Climate change and development cooperation in the european union

Abstract

This book is a collective effort made by eight women concerned and united by the research on climate change, sustainability and cooperation policies within the European Union. This work tries to shed light on the evolution the European Union has experienced since 1992 in its fight against climate change in the search of a more sustainable Europe. Without wanting to be exhaustive, the book aims to depict the evolution of the European Union’s policies on climate, cooperation, sustainability, security, economy and energy with the final aim of being a trustworthy and reliable actor at the international level. The impact that international agreements on climate, cooperation and sustainability have had on European policies is analysed in different chapters.Kattya Cascante Hernández analyses how the commitments adopted in the Agenda 2030 have impacted European cooperation and the development cooperation policies of the EU and how the EU has been present in the International Development Cooperation policy. Europe’s support of the International Development Cooperation policy has overcome the weight of the financial crisis and the isolationist behaviour of other relevant actors, although the EU may be wasting the opportunity created by the distancing of China and the USA from the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) Agenda. All that political performance should have been reflected in the improvement of the European leadership to advance, without gaps and with less rhetoric, a form of governance based on sustainable development, responsible and coherent with the commitments acquired and, most importantly, the initiative of constructing common global goods to address climate change.