TY - JOUR A1 - Bang, Guri A1 - Hovi, Jon A1 - Sprinz, Detlef F. T1 - US presidents and the failure to ratify multilateral environmental agreements JF - Climate policy N2 - Whereas the US President signed the Kyoto Protocol, the failure of the US Congress to ratify it seriously hampered subsequent international climate cooperation. This recent US trend, of signing environmental treaties but failing to ratify them, could thwart attempts to come to a future climate agreement. Two complementary explanations of this trend are proposed. First, the political system of the US has distinct institutional features that make it difficult for presidents to predict whether the Senate will give its advice and consent to multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) and whether Congress will pass the required enabling legislation. Second, elected for a fixed term, US presidents might benefit politically from supporting MEAs even when knowing that legislative support is not forthcoming. Four policy implications are explored, concerning the scope for unilateral presidential action, the potential for bipartisan congressional support, the effectiveness of a treaty without the US, and the prospects for a deep, new climate treaty. Policy relevance Why does the failure of US ratification of multilateral environmental treaties occur? This article analyses the domestic political mechanisms involved in cases of failed US ratification. US non-participation in global environmental institutions often has serious ramifications. For example, it sharply limited Kyoto's effectiveness and seriously hampered international climate negotiations for years. Although at COP 17 in Durban the parties agreed to negotiate a new agreement by 2015, a new global climate treaty may well trigger a situation resembling the one President Clinton faced in 1997 when he signed Kyoto but never obtained support for it in the Senate. US failure to ratify could thwart future climate agreements. KW - enabling legislation KW - environmental treaties KW - Kyoto Protocol KW - political processes KW - ratification KW - United States Y1 - 2012 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1080/14693062.2012.699788 SN - 1469-3062 VL - 12 IS - 6 SP - 755 EP - 763 PB - Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group CY - Abingdon ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Dirnitrov, Radoslav A1 - Hovi, Jon A1 - Sprinz, Detlef F. A1 - Saelen, Håkon A1 - Underdal, Arild T1 - Institutional and environmental effectiveness BT - will the Paris Agreement work? JF - Wiley interdisciplinary reviews : Climate change N2 - The 2015 Paris Agreement (PA) has been widely hailed as a diplomatic triumph and a breakthrough in global climate cooperation. However, it is commonly accepted that the PA's collective goal—keeping global warming “well below” 2°C above preindustrial levels—remains ambitious. Making matters even more challenging, in 2017, global CO2 emissions resumed growth after 3 years of near standstill. In 2018, this growth accelerated. It is therefore extremely important that the PA's institutional architecture meet expectations concerning its ability to induce member countries to promise and deliver emissions reductions. This study offers a review of the rapidly growing literature on the PA, to assess its strengths and weaknesses, its significance, and its prospects. We focus on evaluations of its institutional structure and its ability to induce member countries to implement policies. We frame the issues as a trilemma: the challenge of simultaneously satisfying all three main conditions for effectiveness—broad participation, deep commitments, and satisfactory compliance rates. Based on our review, we conclude that the key challenge for the PA will likely be to facilitate sufficiently fast ratcheting‐up of nationally determined contributions, while keeping compliance rates high. KW - ambition KW - climate change cooperation KW - compliance KW - Paris Agreement KW - participation Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1002/wcc.583 SN - 1757-7780 SN - 1757-7799 VL - 10 IS - 4 PB - Wiley CY - Hoboken ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Hovi, Jon A1 - Huseby, R A1 - Sprinz, Detlef F. T1 - When do (imposed) economic sanctions work? N2 - Previous research has documented only a modest success rate for imposed sanctions. By contrast, the success rate is higher in cases that are settled at the threat stage. In this article, the authors provide new insights about the circumstances under which sanctions cause behavioral change only after being imposed. First, the target must initially underestimate the impact of sanctions, miscalculate the sender's determination to impose them, or wrongly believe that sanctions will be imposed and maintained whether it yields or not. Second, the target's misperceptions must be corrected after sanctions are imposed. A game-theoretical model with incomplete information is used to develop and clarify the argument Y1 - 2005 ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Hovi, Jon A1 - Sprinz, Detlef F. A1 - Saelen, Håkon A1 - Underdal, Arild T1 - The Club Approach: A Gateway to Effective Climate Co-operation? JF - British Journal of Political Science N2 - Although the Paris Agreement arguably made some progress, interest in supplementary approaches to climate change co-operation persist. This article examines the conditions under which a climate club might emerge and grow. Using agent-based simulations, it shows that even with less than a handful of major actors as initial members, a club can eventually reduce global emissions effectively. To succeed, a club must be initiated by the ‘right’ constellation of enthusiastic actors, offer sufficiently large incentives for reluctant countries and be reasonably unconstrained by conflicts between members over issues beyond climate change. A climate club is particularly likely to persist and grow if initiated by the United States and the European Union. The combination of club-good benefits and conditional commitments can produce broad participation under many conditions. KW - UNFCCC KW - climate change co-operation KW - climate clubs KW - club goods KW - conditional commitments KW - agent-based models Y1 - 2019 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1017/S0007123416000788 SN - 0007-1234 SN - 1469-2112 VL - 49 IS - 3 SP - 1071 EP - 1096 PB - Cambridge University Press CY - New York ER - TY - JOUR A1 - Sælen, Håkon A1 - Hovi, Jon A1 - Sprinz, Detlef F. A1 - Underdal, Arild T1 - How US withdrawal might influence cooperation under the Paris climate agreement JF - Environmental science & policy N2 - Using a novel agent-based model, we study how US withdrawal might influence the political process established by the Paris Agreement, and hence the prospects for reaching the collective goal to limit warming below 2 degrees C. Our model enables us to analyze to what extent reaching this goal despite US withdrawal would place more stringent requirements on other core elements of the Paris cooperation process. We find, first, that the effect of a US withdrawal depends critically on the extent to which member countries reciprocate others' promises and contributions. Second, while the 2 degrees C goal will likely be reached only under a very small set of conditions in any event, even temporary US withdrawal will further narrow this set significantly. Reaching this goal will then require other countries to step up their ambition at the first opportunity and to comply nearly 100% with their pledges, while maintaining high confidence in the Paris Agreements institutions. Third, although a US withdrawal will first primarily affect the United States' own emissions, it will eventually prove even more detrimental to other countries' emissions. KW - climate change KW - Paris agreement KW - President Trump KW - 2 degrees C target KW - agent-based modeling KW - reciprocity Y1 - 2020 U6 - https://doi.org/10.1016/j.envsci.2020.03.011 SN - 1462-9011 SN - 1873-6416 VL - 108 SP - 121 EP - 132 PB - Elsevier CY - Oxford ER -