Reshaping Multilateralism: Europe’s Climate Inflection Point

Reshaping Multilateralism è un nuovo podcast sull’intersezione tra cibo, clima, sicurezza e migrazione, realizzato dal team di Nexus25. Nel corso di questa serie, il team tratterà le ultime novità in materia di finanziamenti per il clima, disaccordi multilaterali, sfide per la sicurezza e altro ancora, con la partecipazione di esperti provenienti da ogni angolo del mondo.

Reshaping Multilateralism è una produzione del progetto Nexus25, un’iniziativa congiunta dell’Istituto Affari Internazionali e del Centro per il Clima e la Sicurezza finanziata dalla Stiftung Mercator e prodotta in collaborazione con storielibere.fm.

AffarInternazionali vi propone il terzo episodio della serie in cui la co-conduttrice di Nexus25, Nathalie Tocci, riporta gli ascoltatori in Europa per fare il punto sulle elezioni del Parlamento europeo. Dopo una primavera di proteste da parte degli agricoltori, di incertezza politica e di contraccolpi verdi, la maggioranza centrista è riuscita a mantenere il controllo – ma i guadagni dell’estrema destra e la sorprendente decimazione dei Verdi in tutto il continente sono motivo di preoccupazione. Nathalie e gli ospiti di questa settimana discutono di ciò che queste elezioni potrebbero significare per la politica estera, le ambizioni climatiche e la leadership internazionale dell’UE, nonché le loro prospettive sulle elezioni nazionali critiche che devono ancora svolgersi.

My name is Thin Lei Win, I’m a journalist specializing in food and climate issues, a member of the Nexus25 team, and one of your hosts. This is “Reshaping Multilateralism”, a podcast at the intersection of food, climate, security, and migration from the team at Nexus25. We’ll cover the latest in climate finance, multilateral disagreements, security challenges, and more – featuring experts from every corner of the globe. We will ask our guests to share their lived experiences in contexts most impacted by climate change, stories from their time working in government and international organizations, and their assessments of where leaders should go from here.

Outside of the think tank bubble, the European Parliamentary elections are usually a bore, serving more as an outlet for voters’ angst than a make-or-break moment for Europe’s political parties. The European Parliament is known for containing some of Europe’s most wacky – and extreme – political characters. This year’s elected class includes a YouTuber, a Polish far-right activist known for destroying religious symbols, a Greek butcher with no online presence, and a Bulgarian pop star.
But despite the colorful characters, the tone after this year’s elections is very different. After a spring of protests that saw farmers dump manure and march through European capitals as polling in support of right-wing parties spiked, the EU elections were – for once – incredibly serious. After all, this vote indicated whether the far-right truly was gaining across the continent, whether protests would translate to the ballot box, and whether voters were truly buying what the EU was selling.
In the end, the EU elections have brought about significant changes in the political landscape of Europe. With new parties gaining traction and traditional powerhouses experiencing shifts, the composition of the European Parliament now reflects a more diverse array of political ideologies than ever.
Taking a step back, foreign policy, security, defence, and migration, are all perspectives from which the EU can observe the evolution of the nexus. One of the central pillars of the EU’s 21st century global leadership has been its ambitious Green Deal, aimed at making Europe the first climate-neutral continent by 2050. However, the election results may bring this ambitious agenda to a crossroads. The new political cycle that will commence following the European elections is poised to be heavily influenced by a multitude of crises that are fundamentally altering the priorities of the international arena. The incoming European Commission faces a daunting task – continuing to promote the integration of the EU’s foreign policy and climate policy – while balancing serious green backlash in their own countries.
Ultimately, the EU’s role on the international stage is critical, not only for its member states but for global stability and progress. After all, the EU, as a whole, is one of the world’s largest economies, a critical security guarantor, and a leader in ambitious climate policy. Now that the dust has settled from the elections, it’s time to ask: How will the EU’s external relations shift? And how will the EU adapt to this new reality?

Nathalie Tocci:

Welcome back, everyone! I am Dr. Nathalie Tocci, a co-lead of the Nexus25 project, Director of the Istituto Affari Internazionali and part-time professor at the School of Transnational Governance (European University Institute). In this episode, I’m joined by three experts on European politics and policy.
• Mr. Tony Agatha, the EU’s Principal Advisor on Climate Diplomacy, Dutch diplomat since 1996 who served amongst others as deputy director of European Integration in the Foreign Ministry and spokesman in the Permanent Representation to the EU in Brussels.
• Dr. Ricardo Borges de Castro, a Senior Adviser to the European Policy Centre and former Adviser for Foreign Affairs and Adviser on Strategic Foresight to the European Political Strategy Centre, the European Commission’s in-house think tank; and
• Dr. Heather Grabbe, a senior fellow at Bruegel and visiting professor at University College London and KU Leuven who focuses on the political economy of the European Green Deal and how the climate transition will change the EU’s international relationships and external policies.

