Copenhagen’s Legacy: Future in the Balance

Roger Toussaint, international vice president and director of strategic planning of the Transport Workers Union (TWU), sent us a final report from the climate change talks in Copenhagen, Denmark, where 40 U.S. union members were part of a 400-member global union movement delegation led by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC). Read our previous blogs on the climate talks here. 

The success or failure of climate change negotiations in Copenhagen is being weighed by the world based on the final outcome of the talks that ended Dec. 18. We hoped for a signed treaty with emission targets, a timetable, a commitment from both developing and developed countries to take action to curb their greenhouse gas, as well as ways to measure each country’s progress. 

Rather than a firm agreement with these elements, the legacy of Copenhagen will be a pathway to getting us there in 2010 in Mexico City, if not before. However, our success should not be measured by this alone. While negotiations did not result in a next-generation climate treaty, the process included some notable steps forward. 

In particular, the global labor movement leaves Copenhagen having made remarkable progress in advancing our concerns and influencing the climate crisis discussion.  For one, labor’s participation in climate negotiations is unprecedented. We were clearly and visibly at the table with 350 labor delegates from around the world converging in Copenhagen. The 40 U.S. union leaders and other representatives came from such unions as TWU, ATU, AFT, CWA, Utility Workers, IBEW, Mine Workers and Boilermakers.  Compare this with a total of 80 delegates who participated in climate negotiations in Bali in 2007.

There is no doubt our presence resulted in the delegation’s successful introduction of “just transition” language in the preamble of the draft treaty to ensure there is a “just transition of the workforce that creates decent work and quality jobs.”

This level of participation also clearly signals U.S. labor’s recognition of the importance of the climate crisis on its membership, regardless of industrial sector, and its desire to engage and ensure that a new low-carbon economy will both benefit and protect working people. The emergency is at our doorstep, and it has become an issue we, as a movement, can no longer afford to ignore—whether we represent members in the transportation sector, service sector, building trades or energy-intensive industries. 

We clearly need full protections for workers who are negatively affected by climate policies in accordance with the principle of just transition. Who is better positioned than the labor movement to advocate such protections on behalf of working men and women in the United States and around the world? 

What we also need are science-based carbon dioxide emission targets that can generate a massive increase of green jobs in public mass transit, renewable energy, green manufacturing, energy-efficient construction and building retrofits. Only ambitious targets will generate the necessary massive infusion of public financing to generate green jobs and provide training for members displaced by climate change policies, as well as a strong political signal to private investors who are sitting on the sidelines waiting to invest in an economy at the beginning of its lifespan. 

Our future is in the balance. This re-engineering of the economy will occur with or without labor’s willing participation.  How decisively we move in this direction will determine our ability to effectively compete with our global competitors already traveling down this path, in particular China. Asia is already outspending the United States by 3-1 in clean-tech investments. In the short term, the best we can hope for is that taking ambitious action now will enable us to catch up.

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