Solidarity Matters

Abstract

The Paris Agreement is an extraordinary international treaty. It is an agreement among all nations to collaborate to slow global warming, something that cannot be achieved without the cooperation of peoples everywhere. The fate of humanity depends on international solidarity, and solidarity itself depends (paradoxically) on the universal recognition of both equality and difference. Human rights principles rest on the basic conception that all people are equal in spite of their infinite differences. Yet, embracing the conception that all people are equal and different people have both the incentive and the capacity to collaborate for a common cause, to avert planetary disasters.