Good morning, everyone, and welcome back to reshaping multilateralism. I’m Natalie Tocci and I’m co lead of the Nexus 25 project, director of the Institute of international and part time professor at the School of Transnational Governance in Florence.

Today I’m joined by fantastic experts on European politics and policy. So, we have Ricardo Borges de Castro, Ricardo is a visiting scholar at the College of Europe, and he is senior advisor at the European Policy Center.
He was previously advisor for foreign affairs and then for strategic foresight at the European political and strategy center of the European Commission. Then we have Dr. Heather grabby. Heather is a senior fellow at Google, as well as a visiting professor at the University College, London.

And last but not least, we have Anthony and Gotham. Anthony is EU principal advisor on climate diplomacy, and he previously worked in the cabinet of the first executive vice president of the European Commission, France Timmermans. So welcome everyone to, to the show.

And let me begin with a rather broad question, perhaps to all three of you, which really has to do with the so called green lash. It is clear that over the last five years, climate has really been at the forefront of the European Union and it has really sort of given the European Union a re-found sense of its own purpose. It was a, it is in fact, a policy that really has a very strong normative underpinning.

In fact, as we know, the climate crisis is existential. It is strategic. It has a very strong economic rationale.

It was viewed as a way of reconnecting to citizens and in particular to youth. And this has really been the story over the last five years, or perhaps I should say over the last, you know, in the previous four years. What essentially has been happening, especially over the last year, is that of a growing green lash, a growing backlash to the EU’s climate policies within the European Union.

And in many respects, we could see that the results of the European elections that, you know, alongside an important rise of the far right in a number of EU member states has also seen a very significant reduction in the public support for green parties, which of course in the 2019 elections were really sort of amongst and perhaps the main winners of those European elections. So let me perhaps start with a broad question concerning what you think are the implications of this green lash, which, as I said, is not something that has started now, but it certainly has been confirmed by these European elections. And let me perhaps, Tony, start with you.

Tony Agatha:
Thank you, Natalie. Great to see you. Great to see Heather.

Great to see Ricardo. Glad to be here. Well, let me, on your question, a very pertinent question.

But I take some issue with the premise that we take for granted that there’s a huge green lash. I think that is not true. Globally, there was a very interesting report from the UNDP on June the 20th, the UNDP came out with the biggest single survey about more than 77, 78,000. Sorry about that.

78,000 people around the world from 77 countries. 80% of them said they wanted stronger climate action. So I think that’s an important fact to state.

Then we go to our policies. Our policies, 80% of the European Green Deal, which is a growth strategy, has been put into law. When you come to the climate and energy transition, first accelerated by COVID and the recovery.

Secondly, unfortunately, but also accelerated by the unprovoked war of aggression by Russia in Ukraine, which made us realize, albeit belatedly, that we cannot be this independent. And we are scrambling, putting even stronger targets on our energy efficiency, on our renewable energy, diversifying. And we’re going very, very fast.

So I would say that, in fact, the EU is on course. I think we will relabel after putting the regulatory and policy framework into work. Now the next question is, so how do we make sure that we do this as best we can?

And that’s why we have dialogues with all the stakeholders, social, but business, to make sure that we stay this course. So I’m not too worried about a green flash.

Nathalie Tocci:
Well, thank you for that, Tony. And actually, I think that we’re not necessarily saying two very different things here, in the sense that you could actually view the green flash as perhaps, to an extent, an inevitable consequence of a change that is real. And I think what you were pointing to is the fact that change is real, because indeed, the vast majority of the legislative agenda is in place.

Change is happening. Change is difficult. And it’s perhaps inevitable that there will be some elements and sectors of society that will resist that change.

But perhaps picking up on that, let me turn to you, Riccardo, because in a sense, I can ask you a question that is perhaps slightly more uncomfortable for Tony to address, which is precisely on that resistance, because, you know, I just said a second ago that resistance perhaps is inevitable. But then the question is, has enough been done in order to address those sources of resistance? You know, has enough been done to compensate the, you know, quote unquote, potential losers from this process of transition?

So where do you, firstly, do you see this green flash? And secondly, to the extent that there is a green flash, what do you think, you know, have we made any mistakes?
What should be done?

Ricardo Borges de Castro:
Thank you, Natalie. And good to see you all as well. Thank you for having me.

I mean, I do see there is resistance for sure, and that which has been translated also into political campaigning for the European Parliament elections. So you see that there is resistance. I think that some of the problems then of this resistance, I think they are compounded by other policy areas, from energy security to agriculture to other issues that actually come together into this enlargement, given the issue of Ukraine.

So I think there are several problems that actually go or come together in this discussion. And I do believe that this resistance, which you saw also in one of the major parties, the European People’s Party, that became more resistance to some of these policies. I think maybe the issue might have been that a lot, as you said, I mean, a lot has been, and as Tony was saying, a lot has been adopted in terms of legislation.

