Since 2007, the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) has debated the security implications of climate change on several occasions. This talk addresses these debates by exploring two inter-related questions: what drives the continuous efforts to place climate change on the UNSC’s agenda and to what extent do the UNSC’s debates illustrate a broader process of climatization of world politics?

To answer these, this presentation draws on the concept of climatization, which captures the process through which domains of international politics are framed through a climatic lens and transformed as a result of this translation. Dr. Lucile Maertens suggests that climate change has become a dominant framing and an inescapable topic of international relations and that the UNSC debates follow a logic of expansion of climate politics. She further argues that not only is the UNSC progressively climatized, but its climatization also reproduces and reinforces the ‘reality schism’ that characterizes global climate governance.

Speaker

• Lucile Maertens, Lecturer in international relations at the University of Lausanne and associate fellow at CERI/Sciences Po in Paris

Discussant

• Marine Gauthier,  PhD candidate in International Relations /Political Science and research assistant at the Centre on Conflict, Development & Peacebuilding, the Graduate Institute

Given the current situation with regards to the coronavirus, we are taking measures to reduce the impact and spread within our community. To ensure everyone’s health and safety, we will be tracking attendance at our event. 

You are kindly advised to arrive at least 15 minutes before the event and bring an ID with you for the on-site registration.

This event is part of our our Global Governance Colloquium series.