I believe that the importance of global Realpolitik is declining while the importance of Geopolitics is steadily increasing. Geopolitics are increasing along with the importance and the awareness of the necessity for a series of diverse Climate agreements and treaties to manage the planetary Commons for the benefit of all of us… and the assurance of the continuum of our species. This year the Nobel given to president Obama overshadowed all others – but perhaps more important – was the Nobel of Economics given to Elinor Ostrom for her analysis of the economic governance of the Commons. Elinor Ostrom is an American political scientist and she was awarded the 2009 Nobel Memorial Prize in Economic Sciences, for “her analysis of economic governance of the commons”. Not only is she the first woman to win the prize in this category but she is also dealing with the most important aspect of managing our planet. After the wild excesses of incessant and mindless corporate privatizations and attendant environmental privations and destruction, for lack of clear governance treaties – we now get smart. We need treaties to manage and govern our Commons. Treaties such as those we started working out in Copenhagen. Many new ones are required now for the Climate warming mitigation, for the atmosphere and the Oceans and the glaciers and the rainforests and all sensitive ecosystems… treaties that challenge the sovereign aspect of many corporations and countries and emitters and bring back to the global governance Commons what rightfully belongs there.  You can’t solve global problems unilaterally. Partnerships and alliances and global treaties are needed to deal with Oceanic acidification issues. Same for the glaciers and the Rainforests. If Papua new Guinea or another weak state like Haiti cannot deal with it’s environmental degradation and that conclusively affects all of us – then the power of the global governance of the Commons – kicks in. The good thing is that the US President Barack Obama and the EU leaders have fully grasped this. They are pragmatic leaders. Realpolitik has been a good school to educate – those leaders willing to evolve – about Geopolitics. That is evident when these leaders, and especially Obama, described the Copenhagen Accord as just a “first step” to dealing with global warming. Although they admit that as it  stands, it isn’t enough to address the problem and a series of ongoing negotiations and treaties have to continue moving us closer and closer, to elusive and constantly moving targets. Thankfully, we have experience with this sort of rounds of negotiations resulting in  treaties that are translated into International policies and legally binding agreements actionable in world bodies from the ongoing negotiations for the NPT agreements. Most importantly this sort of treaty is resulting in laws that are entered in the constitutions of the country signatories. Thus the NPT is the simile with the Copenhagen Accord and it’s follow on rounds of what might develop in Bonn and Mexico city. Treaties as a series of negotiation rounds that will look very much like the NPT process that has taken 50 years to mature and is still ongoing as fresh as half a century ago. Generations of Diplomats, Politicians and Policy Makers have been weaned at t the teat of the NPT and have let go of their baby fetters and grew to be realistic and effective statesmen. Let’s hope the same happens now for the Global Environment Treaties; as succesful rounds of discussions will show us. GET is the outcome treaty from a round such as Copenhagen… The Diplomat leaders amongst you and the negotiators and policy makers, reading this Blog will understand the parallels and the vast importance of this slow & lengthy yet effective process. To give you an understanding of the scale of the NPT: The Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty - NPT, is a treaty to limit the proliferation of nuclear weapons globally. It was negotiated for years and finally opened for signatures on July 1, 1968. There are currently 189 countries as signatory parties to the treaty, five of which have nuclear weapons and vast arsenals of the same: the United States, Russia, the United Kingdom, France, and China. Incidentally all five constitute the permanent members of the United Nations Security Council. Only four recognized sovereign states are not parties to the treaty and for good reason. India, Israel, Pakistan and North Korea, specifically because they have nuclear weapons programs in violation of the treaty. India, Pakistan and North Korea have openly tested and declared that they possess nuclear weapons. Israel has had a policy of opacity regarding its own nuclear weapons program – although widely acknowledged as having at least five atomic weapons. North Korea acceded to the treaty, violated it, and withdrew from it in 2003. But we are still working hard to bring them back in the folds of the Treaty and to prevent others, like Iran, from falling foul of it. That is what’s all about… Many environmental stakeholders have been bitterly disappointed with the Copenhagen outcome, which they argue falls short of the ambitious legally binding commitments that the planet demands in the face of fatal climate change impacts. I have one thing to say: They don’t understand the Diplomacy necessary to achieve effective global Treaties for long lasting Geopolitical results. The fundamental requirements for a successful global climate change treaty will be: The all important need to ensure legally binding, mid- and long-term targets