COP Climate Talks Could Benefit From More Feminist Values, Less Focus on Tech Solutions, Experts Say

Dec 3, 2024 | Bob Berwyn
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With few signs that 30 years of United Nations climate talks have significantly slowed the pace of the greenhouse gas emissions warming the climate, calls to revamp the negotiations have grown louder, and some experts say a stronger push for gender equity could be a key first step toward better outcomes.

Many ideas for reforming the Conference of the Parties (COP), the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change’s annual meetings—for instance instituting voting instead of consensus decisions or changing the way host countries are selected—would require agreement from nearly 200 member nations, and are thus seen as unrealistic.

But the member states have already committed to improving gender equity in a series of previous decisions, so focusing on this effort, and on expanding feminist values within the UNFCCC more broadly, could be a promising path toward reform, according to some climate policy experts.