Adaptation funds have been on the negotiations agenda for several years now. Industrialised countries, including progressive countries like Denmark, have run away from committing anything concrete, and developing countries have not been able to pin down any liability on them. Now, out of the blue, they start flashing their wallets again, and commit a paltry US $1.5 million for least developed countries, while announcing that the other developing countries won’t get any, because they’re not being good!

Denmark is eager to get developing countries to ‘start talking’ about future developing country commitments. Instead of relying on financial muscle, they should remember the ethical responsibility they committed themselves to, and understand that any such talk is ‘in bad faith’ in the current climate of global distrust. Developed countries are afraid that ‘just talking’ about commitments could be the first step down a very slippery slope that leads to the undoing of the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities. In fact, if developing countries are asked to take on commitments in the second commitment period, then this principle will be reduced to mere tokenism, since by then, there is no way that the rich countries would have taken action commensurate with their responsibility for global warming. The cuts they have taken on in the first commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol are minute, compared to the amount of carbon dioxide they have pumped into the Earth’s atmosphere.

If Denmark and the other developed countries want to start discussing developing country targets, they had better start behaving like they are serious about taking responsibility for their emissions, and start making policy changes in their own countries. Instead of bullying poorer countries, their monetary and political influence would be better used to bring the US back to the multilateral table. This might make poorer countries believe that they are not being trapped into bearing the burden of climate change mitigation, while rich countries buy their way out. That countries like Denmark are not simply trying to perpetuate a situation where the poor do not get the ecological space they need for their development, but are kept forever on dole, forever dependant on Northern largesse.

Finally, Southern leaders are equally to blame for encouraging the perception that they can be bought. Additional finance has become their constant refrain in these negotiations, drowning out any other valid interventions they may make. There are many instances when finance has been their predominant concern — the creation of a multilateral fund played a big part in convincing many developing countries to sign the Montreal Protocol, despite the fact that they were not part of the negotiations for the text, and it did not adequately represent their concerns. So if industrialised countries get the impression that money, rather than any moral or ethical consideration, is the way to deal with developing countries, then our leaders must be held responsible for this reputation. They should show more spine and substance when protecting the interests of their poor populations.