The Compliance and Implementation Mechanism of the Paris Agreement

The United Nations meeting in Paris resulting in a new treaty on climate change has been described as a major success in multilateral processes to address global challenges. Prior to the meeting, there were fair concerns as to the fate of the negotiations, not least because of serious disagreements about climate financing provided by developed countries to developing countries. The negotiations did not resolve these disagreements. The Paris Agreement simply formalized what was previously proposed in the Copenhagen Accord and subsequent decisions of parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. On divisive issues, such as a new quantified goal for mobilizing funds in the post-2020 period and transparency of climate finance, parties avoided substantive solutions and instead established processes for negotiating them further. Importantly, however, these procedural decisions contain clear goals and deadlines. The successful adoption of the Paris Agreement is also significant as a symbolic milestone signalling to public and private entities the global consensus on a low-carbon and climate-resilient future.