Macron has tried to raise the cost of inaction for Australia in current EU–Australia trade negotiations, but many large emitters in the Indo-Pacific region remain key Australian trading partners, investors and buyers of Australian coal. 

In the meantime, the United Kingdom is preparing for the meeting of parties to the Paris Agreement in Glasgow in November. A key global event following Brexit, the UK will no doubt be hoping to encourage a leadership circle with national commitments that meet global need to make the Glasgow meeting a success.

The UK public has expressed enormous sympathy for Australia in the bushfires and outrage over ‘climate denialism.’ Australia’s experience will be a cautionary tale of the effects of climate change at the meeting. Could the UK also support Australia to become a less reluctant partner in global climate action?

The world is currently witnessing how vulnerable existing production and consumption systems are, with the current global health crisis harshly exposing the magnitude of the risks associated with the global economy in its current form, grounded, as it is, in a linear system that uses a ‘take–make–throw away’ approach.

These ‘linear risks’ associated with the existing global supply chain system are extremely high for national economies overly dependent on natural resource extraction and exports of commodities like minerals and metals. Equally vulnerable are countries with large manufacturing sectors of ready-made garments and non-repairable consumer goods for western markets. Furthermore, workers and communities working in these sectors are vulnerable to these changes as a result of disruptive technologies and reduced demand.

In a recently published Chatham House research paper, ‘Promoting a Just Transition to an Inclusive Circular Economy’, we highlight why a circular economy approach presents the world with a solution to old and new global risks – from marine plastic pollution to climate change and resource scarcity.

Taking the long view

So far, action to transition to a circular economy has been slow compared to the current crisis which has mobilized rapid global action. For proponents of transitioning to a circular economy, this requires taking the long view. The pandemic has shown us that global emergencies can fast-forward processes that otherwise might take years, even decades, to play out or reverse achievements which have taken years to accomplish.

In this vein, there are three striking points of convergence between the COVID-19 pandemic and the need to transition to an inclusive circular economy.

Firstly, the current crisis is a stark reminder that the circular economy is not only necessary to ensure long-term resource security but also short-term supplies of important materials. In many cities across the US, the UK and Europe, councils have suspended recycling to focus on essential waste collection services. The UK Recycling Association, for example, has warned about carboard shortages due to disrupted recycling operations with possible shortages for food and medicine packaging on the horizon.

Similarly, in China, most recycling sites were shut during the country’s lockdown presenting implications for global recycling markets with additional concerns that there will be a fibre shortage across Europe and possibly around the world.

Furthermore, worldwide COVID-19 lockdowns are resulting in a resurgence in the use of single-use packaging creating a new wave of plastic waste especially from food deliveries – already seen in China – with illegal waste fly-tipping dramatically increasing in the UK since the lockdown.

In this vein, concerns over the current global health crisis is reversing previous positive trends where many cities had established recycling schemes and companies and consumers had switched to reusable alternatives.

Secondly, the need to improve the working conditions of the people working in the informal circular economy, such as waste pickers and recyclers, is imperative. Many waste materials and recyclables that are being handled and collected may be contaminated as a result of being mixed with medical waste.

Now, more than ever, key workers in waste management, collection and recycling require personal protective equipment and social protection to ensure their safety as well as the continuation of essential waste collection so as not to increase the potential for new risks associated with additional infectious diseases.

In India, almost 450 million workers including construction workers, street vendors and landless agricultural labourers, work in the informal sector. In the current climate, the poorest who are unable to work pose a great risk to the Indian economy which could find itself having to shut down.

Moreover, many informal workers live in make-shift settlements areas such as Asia’s largest slum, Dharavi in Mumbai, where health authorities are now facing serious challenges to contain the spread of the disease. Lack of access to handwashing and sanitation facilities, however, further increase these risks but circular, decentralized solutions could make important contributions to sustainable sanitation, health and improved community resilience.

Thirdly, it is anticipated that in the long term several global supply chains will be radically changed as a result of transformed demand patterns and the increase in circular practices such as urban mining for the recovery and recycling of metals or the reuse and recycling of textile fibres and localized additive manufacturing (e.g. 3D printing).

Many of these supply chains and trade flows have now been already severely disrupted due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, the global garment industry has been particularly hard-hit due to the closure of outlets amid falling demand for apparel.

It is important to note, workers at the bottom of these garment supply chains are among the most vulnerable and most affected by the crisis as global fashion brands, for example, have been cancelling orders – in the order of $6 billion in the case of Bangladesh alone. Only after intense negotiations are some brands assuming financial responsibility in the form of compensation wage funds to help suppliers in Myanmar, Cambodia and Bangladesh to pay workers during the ongoing crisis.