Now we’re going into the implementation phase of so many of these things. But the fact is that over these past few years, there was change, as you mentioned, Natalie, happened very sort of substantially. And this has a cost.

And I don’t know whether the right incentives are there to make those changes, whether those that feel that are on the losing end are actually being supported. And naturally, this then allows parties like in France, the Rassemblement National, to actually, in their campaign manifesto, say directly we are against the Green Deal. And then sort of propose a series of measures that I would say they do not undo what has been done, but they seriously challenge the efforts that we were doing.

My biggest concern and sort of looking into the future is that the thing that doesn’t change is climate change. I mean, we are living it again this summer. And the last 10 years have been the warmest on record.

Europe is the continent that is warming at a faster pace than all the other regions in the world. So this problem has not gone away. I think it has become probably more political.

And, you know, sort of backtracking is actually not make it better. It’s just going to make it worse.

Nathalie Tocci:
Thank you, Ricardo. Heather, let me turn to you, perhaps picking up on some of these points, because, you know, if we if to the extent that there is a greenlash in the sense, I think there are two possible and obviously connected aspects or explanations to it. One is the one that we’ve been discussing, you know, the sources of resistance, the change in a sense, the quote unquote losers or potential losers from a process of change.

The other is, in a sense, the politicization of all this and in particular, the way in which populist far right parties have really picked up on this issue. And in a sense, you know, you and I have seen this coming for a while. Yeah, I mean, it was very, fairly clear already, you know, sort of roundabout the time of COVID where, you know, far right parties, populist parties, especially after the migration crisis had started subsiding, that they really kind of needed a new banner.

And it was fairly clear that they were going to pick on this particular issue. So this is, in a sense, the toxic dimension of the green lash. Right.

I mean, the nexus between populism, the rise of the far right and the question of climate or the resistance, basically, to climate action. But then if you could also comment on this other dimension, which is very youth specific, because indeed, you know, the big story in 2019, you know, the fight is for future, the youth movement in favour of climate change. And that, as Ricardo was saying, continues to be a big part of the story.

And yet what we have also been seeing in a number of countries where the far right has risen, here I’m thinking particularly about Germany and to an extent France, that youth that has generally been associated to a progressive agenda has actually or sectors of youth have also started supporting the far right. So perhaps if you could also comment on that youth nexus.

Heather Grabbe:
Yes, we can see the way that we put it the other way around. You can see this two ways. One is that the idea that’s been quite widely interpreted in the press, that the vote for the populist radical right is an anti green vote.

But in fact, it’s it’s more the other way round. The populist radical right has turned to anti green as its new way of targeting a particular policy and set of ideas in the political establishment in order to make itself relevant. Now, in the past and even today, the populist radical right is really focused on migration as their main concern.

It feeds into their identity politics, their idea that ordinary people want something different from what elites want. And therefore they, the populists, are the only ones who can represent the will of the people. And now they’re framing climate action very much in the same way, saying this is something that benefits elites, but ordinary people don’t like it.

But there are very good reasons to question that claim, even though it’s quite widely reported. If you lo ok at both the public opinion surveys globally that Tony was referring to earlier, but particularly surveys of voters who are under 40, they are very deeply concerned about climate action and they they are voting for the populist radical right, not necessarily because of the anti green stance, but because of an overall mistrust of institutions and political parties. You need to unpick that vote and look at their motivations.

Now, looking into the research on what people think about climate action, it’s still in the top three priorities for all European voters. That’s very clear from the last Eurobarometer survey that was done before the European Parliament elections. A third of voters think that climate action should be the top priority for the next European Parliament, for example, even though, as Tony was pointing out, it’s not the Parliament that’s so critical.

But but nevertheless, as a general gauge of opinion and among younger voters, it’s still the top priority. It’s still in most surveys, particularly ones which go into detail on what kinds of climate action needs to be taken. It’s still really important.

And as Ricardo was saying, the physical effects of climate change, the heat waves that are going on, the the floods that have destroyed a lot of the wheat harvest in northern Europe this year is really bringing people’s attention to the fact that climate change has not gone away. So I think it’s very important not just to kind of assume that the vote for the populist radical right is because people don’t like the Green Deal. I think that’s not the case.

And in fact, that would be a very dangerous conclusion for mainstream parties to draw, both in terms of the need to keep consistent climate action to maintain business investment and also household investments. How tragic if people have invested in a heat pump or an electric car and then they feel abandoned by their government saying, oh, no, we’re not doing that anymore. No, no, we’re not interested in green anymore when they can see the heat waves and the floods around them, for example.

And I think particularly farmers really deserve some special attention in the next term of the EU institutions. They’ve been protesting. They have many reasons to protest.

They’re uncertain about the future of agricultural subsidies. Many of them are actually worried about the productivity of their soil and about the health of water and soil for a long term agriculture because of industrial farming. But here again, there’s been a very kind of quite lazy assumption that farmers are out there protesting because they don’t like green measures.

