CKN Presentation - A Matter of Principle: China's Developing Country Status in International Climate Negotiations
Join us for the presentation of the new China Knowledge Network (CKN) report which examines why China insists on maintaining its developing country (DC) status in international climate negotiations - and how the Netherlands and the EU can strategically and pragmatically respond.
China presents two faces to Europe in climate diplomacy. On the one hand, cooperation between the EU and China is essential for accelerating the global energy transition and reducing fossil-fuel dependencies. On the other hand, a key point of tension stands in the way: China’s unyielding adherence to its developing country status in forums such as the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). While the EU increasingly challenges this status on principled grounds, China defends it as a matter intrinsic to sovereignty, identity, and geopolitical positioning.
This report explores the historical, economic, political, and ideological underpinnings of China’s position; how the status informs China’s multilateral diplomacy; and the implications for EU–China climate cooperation. It recommends pathways for the Netherlands and the EU to address the issue constructively, including alternative climate-financing arrangements, strategic use of UN reform debates, engagement with other countries whose DC status is contested, and ways to amplify the voices of least developed countries and civil society actors.
Programme
15:30 – 15:40 | Entry
15:40 – 15:50 | Welcome and Introduction
15:50 – 16:30 | Presentation of Key Findings
16:30 – 16:50 | Q&A and Discussion
16:50 – 17:00 | Closing Remarks
17:00 – 18:00 | Networking borrel
Authors
Louise van Schaik is Head of Unit EU & Global Affairs. She also coordinates Clingendael research in the field of climate change and sustainability. In her research she has extensively analysed the EU’s diplomatic performance in various fields, among others climate change, energy, health and food standards. She has also published on related research areas such as EU foreign policy, EU climate change and energy policy, EU research policy, climate-security and scarcity of natural resources and raw materials. She is often asked as a commentator on European affairs, geopolitics and sustainability issues.
Ties Dams is a Senior Research Fellow at the Clingendael Institute. His research focus is on Europe’s great power competition, particularly with China. How does China’s ascent impact Europe’s evolution as a geopolitical actor? Educated as a political theorist in Utrecht, Xiamen, Hongkong and London, Ties has a particular interest in the power of narrative. How do great powers tell stories to project geopolitical influence? Bridging the gap between the philosophical and the strategic, he is a member of the EEAS’s Expert Roundtable on Foreign Information Manipulation and Influence, the European Centre of Excellence for Countering Hybrid Threats’ expert pool, and speaks broadly about strategic communications, soft power strategies and influence activities.
Pieter Pauw is an assistant professor at Eindhoven University of Technology, where he conducts research and provides policy advice on international climate finance and climate policy. Pauw is also an associate at the Stockholm Environment Institute and the Clingendael Institute. Previously, he worked at the FS-UNEP Centre of the Frankfurt School of Finance & Management and at the German Development Institute (DIE – now IDOS) in Bonn, where his research focused more on questions of climate finance, climate justice, adaptation to climate change in developing countries, and other themes within international climate politics. Pauw also worked for a year at the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development (BMZ) and is active as a consultant.
Contributing authors: Steven Verburg, Sander Chan and Ellen Schepers
