Abstract

Part of Book
The Political Economy of Climate Finance: Lessons from International Development

Abstract

The world is currently trying to navigate how to cope with the current climate change crisis. There are goals, policies and programmes in place at nearly every level of organizations (from International NGOs to national governments to cities and municipalities), but how the multitude of actions and interventions not only reach but impact local communities is not yet clear. Those who work at the INGO level, who are responsible for helping countries implement the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) admit to the difficulty in ensuring that climate finance funds reach those most affected by climate change impacts. In this chapter we reflect on lessons to be learned from international development. The chapter argues that like international development, climate finance emerges from and is embedded in the institutional architecture of neoliberal globalization. As such, ‘successful’ climate finance looks very different depending on one’s position in world order. Within the current constellation of social forces, achieving climate justice is not merely a function of the aggregation and disbursement of capital, but of social struggle to ensure maximum benefit for those most seriously affected by climate change.