Whereas, in fact, more detailed focus group work on what particularly younger farmers are concerned about reveals a complex mixture of different factors about the future of agriculture, which really need to be taken into account in reforming, for example, the common agricultural policy. So it’s really important now to go into detail on what are the policy issues that people are most concerned about and how would they like to address them? And I think especially in the next phase of the European Green Deal, to look carefully at what’s going to deliver results that citizens feel justifies the decisions that many of them have made to go green in their own lives, to make individual changes in behavior and patterns, and to also engage with citizens on how effective climate policies can be and how fast they’ll bring results.

Because some of them are very long term, but they still matter. They matter for future generations. So it shouldn’t just be about quick wins for the next election because this is a long term project.

Nathalie Tocci:
Well, great. And actually, this allows me to make the transition actually to another issue that I wanted to discuss, which is precisely agriculture. And Tony, let me let me turn to you on this one.

I mean, you were saying earlier, and I agree with you. Well, you know, we have we’ve done the bulk of what we said we were going to do. Now, of course, the one thing that has not been done yet, and actually it wasn’t even planned to be tackled head on in this first phase of the Green Deal is precisely agriculture reform.

So in a sense, again, you know, there are two possible versions of the story, and I think both have an element of truth to it. One explanation is, well, you know, in a sense, we started with, well, I mean, perhaps defining it, defining decarbonization as a low hanging fruit is a bit of a stretch. But we started in a sense with not only the most important thing, but actually, in a sense, the one thing, which is basically the energy transition, which had a lot of traction also because there was a very strong business case in favor of decarbonization.

And, you know, you were mentioning it as well earlier. I mean, the idea that basically this was a good strategy. Now, of course, when we come to agriculture reform, although I think, you know, the points that Heather was making were actually incredibly important.

But, I mean, the truth is that when it comes to agriculture, you have very strong resistance against change and not as much of a business case in favor of change, right? I mean, this hasn’t really consolidated yet. And I think the points that Heather was making are incredibly important.

And then the question is, you know, how is it that we can put more oomph behind them? But basically, you know, if one is indeed to look ahead, you know, how do we address, on the one hand, the resistance of some sectors of, you know, sort of big, big agriculture to an industrialized agriculture to move towards change? And how do we create a business case in favor of change, much like was, you know, happened in the case of the energy transition with the renewable industry?

Tony Agatha:
Yeah, so again, I think here it’s too broad a brush to say that everyone’s against agricultural change or all farmers. In fact, if you speak to different sectors in the agriculture, there are a number of groups that would come forward and who are already practicing a new way of farming. The business case lies in the following, that the way we have been farming over the past decades, by the way, stimulated through government, also European government, is becoming untenable and unviable.

We will have to continue to put in, use more pesticides to make sure that we can grow our crops. This is depleting our soil. It is making our water more dirty.

It’s a health hazard in the air. And we, you know, the threat of zoonosis is increasing. We had such a case in the Netherlands with Q fever.

Nobody knows what the Q stands for. It stands for query. We don’t know.

So if we continue on this same base, the business case will become increasingly difficult. And a lot of farmers, and I recall these conversations in the past with my former boss, was that they complain, you know, we don’t earn enough to die. And we earn, sorry, we earn too little to die, but not enough to live.

And so there has to be a step change there. And in fact, the business cases, if we do it in a smarter way, if we were able to put a modern agriculture, setting it up, more innovation, using drones, digitalizing, being more organic in certain ways, allowing nature to be part of that. There is a business case there, but the highly intensive way we’re doing it is going to cost more energy and more chemicals.

That’s not good for anyone. Now, what is understandable, if you invest, you know, thousands and thousands of euros into your farm system, you know, you cannot knock on the door and to say, well, you know, this is over, get out. And that’s not how this can be done and nor should it be done like that.

This has to be done in very close partnership, because farmers are stewards also of our environment. They are the ones who probably know the best what the detrimental effects are, but also know the best how to move forward. But sometimes it’s not easy for them, either.

There are too many regulations piled on top and they don’t know what to do. And so I know that the president from the layer stated as such, and she’s doing engaging in a structural dialogue or stakeholders dialogue with farmers to see how we move forward. And I think it’s also if you look at the impact assessment of 600 pages on the 2040 target, you might recall that earlier this year, the commission put forward a recommendation, like if we want to go to 250 climate neutrality, we know we’re going to be at at least 55% less emissions in 230, somewhere in 240, we also have to have a target.

And that target was 90%. As a proposal, the dialogue has to start. But in the impact assessment, agriculture has its chapter, because agriculture will be part of this conversation.

And this is perhaps why in the beginning, I responded kind of strongly on the premise, if we use words like green lash or backlash, sometimes we fall in love with nice words, because they sound right, but the meaning of it is quite different. Because a green lash supposes that somebody will completely as Ricardo, he used the word backtracking will com pletely go back. There’s no way we’re not going to go back.

