Earlier this year, Brazilian President Lula da Silva introduced the concept of mutirão as a guiding idea for hosting COP30 in Belém. Derived from Brazil’s indigenous culture, mutirão refers to the community-wide effort directed towards a shared goal. It is applied to COP30 to emphasise the crucial role of increasingly ambitious national actions in mobilising collective effort towards the climate challenge. This model of multilateralism is an evolution from its vision at the birth of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in 1992, which was more starkly divided between the historical responsibility of the Global North and the needs of the Global South. This commentary reflects on the evolution of climate multilateralism, the challenges it faces, and the ways to strengthen it, drawing on recent developments in climate finance, governance, and trade.
Climate Negotiations Through the Years
The task set before the 198 Parties to the UNFCCC negotiations has been to arrive at various points of consensus on how to limit global warming and respond to its impacts. Differences in national development priorities, political economy contexts, and climate vulnerabilities have led to three decades of politically charged climate talks that have progressed in a lengthy and incremental manner. Climate multilateralism, in its attempts to respond to its own limitations and enable greater consensus in the face of global North-South disagreements, has evolved through multiple phases, which we summarise below.
1992 – 2005: A Top-Down Approach
An early victory for the UNFCCC was the adoption of the Kyoto Protocol in 1997, the first and only international treaty that set legally binding emissions reduction targets for developed countries. In line with the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (CBDR-RC), it exempted developing countries from these targets.
At best, the Protocol delivered mixed results. The US, despite being by far the largest emitter, refused to ratify the treaty, and some other developed countries withdrew from it, citing its exclusion of the increasing emissions of emerging economies and the high economic cost of meeting their climate targets. The Protocol’s second commitment period (after 2012) thus saw lower participation from developed countries.
The market mechanisms under the Protocol, operationalised at COP7 (2001), were hindered by weak systems for accounting, reporting, and verification of emission reductions. COP7 also established the Adaptation Fund, the Least Developed Countries Fund, and the Special Climate Change Fund, with guidance to developed countries on financing adaptation in climate-vulnerable countries.
Attempts to formalise the obligations of developed countries, and distinguish between developed and developing countries (Annex I and non-Annex I Parties at the time) through mechanisms such as the Kyoto Protocol, didn’t succeed because sovereignty trumped historical responsibility, revealing the weakness of the Protocol in enforcing its mandate. It became clear that political and economic realities, and not just equity concerns, would also shape negotiations. Moreover, the realisation that countries could simply walk away from binding commitments without any consequences fuelled a crisis of trust among parties.
Concurrently, therefore, the need to encourage greater climate action by developing countries also began to be discussed.
2006-2014: A Growing Voice For Developing Countries
This phase witnessed tussles over the Kyoto Protocol and concerns about the reinterpretation of CBDR-RC. In Bali (2007), Parties launched an action plan to conduct two parallel dialogues; one to discuss the second commitment period for the Protocol, including its updated emissions reduction targets, and the other to deliberate on the long-term commitments of developing countries and those developed countries that were not party to the Protocol. Notably, developing countries agreed to undertake nationally appropriate mitigation actions, provided they were supported by technology and finance.
Subsequently, to sustain progress amid fracturing negotiations in Copenhagen (2009), developed countries committed to mobilise USD 100 billion per year by 2020, including USD 30 billion in fast-start finance for 2010-12. Major developing countries also agreed to voluntarily pledge to reduce and avoid emissions. However, the USD 100 billion commitment suffered from ongoing problems around estimating additionality and weak reporting and verification of flows.
Drafted in a closed-door meeting between the US and the BASIC (Brazil, South Africa, India, and China) countries, the final agreement — known as the Copenhagen Accord — failed formal adoption, deepening mistrust, and exposing fractures between traditional negotiating coalitions. The impasse continued until COP17 in Durban (2011), where Parties decided to arrive at a new emissions treaty by 2015 that would apply to all countries.
The importance of adaptation was also increasingly recognised during this phase, and at COP16 in Cancun (2010), a process was established to enable least developed countries to formulate National Adaptation Plans (NAPs). NAPs would aim to address medium- and long-term needs and build on the more short-term National Adaptation Programmes of Action (NAPAs). Although NAPs have been in existence for over a decade, challenges such as cross-sectoral coordination, delayed and insufficient funding, and lack of data hinder enhanced action. COP16 also established the Green Climate Fund (GCF), which addressed the longstanding demand by developing countries for a dedicated climate fund under the UNFCCC framework.
