Politics is indeed the art of the possible, but less considered are the elements needed to underpin political action. Public opinion, even in democracies, is not always pivotal. Tony Blair took Britain to war in Iraq alongside the United States despite massive voter protest beforehand. Yet sometimes politicians can imagine that they are surfing on top of a mighty wave of public opinion. The Copenhagen climate summit which opened yesterday appears such a case.
The first day was full of emotive happenings. Children sang plaintively to remind delegates from the 192 nations present that it was their future that the summit held in their hands. An activist from the Maldives plunged up to his chest in a tank of icy water to demonstrate what global warming is expected to do to his low-lying island nation. And in its opening session, the conference was told that the event represented “the best, last chance” to save the world from disaster.
There is only room at the conference for 15,000 delegates, journalists and lobbyists. However, organizers report over 30,000 people sought accreditation. The world’s media are certainly present in extraordinary force and will spend the next 10 days urgently seeking any new snippet of news to put into what will be blanket TV coverage. Newspaper writers are more fortunate in that they will have several hours in which to digest each day’s events and write considered articles. However, it will be the broadcast media that will drive the general sense of crisis and urgency that is already surrounding the summit.
This is first and foremost a political event, in which politicians, particularly from Europe, will seek to present themselves as greener-than-thou, though as with so many international promises of action (think of aid for Afghanistan) the devil will lie in the detail. Being politics, to the annoyance of many environmentalists, the science will generally now have a supportive role, even though it is the science which has brought the politicians to Copenhagen.
Even so, there is a hardly concealed dread that the “Climategate” revelations of doctored research may yet cause some nations to resile from the raft of carbon-reduction pledges that virtually all have made. The reality, however, is that news of “Climategate” probably broke too late to allow delegations to make considered changes to what they are going to say. Nevertheless, the scandal will probably have the beneficial effect of keeping the summit honest. In addition, an excellent development is the decision by research institutes, including that in the UK which sparked “Climategate,” to make all their raw data available.
The hard core of climate change skeptics in the scientific community has always claimed some of the data were being withheld. Full publication in the coming weeks will prove or disprove this accusation and, if the latter, will only give weight to whatever framework agreement emerges from Copenhagen. Meantime world politicians can present their earnest and no doubt emotive messages in the comfortable knowledge that for the duration of the summit at least, no one is going to rock the boat.
