International negotiations on climate change: Integrating justice psychology and economics - A way out of the normative blind alley?

Abstract

For international climate policy the point at issue is: Will the nations be able to work out a binding post-Kyoto agreement with stringent policy targets and will this be translated into action within a reasonable time frame? In other words, what are the determining factors of cooperative behavior within international climate negotiations, and how can global cooperation among sovereign nations be fostered? To deal with these questions, our conceptual paper proposes to strongly link justice psychology and environmental economics, in particular game theory. Game theory interprets the interaction of nations resp. of representing actors as a public goods (PG) game identifying a social dilemma situation. The aim is to identify the conditions under which a sufficient rate of cooperation can be realized to provide the PG. Game theory thereby focuses on structural conditions in order to reach a sufficient and efficient rate of cooperation to provide the PG at stake. Also searching for determinants of cooperation, psychology follows a different path: it takes a variety of possible human motives into account and analyzes their impact on cooperative decisions empirically. Within that, our approach focuses on subjective justice perceptions: Can justice motives foster cooperative behavior within international negotiations? And if so, towards whom and under which structural conditions? On a conceptual and methodological level, we focus on individual political actors representing national interests within international climate negotiations and dealing with international cooperation tasks. The empirical approach of psychology intertwined with game-theoretical modeling allows important conclusions for the support of international environmental cooperation. Additionally, we consider our integrative perspective as fundamental for further theoretical and empirical advancements of the interdisciplinary as well as disciplinary approaches.