In this phase, developing countries such as China and India saw rapid economic growth, rising emissions and a greater global heft. Consequently, climate multilateralism’s approach evolved beyond preserving the global North-South distinction to also focus on addressing the carbon-intensive activities of the major emerging economies. The USD 100 billion pledge and the establishment of the GCF were an (inadequate) response to growing developing country calls, acknowledging the critical role of climate finance.
The role of emerging economies was evidenced in 2014, when the US and China jointly announced their climate commitments, an important precursor to securing the Paris Agreement. A month later, at COP20 in Lima, it was agreed that the future Agreement would reflect the principle of CBDR-RC in light of different national circumstances.
2015-2022: Towards a Bottom-Up Approach
The Paris Agreement (2015) represented a significant shift in the nature of multilateral climate cooperation. It introduced a bottom-up structure for emissions reductions in the form of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), a qualitatively different paradigm than the one that had guided negotiations back in 1992.
Countries are now expected to raise their ambitions in line with their national circumstances, based on periodic reviews through a global stocktake. This process of reviewing progress and identifying areas that require urgent action is not legally enforceable, but is legally mandated under the Paris Agreement. The purpose is to assess collective progress to create a facilitative as opposed to punitive basis for action.
Leading up to COP26 in Glasgow (2021), and amid negotiations on how to operationalise the means of implementation, many countries began committing to mid-century net-zero emissions. This phase also saw movement towards laying down rules on national actions, finance, and the trading of carbon credits under Article 6 of the Agreement.
A proliferation of mini-lateral groupings has accompanied the NDC-oriented approach to climate action. Since 2015, more than 475 issue-specific initiatives have been launched, though they have underwhelmed when it comes to delivering results. A case in point is the diminishing influence of the Glasgow Financial Alliance for Net Zero after a string of exits by banks, insurers, asset owners, and investors, due to financial concerns, political backlash, and legal risks.
The post-Paris era has seen a widespread adoption of the climate agenda across stakeholders. However, while the spotlight has been on what actors are doing to raise their ambition, implementation gaps — and challenges related to finance and technology — are yet to be resolved. Without substantive near-term measures, distant net-zero targets risk seeming only like symbolic gestures of climate credibility. Further, the proliferation of mini-lateral initiatives raises questions about whether it builds upon a necessary platform set by multilateralism, or whether it signals fragmentation in multilateral climate cooperation.
2022-Present: Finance, Trade, and Geopolitical Complexities
The climate agenda has become more complex in recent years, reflected in the pursuit of finding intersections between domestic interests around low-carbon development and a fragmenting international landscape.
In 2022, developed countries announced that the goal of USD 100 billion in climate finance was belatedly reached. However, not only was its delay criticised, but its composition and end-uses also came under the scanner. In parallel, the interlinked challenges of climate change, indebtedness, and inequality were better recognised. Acknowledging these, COP27 began to focus on multilateral development banks (MDB) reforms. However, progress has been slow, while vulnerable economies continue to be burdened by debt and limited fiscal space to act.
After years of negotiations, Parties agreed at COP27 (2022) to create a Fund for Responding to Loss and Damage (FRLD), which was operationalised in 2023. The FRLD has received funding pledges totalling USD 789 million (as of June 2025), representing under one per cent of the USD 395 billion required by vulnerable low-income countries.
Significantly, the new collective quantified goal (NCQG) adopted in Baku in 2024 – as an update to the USD 100 billion target – called on developed countries to take the lead in delivering USD 300 billion per year by 2035 for developing countries, but is vague on modalities and encourages voluntary contributions from developing countries. This amount, however, does not come close to meeting the needs of the Global South. A roadmap to the NCQG’s second goal – to scale financing to at least USD 1.3 trillion per year by 2035 – is under discussion.
Linking commitments to action, in the absence of financial, technological and capacity-building support, has been a major sticking point in climate action. Despite consensus on transitioning away from all fossil fuels in energy systems in a just, orderly, and equitable manner, the language of COPs on formulating and implementing transition programmes has been weak. For instance, the Just Transition Work Programme was established at COP27 to facilitate countries in designing their transition pathways but the modalities of implementation are still a work in progress.
Finance has clearly emerged as a barrier to climate cooperation in this phase. The inadequacy of the FRLD, the slow pace of MDB reforms, and the inadequacy of the NCQG clearly highlight this. Climate cooperation has been further complicated by the US’s second withdrawal from the Paris Agreement and other trade and geopolitical headwinds. While COPs have provided a critical platform for deliberating on climate, evidence suggests that progress has been too little, too late.
