Temporaliseret risiko i klimapolitisk forhandling i FN-systemet: En analyse over tid af risiko kommunikeret igennem Klimakonventionen, Kyotoprotokollen og Parisaftalen

Abstract

This thesis studies temporalized climate change risk communication in the United Nations IPCC negotiations, through empirical analysis of the UNFCCC, Kyoto Protocol and Paris Agreement. By using a discourse analysis approach, searching for risk communication, and applying systems theory analysis, to observe in a temporal perspective, it shows what discourses and logics appear in the communication in relation to the danger from climate change, and the significance this has had over time, and aspects of communication the UN system has blinded itself to. The results highlight the use of the discourses adverse impacts of climate change and urgent threat of climate change, as examples of the progress over time, that are used to legitimize or rationalize which decisions must be made when, depending on what becomes a political priority, based on the logics, that include power, rights, resources, welfare, science, technology and ecosystems, which have been more or less constant over time. It can be concluded that the UN system sets up a fundamental paradox for its own functionality as a negotiator of climate agreements and opportunities to make decisions. This may mean that necessary climate measures will never be fixed politically through negotiations in the UN system. It also concludes that the temporalized approach to the temporal understanding of risk with open horizons, noticeable throughout all risk communications in the negotiations, creates a challenge in relation to our existing time calculation, thus disqualifying our jointly decided chronological calculation of time in relation to climate risks and necessary decisions made in the present.