Climate science, the politics of climate change and futures of IR

Bibliographic Data

ID4789995
AuthorsRichard Beardsworth (0000-0002-4252-3518, University of Leeds, corresponding author)
Year2020
Volume34
Issue3
Pages374-390
Publication date2020-09-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueInternational Relations (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0047-1178 • E-ISSN: 1741-2862
PublisherSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0047117820946365
OpenAlexW3048430192
LanguageEN
Citations received5

This article considers what is necessary politically to respond to the empirical challenge of climate change and to the present calls of climate science (a carbon-neutral world by 2050). Its basic argument is that, among an array of national and international actors, it remains the state that can drive a successful politics of climate change. Without the heavy-lifting of the state and the state's ability as a national entity to motivate behavioural change, neither the daunting scale nor imminent time-horizon of climate mitigation and adaptation is possible. The article shows how this specific argument, far from pitching anew nationalism against internationalism, can bring the two presently polarized movements together. The article then suggests that if these arguments are essentially valid, the discipline of International Relations needs to focus much more on the climate challenge, re-engage with its traditions of thought on the state and help harbour a specific disposition or mindset in the research and teaching of the discipline for the next decades: a fierce optimism

Argument (complex analysis) · Climate change · Economics · Environmental ethics · Epistemology · Futures contract · Mindset · Nationalism · Political economy · Political economy of climate change · Political science · Politics · Positive economics · Social science · Sociology · Climate Change Policy and Economics · Global Energy Security and Policy · Law · Sustainability and Climate Change Governance

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Open DOIOpen Access