The Geopolitics of Climate Change

As we reel from a summer peppered with extreme weather incidents the world over, Altamar’s 24th episode takes a look at the most global of all challenges: climate change. Specifically, the growing impacts it’s set to have on geopolitics, and vice-versa.

Peter and Muni are joined by Amy Harder, energy and climate change reporter for Axios, and Giulio Boccaletti, Chief Strategy Officer at The Nature Conservancy, to discuss what lies ahead.

Amy and Giulio leave no doubt about it: whether we’re ready for it or not, the environment, for too long an afterthought, won’t let us keep it on the back burner for much longer. Though not a direct cause of the sorts of catastrophic weather events we’ve been seeing in recent years, climate change certainly does make these incidents more frequent and more severe. And the real impact on communities around the world is only set to intensify.

Still, while today’s seemingly constant state of global upheaval may make prospects for cooperation on environmental issues seem bleak, Amy and Giulio both note that some of the most important work isn’t being carried out at the intergovernmental “Paris Agreement level,” but rather at various sub-national levels.

It’s the far-reaching and impactful efforts at those levels that give our guests hope for meaningful progress. But, they warn, stemming a global temperature and sea level rise will require a concerted effort by all actors. What are today generally isolated conversations will soon need to start happening together.

The episode is available for streaming and download.

(Image via Wikimedia)