The Struggles of Multilateralism
To be sure, multilateralism has played a critical role in moving the world to a lower-carbon trajectory. It has given an equal voice to the smallest and most vulnerable countries, and has evolved and expanded its scope over time to better reflect global needs and realities. However, it has not been without challenges.
For a decade, successive COPs have highlighted the inadequacy of NDCs for limiting temperature rise to well below 2°C. The planet breached the 1.5°C global warming threshold for the first time in 2024, and current NDCs put the world on a 2.6-2.8°C pathway. Progress since Paris is real but insufficient, and gaps remain in linking progressive ambition with progressive action.
The NCQG illustrates this problem. It set an inadequate target and failed to specify clear obligations for developed countries. By inviting developing countries to contribute voluntarily, developed countries attempted to sidestep Article 9 of the Paris Agreement, which assigns them clear financial responsibility.
This tendency towards inadequate and unmet promises has been an ongoing feature of climate multilateralism. It can be attributed to countries’ prioritisation of their domestic economic and developmental interests, the weak enforcement capabilities of the UNFCCC coupled with the challenges of a consensus-based approach, legacy institutional and governance structures — including those of MDBs — that under-represent the Global South, vested interests and lobbying by the fossil fuel industry, and a historical framing of the climate problem as a techno-economic one that is narrowly focused on quantifications of emissions.
To be future-ready and remain economically competitive, domestic actions are increasingly prioritised in the Global North. Beyond undermining cooperative approaches, this comes at the expense of supporting adaptation in the Global South. The Global Goal on Adaptation, for instance, emphasises the mainstreaming of adaptation, but the financial means to achieve this remain limited. The Glasgow goal of doubling adaptation finance to USD 40 billion a year by 2025 is set to be missed. By 2035, developing countries will require twelve times more adaptation finance than is currently provided through international public funding.
Questions around the integrity of the COP decision-making process, and its lack of scrutiny of conflicting interests, pose a challenge to the effectiveness of climate talks. It took 28 years for countries to merely start talking about transitioning away from fossil fuels, while fossil fuel interests continue to shape the climate agenda; 1773 fossil fuel lobbyists were present at the last COP, outnumbered only by the delegations from Azerbaijan, Brazil, and Turkiye.
The COPs struggle to manage the complex political dimensions of climate action, including shifts in the global political economy, rising protectionism, the unpredictability of major powers, and a general decline in trust in multilateral institutions. These dimensions are driving a new wave of unilateral measures towards climate-related trade protectionism. The EU’s Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) serves as such an example. Back in 2010, countries had agreed to implement response measures to deal with the adverse cross-border effects of domestic mitigation policies, but the polarisation around this issue now hampers meaningful progress.
As the COP process evolves to incorporate a wider set of issues and challenges, its response to existing demands for urgent action has not inspired sufficient confidence. Competing political, economic, and institutional interests by various actors have contributed to the sluggish movement of global climate cooperation.
What Lies in the Future for Climate Multilateralism
Like any global framework, avenues for climate cooperation are shaped by the changes in the larger political and economic environment. With advanced economies focusing on reindustrialisation and onshoring of manufacturing, climate concerns have taken a back seat in policymaking. This is exacerbated by the populist backlash against climate regulations and decarbonisation, strengthening political opposition to the transition.
Amidst this uncertainty, an enticing option for countries is to retreat and/or opt for bilateral and minilateral deals that can deliver both climate and trade benefits in a predictable manner, while protecting their narrower economic interests. These coalitions can complement multilateralism by enabling targeted climate actions, but they risk limited legitimacy, low ambition, and weak accountability.
Multilateralism remains central to continued climate cooperation. Its revival will require better reflecting the principle of CBDR-RC, while addressing the legacy inefficiencies of the UNFCCC. Climate discussions will also need to create channels of active engagement with multilateral trade, industrial, and financial frameworks, all with greater speed and urgency than in the past.
As countries submit their third NDCs, an open dialogue at COP30 on how global economic restructuring affects national actions – and vice versa – could help revive multilateralism. For instance, COP30 will launch a forum on climate and trade that can provide an impetus for collaboration in areas that lie at the climate-trade nexus, something that is essential to prevent the conflicts arising from violations of trade rules by policies aimed at addressing carbon leakage.
For the effective implementation of greater climate ambition, it is crucial that multilateral decision-making responds nimbly to uncertainties around the global economy, prioritises long-term needs over short-term interests and short-term actions over long-term platitudes, and deepens collaboration targeted towards systemic shifts. Going forward, substantive progress will depend on the ability of climate multilateralism to translate goals into equitable and practical steps.
