Identity-Based Cooperation in the Multilateral Negotiations on Climate Change: The Group of 77 and China

Abstract

This chapter analyses the cooperation in multilateral negotiations on climate change among developing countries, focusing on the Group of 77 and China, based on a constructivist approach of International Relations. Constructivism identifies how the formation of identities affects the Southern alliances, in contrast to other theoretical approaches of IR mainstream that rely on the material elements as a way of explaining actor behaviour and regimes evolution. Constructivism considers that these material aspects are significant as they compose, together with the ideational aspects and interests, the social structure. Therefore, this chapter states that the idea and construction of a ‘South’, as a space of multidimensional cooperation where the developing countries, with their multiple material and historical differences, find common positions based on all the elements of the social structure, is the source of the G77 and China cooperation and strength. This ‘South identity’ is closely linked to poverty eradication and other development dilemmas that have a concrete expression with regard to the adverse effects of climate change. The chapter makes specific emphasis in Latin American countries of the G77 and China, which is composed of all the countries of the region, except for Mexico.