Description
Effective climate change mitigation will require significant joint action by the US and China. Because such mitigation will be costly, catalytic, and long-term, rising security competition between these states could complicate such efforts. I describe two mechanisms through which great power security competition will affect their climate action. First, great powers facing increased security competition will be less likely to engage in mitigation due to lower trust, heightened focus on relative gains, and heightened focus on short-term security threats. Second, great powers facing increased security competition will have a more difficult time coercing third-party states to mitigate. Greater tensions between great powers increases their dependence on allies, providing third-party states with exit options and bargaining leverage. My argument contradicts prominent theories of international order which depict policy disputes as independent across different issues or questions, including climate change and security. My argument also contradicts theories which acknowledge the connection of climate change and security but which hypothesize positive feedback between these policy spaces, such as if security competition spurred a race to the top in climate investments. I test my predictions for hypothetical US and Chinese climate change action on the historical case of US action on the mitigation of ozone-depletion while locked in security competition with the USSR.