But we’re going to find perhaps new pathways, hopefully in good partnership with all those stakeholders. And yes, once the first thing is to put the regulations there. The second thing is to implement and implement will be bumpy.

If you put your nose on the window and you look at implementation, things will be bumpy.
So the market is also you talk about the business case, the market is important here and ultimately will also I think have to drive the transition because they know where the money is.

Nathalie Tocci:
Right. So this actually allows me to ask, actually, first of all, Heather, what do you think should be, can be, I mean, given the political context that we’ve been discussing, the European Green Deal 2.0, you know, so what should be the priorities? And Tony there has already, I think, put out three important words.

He talked about targets, in particular, the 2040 targets. He talked about implementation of what has already been agreed. And of course, we’ve been talking about agriculture.

So, you know, I’m wondering if you could comment on, you know, what, you know, should these three things feature? What else should feature? You know, what is it that should be the priorities of the next stage of the Green Deal?

Ricardo, let me start with you.

Ricardo Borges de Castro:
Listen, I think what the conversation that we just had previously also what tells us is that some form of resistance is not necessarily negative because you are actually trying to address concerns that people have. So I think what, and I agree that these three would be important, the ones that you just mentioned, Natalie, to think about this. But I believe that this moment allows us also to maybe recenter some of these policies, to think of them as a nexus policy, as your podcast does advocate, is that we think about this in an integrated way.

Because, I mean, I keep going back and particularly on the agriculture reform. If we are going to be speaking about enlargement in the next few years, and if we have Ukraine in the picture, which is agriculture superpower, we do need to have these conversations. And I believe that we also, I think from a strategic standpoint, I believe, Natalie, on so many of these issues, we do need to have a discussion on costs.

How much these things do actually cost. I mean, there are costs to this, as you were saying. Let’s not speak about losers.

I mean, there’s always someone that loses in processes of change. But let’s focus on costs and also on what are some of the tradeoffs that will need to be done. Again, I believe that we are at the moment.

There are so many issues that we need to solve, you know, from agriculture reform to energy transition to the digital. I mean, all of them, they’re still out there. I mean, none of these, I would say, OK, they’ve improved marginally, all of them.

But they are, at the moment, the EU is confronted with so many of these challenges that we need to address. So I think that having actually a healthy conversation about that there are some costs. And just to finish on this point, Heather was referring to, and Tony also did that, to polls that people in opinion polls, they still want, they prioritize these issues.

As, for example, they prioritize security and defense. But the question is, are they ready for the costs that some of these things will entail? And that’s really my question.

And this also presupposes a much more honest and leadership conversation between leaders and citizens and a much more sort of integrated debate about some of these issues. I know that there are efforts being done to evolve. And it was just given the case of the strategic dialogue and agriculture.

It’s very important to do this. But maybe this also needs to be mainstreamed across so many of our countries and member states to be able to really to have a conversation that really brings what are to the forefront the issues that are concerning people. Because it’s not going to be against the farmers.

It’s not going to be against the youth that we’re going to be able to do some of these issues. It has to be with them alone.

Nathalie Tocci:
Tony, you wanted to jump back in a second.

Tony Agatha:
Very briefly. No, no, I fully agree. This is absolutely not against the farmers.

We want them to thrive. I think it’s also a treaty commitment if everyone looks in our treaty. That’s not the issue.

The issue is about the dialogue, how best to do it, how to help them, and make sure that they make a good living, but do it in a more sustainable way as every sector of the economy and society will have to take part. You mentioned to have these structural or strategic dialogues with other sectors. We are.

There are clean transition dialogues. I think we have nine of them that Fondolet spearheaded with EU industry and social partners. They’re focused on hydrogen, on energy industries, clean tech, infrastructural, critical raw materials, all of this, city, clean mobility, and steel.

So this is absolutely, how do we take the regulation? How do we then implement it in the most easy way? How do we make sure that the money that we park is actually accessible so that they can go forward?

How can we make the permitting procedures easier? Because again, the Green Deal was a growth agenda and we’re gonna fast forward it now into making sure that the EU is also competitive in this issue and leads by example.

Heather Grabbe:
Heather. I think we have to look to national level because that’s where the money is and that’s where most of the politics is now. And what the member state governments, I think, have failed to deliver during the first part of the European Green Deal is the deal.

So what’s the deal for citizens? How can they be sure of being supported through this transition? Where are the income guarantees?

Where’s the targeted help to those in society who are affected first and who are affected most? Mostly what we’ve seen, and it’s partly the result of COVID and then the energy crisis because of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but what national governments have spent a huge amount of money on in the last five years is untargeted subsidies, for example, to fossil fuels at the petrol pump. Now, if they were to target those subsidies and particularly to take them away from fossil fuels, which is holding up the transition and instead target those towards very specific social measures that address energy poverty, for example, heating, that help people to make the conversion to things like heat pumps and especially people who, for example, don’t control their source of power or heating because it’s their landlord who does it.