for emissions reduction to limit global average temperature  increases to at least 2 degrees Celsius, a sizeable and transparent funding package with strong  governance to address adaptation and mitigation in the most vulnerable countries, and support  technology transfer and low carbon developed among the least developed countries. The urgency for  an agreement which is implemented immediately to reduce costs and impacts of climate change must  be reflected in the ambitious deal adopted globally; and world leaders, delegates and NGOs at  COP15 are well versed in understanding the political contentions associated with reaching such consensus. If this is the criterion we were hoping to tick off in Copenhagen, then it is safe to say that COP15  hasn’t delivered the deal the world was hoping for – a legally binding treaty with emissions cuts for developed counties (as well as some measures for developing countries), and a detailed finance  package; and several contentious issues have simply been postponed and relegated to COP16 in Mexico. The success of COP15 may be better judged in hindsight at the end of 2010, and especially after the early summer Bonn meetings when it is expected that there will be a significant number of new signatories from  both developed and developing countries, that will have presented their pledges for tackling climate change, and the world may be closer to the possibility of a legally binding treaty developed from the Copenhagen Accord. However, the likelihood of taking this weak agreement to a stronger legal treaty is likely to be a challenging path full of hurdles, backholders, misguided friends, pure enemies of a climate process and saboteurs. And although globally countries could reach a binding agreement on climate change in Bonn and then in Mexico City this year - I think we have a very short period of time – in which the world has to understand that Realpolitik is irrelevant if we can’t get the Geopolitics right.  Let’s get our act together and step up. And if that happens, Mexico could produce a binding agreement as an ongoing series of negotiations and similar to the NPT rounds of agreements – it will be succesive Rounds of discussions and agreements that will guide our lives and provide us with a comfort level that we are managing the greatest threat of our lives and the survival of the species. NPT is the method for the ongoing Nuclear Non Proliferation Treaties that allowed us to survive the Cold War from becoming a Thermo-Nuclear war in an instant. It’s a daunting, but certainly a doable, prospect, as our friend Rajendra Pachauri said, referring to the next summit, planned for later this year in the Mexican capital. In reality although the Climate talks in Copenhagen last month ended with a non-binding agreement to reduce rises in global temperatures, a result that has been criticised as insufficient – they actually produced a critical treaty named Copenhagen Accord. This trety was the global accord, agreed to by the greatest and wealthiest emission producers along with the poorest and most vulnerable nations to cooperate and limit their emissions. It is but the first round of GET. A first round of a Global Environment Treaty as  a comprehensive treaty to limit global warming from making this planet a Venus like blast furnace. But if countries are to reach a binding agreement in Mexico City, “there are a few critical factors which would need a superhuman effort,” so said, Pachauri the current chairman of the IPCC. The main factors are the following: “One is a strong commitment from the US,” he said. ”Two is that countries would also need to take steps such as agreeing on an institutional framework by which funding for developing nations to address climate change could be effectively utilised”, he said. I fully agree: A binding agreement in Mexico City is within reach if we manage these factors for the stakeholders right through Bonn and lead with strength to Mexico City. I also agree with Chairman Pachauri second contention: that it’s doable – but I want to add – that it’s gonna be really hard. And we have to build on every positive outcome and bridge building experience from the Copenhagen Accord. Going forward is a matter of governance of the Commons and being realistic that it might take a generation or more to get it right… Naturally the challenges posed by climate change would not be resolved anytime soon and people will have to learn to manage this and live with the ills of the planet under management. Also time is running out to get this sorted… But we have to understand, that we, who are policymakers will deal with climate change every day for the rest of our political lives. We have to participate in the negotiating rounds eagerly for a treaty always shifting, always addressing new issues, urgent needs and global as well as regional challenges. We clearly ought to stop thinking that this is something we can solve at the next conference of the Parties. It’s part of an ongoing process. Well – Let’s think of it as – Earth under New Management – Negotiations and Treaties. COP15 and the Copenhagen Accord are but a precursor to the future rounds of Climate talks. Now we have to create the equivalent of the NPT for the future of Geopolitics. I propose herewith we call the treaties resulting from all of our COP – Conference of the Parties – negotiations as ”GET” agreements. GET as in ”Global Environment Treaty” Yours, Pano. PS: Let’s GET ourselves a good agreement in Bonn and a global GET  agreement treaty in Mexico City this fall. See you there.