Selin in Fast Company on U.S. Withdrawal From Paris Accord
Henrik Selin, Director of Curricular Innovation and Initiatives and Associate Professor of International Relations at the Frederick S. Pardee School of Global Studies at Boston University, was recently interviewed on President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from the 2015 Paris Climate Accord.
Selin was interviewed for a June 2, 2017 article in Fast Company entitled “We’ve Pulled Out Of The Paris Agreement. What’s Next: A Damaged Economy, Country, And Planet.”
From the text of the article:
In a speech announcing his decision, President Trump announced that the U.S. would not follow through on any of the non-binding targets in the agreement, and not make payments to the Green Climate Fund, which gives U.S. funding to help other countries implement renewable energy. He did say he would be interested in renegotiating the deal, but it seems unlikely: “There is absolutely zero chance that other countries would agree to renegotiate the Paris Agreement,” says Henrik Selin, associate professor of international relations at Boston University. “It was the result of years of tough negotiations and delicate compromises and it has also already entered into force.”
“I think China will have a real opportunity to step up and basically say to the rest of the world or the rest of the developing world, ‘Hey, the United States promised you money. The United States is not delivering on that. We are. Who’s your friend now?’” says Selin. “So it sort of changes the balance. Whenever the Chinese provide money for overseas investment, their strings attached are going to be different from the strings attached, generally, by the United States and Europe. For instance, the Chinese are not too concerned about human rights.”
Henrik Selin conducts research and teaches classes on global and regional politics and policy making on environment and sustainable development. His most recent book is EU and Environmental Governance, by Routledge Press, and is also the author of Global Governance of Hazardous Chemicals: Challenges of Multilevel Management by MIT Press.