But providing that kind of very targeted help and also help with the upfront capital costs of switching to buying an electric vehicle or switching to a different mode of energy and indeed other parts of their lives, I think that would help a lot. So we need a social deal, a social pact that can’t be done at EU level because most of this is about national budgets. That’s where social insurance is delivered.

That’s where things like employment insurance and also a lot of the skills schemes, skills development schemes that are very much needed. The green economy is a rather labour-intensive economy. And one of the big impediments right now to, for example, building out renewable energy faster is the lack of skills, the lack of skilled workers.

So national governments providing assistance to people to train in that sector would provide both more skills available to make the transition go faster, but also a sense to people of what kinds of employment opportunities will be open in future for them. And also for kids who are thinking about, okay, where do I wanna go after school? Well, actually going into that kind of engineering job for a grid upgrade or into things like house insulation, that’s gonna be a growth area of the economy for years to come.

That’s the kind of vision of how a greener and decarbonized economy might work that has been really lacking so far. So far, people have had a sense that, okay, this is about measures that are necessary, but they could be painful, but actually there will be huge opportunities and people can live better. So I think we’re gonna need that at national level.

We also need much more in the ways of adaptation policy at EU level, because there will have to be cross-member state solidarity. Last year, Slovenia lost 16% of its GDP because of 48 hours of heavy rain, right? So those kinds of floods, we’ve seen the wheat harvest devastated this year because of excessive rain.

We’re seeing all of these heat waves which knocked out Croatia’s power sector last week, for example. So I think the pressure to have the EU budget supporting some kind of internal crisis management and assistance across member states will be really important. And finally, I think a really key area for the next stage of the European Green Deal is the circular economy, which is there and it was there before, but it could be much bigger.

The fastest way of gaining better economic security, weaning ourselves off toxic dependencies with autocracies, and also gaining more strategic autonomy is to use our resources much more efficiently to move to a truly circular economy where we actually have shorter supply chains because we have raw materials and intermediate goods available in Europe in secondary markets. We’re not just extracting from nature elsewhere in the world and bringing it to Europe in a rather neocolonial relationship of we take your raw materials and then we turn them into something here. No, actually, we can use the things we already have here far better.

Now, I think the commission did well in pushing the circular economy in the past five years, but it could go a lot further and we need to use the scale of the single market to make things like recycled materials a lot more competitive with virgin materials, which are artificially cheap because their environmental costs are not taken into account. So I think that area could go much further and I’d like to see the commission in particular really pushing the circular economy as part of the competitiveness agenda because it would make European firms much more competitive if they were more resource efficient and if they address the hidden inefficiencies in production processes and provided consumers with a lot more secular alternatives.

Tony Agatha:
Can I come briefly in on that, Natalia? Natalia, sorry. You know, just very briefly, I think what Heather points to is, and what Ricardo did as well, there are two different costs and we usually only talk about the costs, which are investments in our society and economy, which will give us good returns.

There’s a positive proposition there and there are negative costs and those are huge costs of non-action. And I think every time we speak about the money that is needed for transition, and yes, there’s a lot that is needed, it’s also switching subsidies from fossil fuels to renewables, for instance, but we have to take into account the costs of not acting in terms of droughts, freak storms, floods, you name it, which will bring us into problems, not only in Europe, and I’m sure that might be another topic that you’d like to delve into, but also in the rest of the world, the costs of not acting will be tremendous and have to be internalized when you speak about these things.

Nathalie Tocci:
Well, exactly, and that is actually the last sort of set of issues that I wanted to get into, in the sense that both, Tony, what you were saying now, what Heather was saying when she was talking about our dangerous and toxic dependencies and also the need to move beyond sort of extractive neo-colonial relationships, allows me, I think, to sort of touch on the final issue. I mean, I would say that probably one of the major priorities of Green Deal 2.0 should be the external dimension, which was not prioritized as much as it should have been in Green Deal 1.0. And I think this has, well, it has many dimensions, but I think it has two specific dimensions. The first has to do with our relationship with the global South, which are not going fantastically well for reasons that are related to the Middle East and vaccine hoarding and a host of other reasons, right?

So one issue is the climate dimension of our relationship with the global South and what should be done about it. And the second, I think, key aspect has to do with the way in which climate fits in to the broader US-China competition, our relationship with China, which of course is increasingly complex and therefore what should be done about it. Ricardo, let me turn to you.

Ricardo Borges de Castro:
Listen, I think, I mean, both dimensions that you mentioned are crucial and I think they are on different levels. I think, I mean, on the global South, this, to a certain extent, the Green Deal, although it is very positive on the policy objectives that it tries to achieve, has also downsides in terms of the relationships with third countries, because some of them on specific regulations or policies, such as deforestation, just to give a concrete example, see that as something that is protectionist, that the EU is becoming sort of, is closing up or putting up barriers in relationship with them.

