Description
Germany, Japan and the UK, as fellow members of the G7, are comparable ‘middle powers’ with a history of engagement with the climate change regime. Both Germany and the UK (particularly since the arrival of the Labour government) have aspired to international climate leadership; Japan less so, but with the potential to play a similar role in Asia in the future. This paper will provide a comparative mapping of the different forms of leadership these states have exerted since Paris, in terms not only of their NDCs and funding activities, but also their level of participation in various climate fora. Some anomalies are immediately evident. Germany, for example, provides significantly more climate finance than the UK but has less representation in terms of committee memberships, facilitating roles etc. We explain these differences through an assessment of each country’s international climate activity against four types of leadership – structural, entrepreneurial, cognitive and exemplary – which in turn relate to their respective national strategic priorities, political cultures, domestic politics and social movements. The election of Donald Trump and the probable absence of the US raises the significance of such middle power climate diplomacy.
