Anthropogenically induced climate change represents one of the true ‘global commons’ cooperation problems of international environmental law and governance. Greenhouse gas (‘GHG’) emissions (as well as response measures) from anywhere in the world might have profound effects on an environmental medium that is global in nature and whose alterations may be felt even in most remote areas. Tackling climate change does not, however, become a ‘malign’, ‘wicked’ or even ‘super-wicked’ problem simply because of the breadth and scope of the material challenge. It was already noted above that international law (or IEL more specifically) may itself have effectively contributed to the emergence of the economic structures that have ultimately allowed for the current patterns of climate change. Understood this way, climate change represents a quintessential problem of ‘modernity’, i.e. a question of ‘how law and civilisation might restrain the very conditions for human flourishing that modernity has instituted’. Any response to climate change needs to take into account numerous other political, economic, ethical and legal factors that are unlikely to be able to be balanced in a mutually supportive way. As this is not the place to attempt a comprehensive outline of such factors, it should suffice to briefly recap some of the major implications of anthropogenic climate change and the challenges associated therewith.

First, climate change is likely to entail most severe social and distributional consequences. The impacts of climate change are unlikely to be felt first by the nations that have primarily contributed to it, but by small and often developing island states that might even lose the very basis of their existence – the landmass that is subsumed by sea water. Furthermore, there is a considerable likelihood that climate change impacts will be distributed in an unequal fashion at the expense of low-income states. The consequences of climate change may not only affect the very existence of state territory but also impact in various ways on soils, water resources, agricultural production and sources of food, and hence aggravate the harsh living conditions of people. Recent examples of transnational climate change litigation have further underlined the challenges that complainants from developing states may face when deciding to sue major emitters, which are usually located in industrialised states.