I mean, the issues that also, we haven’t spoken about trade, but the fact that the EU is turning away from, let’s say, from a free trade agenda or a more sort of active free trade agenda, this has also, I believe, consequences in terms of the way that we relate to the global South. I think there’s also from their side, from their perspective, this idea of injustice that now they’ve been asked things to solve a problem that they did not create. And I believe that we have not found, so let’s say the right tools to address some of these problems that in terms of this partnership that we need to create with the global South in addressing this problem.

Of course, I think the relationships are now very much sort of geared to try to support a sort of green transitions in partnerships in the South. But I believe that we are not there yet. I mean, as regards China and the US, these are completely different.

It’s a completely different problem in a sense that this is more about sort of the competition to have a competitive green economy. And I think that, and we are using just different policies and different incentives. I think my general concern here is more that the paradigm of cooperation, of multilateralism, which is also, I think, part of this discussion has changed considerably over these past five years.

I think having a war in the European continent, and we haven’t spoken, I mean, you did mention the war, Natalie, initially in introduction, but the war, having Russia’s war of aggression on Ukraine does not help solving so many of these problems because it just, I think they magnify some of the risks that citizens also see from the problems that are emerging and which makes policy response to this much more difficult.

So I’m sorry to have diverged here a little bit, but I wanted to put here on the table also the fact that all the issues that we’ve been speaking so far are today much harder because we have this bigger problem or this, I mean, as big a problem to address that just complicates all decision-making process and political calculations. Also in the member states, I think Heather was spot on on how then politicians are sort of engaging with their public opinions, how this all complicates. But I believe that, and we do have to restore our relationships with the global South.

I don’t know how long this will take. And I don’t think it’s not gonna be the global gateway that is gonna get us there. I think it is also, I think we need a moment of profound self-reflection about how we have sort of behaved over the past few years.

Nathalie Tocci:
Absolutely, Heather.

Heather Grabbe:
It’s true, as Rikard is saying, that the war has an impact in Europe and it’s also what makes people feel more insecure. But I think we should not lose sight of the fact this is a global green transition because this is a really big global problem. We are, in Europe, warming at twice the global average, but there are also devastating environmental consequences of climate change plus biodiversity loss and so on in, for example, China, in Africa, in Latin America.

People are feeling this in their daily lives. And there are other countries in the world, it’s not just Europe that is actually doing the global transition. China actually has rather ambitious plans on a whole range of things, from air pollution to emissions.

A lot of countries are now looking at or even developing emissions trading systems. So, we tend to talk about the common border adjustment mechanism in Europe as Europe’s great contribution. Well, actually others are, it may help to encourage others to move faster, but others are also doing this kind of thing.

And there’s huge, of course, investment in clean tech. I mean, the reason why we’re having all of these tensions with China about electric vehicles and so on is because they have been investing for nearly 20 years in the green technology of the future. The Chinese are producing absolutely the best low-cost electric vehicles on the planet.

They’re producing the best quality as well as price of solar panels because they made a bet that these things were going to be important and they needed them for their own transition, for they actually want to decarbonize their own economy. So, I think we should be careful not to see Europe as always and only the global leader. There are others that are also working in this.

But as Rukari was saying, we do need to have better forums for cooperation for managing the tensions that do arise, like the one we’re having with China over clean techs and subsidized development of it. But also we need to think about how we can manage this as a collective action problem for the whole of humanity. There’s a danger of losing sight of that as seeing as it is a series of trade-offs of one region gains or another region loses, when actually we’re all in this together ultimately when it comes to climate change.

The atmosphere does not care whether the emissions come from Europe or China or Africa. Whoever is driving that internal combustion engine vehicle, wherever it is, is going to be emitting and causing problems for everybody else. So, maintaining this sense of common destiny in the negative as well as the positive sense is actually really important.

And I think that means that the EU also needs to be using in the next term, the institutions are much, using its development and its trade policies to support its climate policies. We can’t afford to have diplomacy as the art of managing double standards, to quote a certain high representative of the EU recently. This doesn’t work for climate because everybody has to act, because Europe doesn’t really in the end get very many brownie points for acting first, if it then is inconsistent and doesn’t follow through.

Actually, what we need is development policies to be encouraging and helping partners along their own transition paths. For example, if you think about the EU’s neighborhood policy, it should not be the EU encouraging water intensive agriculture and industry. In North Africa, when water stress is the single biggest issue that will be affecting security and stability in North Africa over the next decade, it shouldn’t be trade policies which are all about ensuring European firms win out.

It also needs to be for developing clean tech supply chains globally. So these are complex issues. It’s not like there are kind of quick solutions, but making the policies more coherent, making sure that climate policy is fully represented also in trade and development and other external policies is still a challenge.

