“Commentary on the Paris Agreement”, a forthcoming edited book by Edward Elgar Publishing, gives an overview of the various individual articles in the Paris Agreement. Each chapter corresponds to one article, and is written by world-class specialists on the issues pertaining to the article in question. Leonie Reins (Tilburg University) and Geert van Calster (KU Leuven) have edited the book.
UDP staff Daniel Puig and Fatemeh Bakhtiari have contributed to chapter 8 in the book, which analyses article 8 in the Paris Agreement. Article 8 focuses on climate change-induced loss and damage. The chapter is structured around four sections. First, it provides a historical overview of loss and damage in international climate-change negotiations. Second, the chapter analyses the four main aspects included in Article 8 of the Paris Agreement: the scope of loss-and-damage discussions in international negotiations, the governance of the mechanism that oversees and facilitates those discussions, the possibilities of cooperation with other institutions, and the controversial issues around compensation and liability. Third, the chapter discusses financing for loss and damage, and what the transparency framework and the global stocktake might mean with regard to loss and damage. Fourth, the chapter describes three legal regimes outside of climate change negotiations that are relevant in the context of loss and damage.
Puig and Bakhtiari authored the analysis related to the transparency framework and the global stocktake. With regard to the transparency framework, the text provides suggestions on issues that parties to the UNFCCC that choose to report on loss and damage may wish to consider. This text draws on a more comprehensive assessment published in 2019. With regard to the global stocktake, the text highlights the political choices that are yet to be made and will have the largest influence on how loss and damage is treated in the global stocktake.