In addition, the current pandemic is damaging demand for raw materials thereby affecting mining countries. Demand for Africa’s commodities in China, for example, has declined significantly, with the impact on African economies expected to be serious, with 15 per cent of the world’s copper and 20 per cent of the world’s zinc mines currently going offline. 

A further threat is expected to come from falling commodity prices as a result of the curtailment of manufacturing activity in China particularly for crude oil, copper, iron ore and other industrial commodities which, in these cases, will have direct impacts on the Australian and Canadian mining sectors.

This is all being compounded by an associated decline in consumer demand worldwide. For example, many South African mining companies – leading producers of metals and minerals – have started closing their mining operations following the government’s announcement of a lockdown in order to prevent the transmission of the virus among miners who often work in confined spaces and in close proximity with one another. As workers are laid off due to COVID-19, there are indications that the mining industry will see fast-tracking towards automated mining operations. 

All of these linear risks that have been exposed through the COVID-19 pandemic reinforce the need for a just transition to a circular economy. But while the reduction in the consumption of resources is necessary to achieve sustainability, the social impacts on low- and middle- income countries and their workers requires international support mechanisms.

In addition, the current situation also highlights the need to find a new approach to globalized retail chains and a balance between local and global trade based on international cooperation across global value chains rather than implementation of trade protectionist measures.

In this vein, all of the recovery plans from the global COVID-19 pandemic need to be aligned with the principles of an inclusive circular economy in order to ensure both short-term and long-term resilience and preparedness for future challenges and disruptions.  

Avoiding the worst economic, social and environmental risks of climate change requires a better understanding of what those risks may be. Decision-makers need information on the full range of risks that climate change poses, across the full spectrum of probabilities. Monitoring the nature and severity of these risks is essential if decision-makers are to make the right choices about effective mitigation and adaptation responses.

To meet this need, international scientists and policy analysts in the UK (including at Chatham House) and China have been engaged in a multi-year, multi-disciplinary, and collaborative research process. This has deepened understandings of how these complex, interconnected first, second and third-order risks can be better assessed and tracked.

Phase one, culminating in 2015 and involving experts, demonstrated how general principles of risk assessment could be applied in relation to climate change.

Phase two (culminating in 2019) was a bilateral cooperation between the UK and China that was agreed during President Xi Jinping’s state visit to the UK in 2015. It addressed a specific recommendation from phase one - that risk assessments need to be made on a regular and consistent basis - by providing a proof of concept indicator framework.

Substantive project funding for phases 1 and 2 was provided by the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, with additional contributions and in-kind support from the China Expert Panel on Climate Change, the UK Government Office for Science, the Skoll Global Threats Fund, the Global Challenges Foundation, the UK Institute and Faculty of Actuaries, and Willis Research Network (phase 1); and Chatham House, China Expert Panel on Climate Change, UK Committee on Climate Change, International Energy Agency, Willis Towers Watson (phase 2).

Many institutions contributed to the project under phases 1 and 2 (see reports for full list of contributors).

• Phase 1 report, 2015: Climate Change: A Risk Assessment
• Phase 2 report, 2018: Developing Indicators of Climate Risk

Chatham House now leads a third phase of this project (2020 to 2022), funded by the Prosperity Fund of the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office. The purpose is to help ensure emissions reduction and resilience strategies, policies and decision-making - both in China and globally - are better informed by an evidence-based perspective on climate-change risks.

Under the guidance of the China Expert Committee on Climate Change and the UK Committee on Climate Change, the programme is building on the risk indicator and risk assessment work developed in Phase 1 and 2.

This phase of work has four complementary workstreams looking at emissions risks, direct climate risks, systemic climate risks and the integration of climate risks into Chinese and international governance frameworks. Embedded throughout the project is considerations of gender and inclusion（G&I) which are fundamental to achieve climate-compatible development.

The programme is delivered through a cohort of partner organisations based in both China and the UK, including Chatham House, E3G (Third Generation Environmentalism), Hubei University of Economics, National Climate Centre of China, Tsinghua University and the University of Reading.

Finance plays a key role in enabling climate change mitigation and adaptation. It is also a contested issue in the UN climate negotiations. The fourth event in the Chatham House COP26 Diplomatic Briefing Series will explore the politics of climate finance in the context of the COP, and provide a comprehensive update of the main climate finance-related negotiation items and processes. The topic is particularly timely given that the UK Government has made climate finance one of its top thematic priorities for COP26 and that 2020 constitutes the deadline for developed countries to mobilise USD 100 billion per year to support climate action in developing countries.