No Borders, No Brains.

Today the COP15 Summit in Copenhagen has been suspended following a walk out by developing nations. The walk out, led by African countrys, is being reported as a protest by the developing nations against what they see as their exclusion from negotiations between developed nations. As with all of the most pointless arguments this dispute has a disagreement about money at it's core. Specifically which economic model is best to help combat climate change. Realistically there are only two possible models which I am calling the "Subsidy Approach" and the "Development Approach."

Subsidy Approach. Basically this involves the governments of developed nations raising money by taxing carbon emissions. This money would then be given to the governments of developing nations in order to preserve environmental assets such as forests and build things like flood defences in order to mitigate the effects of climate change. The main advantage of this approach is that it will be very quick to set up. In the highly unlikely event that COP15 ends in a binding agreement much of this plan could be in place in developing nations by this time next year. The main disadvantage of the approach is that it stinks of neo-colonialism. It would effectively force the developing nations to give large parts of their country to the developed nations and forever bind their futures to the fortunes of those developed nations many of whom are already starting to see their position in the world slip.

Development Approach. Basically this involves globally turning environmental assets into economic assets by creating an international market for carbon credits. This would allow developing nations to become richer without having to cut down vast swathes of rain forest in order to ranch cattle of farm soya beans. All nations would also be able to share green technology through a system where technology is exchanged at little or no cost. The main advantage of this approach is that it allows developing nations to retain and possibly increase their economic and political independence while at the same time reducing the amount of environmental damage being done to the planet. The main disadvantage of the approach is that it is very much dependent on this system of technology sharing. This will be difficult because with the world being what it is today nobody likes giving stuff away for free. To make things even more complicated two of the current world leaders in green technology are the USA and China. At the moment these two superpowers are engaged with each other in a number of very complicated diplomatic situations including the Palestine/Israel conflict, the war in Afghanistan and Iran's nuclear program. In every one of these situations both superpowers are trying to swing the balance of global power in their favour. This makes any discussion between the two over technology sharing so delicate they won't be helped in any way by me trampling all over them.

In terms of getting a binding agreement out of COP15 the subsidy approach creates a whole new set of problems. This is because it will be impossible for Barack Obama or any other developed world leader for that matter to sell the subsidy approach to the American people for the simple reasons that it's simply not a very good idea.

As for the walkout itself although the timing was a shock the protest itself was no surprise. A walkout by developing nations had been scheduled to take place on Wednesday December 16th at a time which most certainly would have collapsed the summit. Although supported by a variety of groups the Wednesday walk out was mainly promoted by a British dominated pan-European/Mediterranean* activist group called No Borders. No Borders are a pro-migration group who have been draw into the climate change debate because of the increased migration that climate change causes. Their most high profile action to date was the 2009 Migrants Camp in Calais, France. For those of you who don't know Calais is the main crossing point for illegal migrants/refugees from across continental Europe, Asia and Africa who want to cross into the United Kingdom. As such it has been a major source of tension between the British and French governments over the last 15 years. In 2002 the British government forced the French government to close the Sangatte refugee aid centre. This forced the illegal migrants/refugees to live in makeshift, squatted camps that became known as "The Jungle" The Jungle stood relatively undisturbed for the best part of seven years until in June 2009 the No Borders group set up a solidarity/protest camp to help the residents of the Jungle. Within a month the French police were forced to clear both the Jungle and the No Borders camp and continue to make life very difficult for illegal migrants/refugees in the area.

With tens of thousands of activists currently on the ground in Copenhagen and the Danish police showing clear signs of co-operation with their British counterparts** it would be unwise of me to accuse the No Borders group of being a MI6 front organisation especially as I have no evidence to support this. However I will warn that in the past protests by No Borders have done more harm then good to the people they claim to be trying to help.






*The group of European nations that border the Mediterranean sea e.g Spain, France, Italy, Greece etc.

**They're clearly trying their hand at "kettling" but because they're new at it they're making lots of mistakes.