US Needs to Lead

This opinion piece, written in the midst of the Copenhagen climate negotiations, argued that these negotiations were going to fail because of a Prisoners Dilenma-type situation. Mr. Joy argues that a power vaccum has reduced potential for the climate negotiations to deliver a new binding multinational treaty, both now and one year from now. However, he also says that the way forward was for the United States to increase its credibility on the issue by unilaterally passing comprehensive carbon regulations, and also by stepping up investments in low-carbon technologies. This would give the US negotiation team the credibility to extract concessions from other developing countries down the road.