Climate Change

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In my diagram, I presented the main points of the Copenhagen Accord and the strategies the United State tried to use to support other opposing countries. I started with climate change, which was one of the main points in the article. I stated with this because people realized that climate change has become a serious issue. I then connected climate change to how the United state proposes the Copenhagen Accord. To have the Copenhagen Accord put into effect, the United States needs to find allies. In order for the United States to get allies they offered money to other countries if they joined them on their plan. They offered money to smaller countries, like Maldives. The United States offered a large amount of money and the countries would accept the offer because the climate change affected them significantly. The United States also threaten to stop all communication with other countries if they did not agree with them. One country that was mentioned that the United States threatened to stop all communication with was Ethiopia. Ethiopia was against joining the Accord, which is when the United States sent them a confidentiality cable saying to sign the accord. After they realized the threat threat that the unites States was opposing, Ethiopia and decided to join the Accord. If certain countries did not agree with the United States, they spied on them using confidentiality cables. When WikiLeaks leaked about the United States using cables to spy on opposing countries. Because of the spying on the opposing countries, the United states lost the trust of all the opposing countries.

The way the United States handles this whole situation was selfish and untrustworthy. The United States using the cables caused countries to lose their trust and not want to join them on the Copenhagen Accord. Although some of the countries were suffering from climate change, they still chose not to join the United Stated after WikiLeaks leaked about the cables. I think that it was right and fair for the cables to be leaked. The other countries had a right to know about what the United States was doing. The countries had a right to know because the United States bribed them and threatened them. With the United States, the countries signed the Accord for the wrong reasons. Climate change, a collective action problem, is a problem is every country. The United States should have gone about the subject of greenhouse emissions in another way.

3 thoughts on “Climate Change

  1. Hi, my name is Chloe! I really enjoyed looking at your diagram because it explains the steps of the situation very well. I would agree that the trust from other countries was completely lost after the United States was unfair about the way they handled the situation. The U.S definitely could have chosen a different way to go about solving problems of the greenhouse emissions.

    here is a link to my post! http://sites.psu.edu/geog30/2016/04/27/module9/

  2. Hello kxb5453,
    My name is Ralph Diaz and the link to my post is: https://wp.me/s3RCAy-52552. I agree with Gershom — The United States is coming in as a country that has used fossil fuels extensively to develop our infrastructure, military, research, etc. and we are trying to tell other developing countries that they cannot have this luxury. This is not our place to be saying these things. I think our efforts are much better used in doing our best to reduce our own carbon footprint rather than telling others that they need to make a mutual agreement with us for everyone to reduce their carbon footprints. The idea is not practical in the first place — the people in the country create the carbon footprint, so the government should be focusing on the people to reduce it.

  3. Hi, names Gershom Espinoza and here’s my bloghttp://geog030.dutton.psu.edu/2016/04/09/module-9-leverage-is-key/. I would say that in reality opposing countries “trust” the U.S. as long as it is advantageous for them (in this case they get aide but even then they doubt that we would keep our word so…) Personally, the chances of a majority of countries agreeing to limit their production wouldn’t happen without the use of strong-arming because it is in a countries’ best interest to not (especially for developing countries). If anything I would argue that developed nations should have a treaty amongst themselves that limits their emission growth rate as they have already “peaked” while other countries have not (developing nations have their own as well but suitable to their circumstances).

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