It shouldn’t be such a challenge at this point along the road.

Nathalie Tocci:
Tony.

Tony Agatha:
Yeah, I’m listening to all of these very good remarks. I think it starts with the fact, it is true that others are doing, they’re also engaged in a transition, but I would challenge anyone to come up with another continent or country that has a comprehensive programme as the Green Deal as we had. And this is not because I want to brag about, this is not about bragging rights, but it also goes to show where then, you know, the friction comes with our partners.

Because on the one hand, if we move fast and we moved fast at the beginning, domestically going through this green transition, it meant that our external policies had to follow suit. So when Ricardo speaks about deforestation, which I was very closely involved in, that was done for a reason. If you look at the damage that our consumption at the EU is doing through coffee, consumption of coffee and palm oil, timber, rubber, beef, you name it, is tremendous.

And there was a big political backing from people to say, we no longer want to be part of that deforestation. And then you come to the stage where, well, you come to countries that, you know, on the one hand, some people say, oh, you know, we spoke about this green lash, and then some say, oh, what about your credibility outside? But in fact, you ask our partners whether we’re going too slow or too quick, and they’re saying, you’re going too quick for us.

You know, they might agree with some of the reasons we’re doing it. And I think, as was said by Natalia, Ricardo, and Heather, yeah, sure, you know, we’ll learn. We’ll have to learn to see how we better deal with our partners, because there are partners.

But one thing which is very important, we are engaged in a world that is producing more history than we can conveniently consume at the moment. There’s a lot more going on that’s interfering. And I don’t think anyone should have any illusions or be naive on how international relations work.

It’s not because they like how you look, or they never, it’s not about loving each other. It’s about interests. That’s how it works.

It goes, same goes for us. And I would be here, you know, taking issue with anyone who would say that the EU’s proposition is a worse one than the Chinese or the Russian one, or even the American, because the facts, it’s not a beauty contest, but facts matter. The EU is the biggest global donor.

The EU and its member states, by far the biggest global donor. When we do business, we stick to our commitment. So there is a proposition there.

There’s a group of countries that are upset with our green policies because we haven’t explained them well. And there’s a lot of misunderstanding and disinformation on what they may or may not entail. There we have to up our game big time.

There’s a group of countries that is upset legitimately because it impacts their existing and their vested strategic interests. There, as Heather has said, and Nathalie, I think you alluded to it, there we have to be better in accommodating. So all that help that is going through our global gateway, 300 billion, and what the member states are doing, there we have to accommodate and align to make sure that they also go through this transition because ultimately it is also in their interest.

As Heather said, we’re all in the same boat. And then there’s always going to be a group, and these are overlapping groups that will call us out for double standards or green colonialists. That is part of diplomacy.

And I don’t think we should be completely phased by it. We should focus on the interest, focus on these partnerships, and I’m sure we can do so, but also let’s not think that Russia has a better offer. What I think is happening in the world, because the order is fraying at the edges and cracking in the center, is that countries are also hedging.

They’re also looking at the world. We don’t know what’s going to happen. And I think it’s incumbent upon the EU to continue to fight for strong multilateralism with our partners as best we can and forge forward.

Nathalie Tocci:
Well, I think this has been an absolutely fantastic conversation. And I’d really like to thank Tony, Ricardo and Heather. I really think actually we have there a very interesting menu of options for our European Green Deal 2.0. I think we’ve talked about several important internal dimensions, implementation, targets, agriculture, circular economy. And I think there in that last bit, we really sort of pinpointed a number of extremely important external sort of issues and initiatives that you should be working on, doubling down on climate finance, particularly when it comes to the Global South, in the relationship both with China and with the United States, not losing sight of the fact that this is a shared crisis. This is a shared challenge. The way in which climate should be integrated more and better in all of our external policies, development, trade, diplomacy, security and defence.

So I think here we are, we’ve got an extremely interesting menu of options with that last bit, really driving at the heart of what the Nexus Project is all about. So again, thank you all for this extremely interesting conversation. And I look forward to seeing you very soon.

In the next episode of Reshaping Multilateralism, Nexus25 co-lead Erin Sikorsky will take listeners back to multilateral space, as leaders prepare for an autumn sprint that includes the UN General Assembly, Summit of the Future, G20, COP29, and IDA replenishment. As policymakers return from their summer holidays and begin finalizing their commitments for 2025, Erin and our expert guests will discuss these upcoming convenings, emerging trends in climate finance, and other key events this fall – including November’s consequential U.S. elections.

Reshaping Multilateralism is a production of the Nexus25 project, a joint Center for Climate and Security/Istituto Affari Internazionali initiative funded by Stiftung Mercator in Germany. To learn more about nexus challenges and read our latest analysis, go to www.nexus25.org. Please remember to subscribe to Reshaping Multilateralism wherever you get your podcasts and see you next time. 

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