Common and Symmetrical Responsibility in Climate Change: A Bridging Mechanism for Adaptation and Mitigation

• Author: Haifeng Deng & Chiyuan Chen
• Pages: 99-100

Common & Symmetrical Responsibility 99

IX JEAIL 1 (2016)

Haifeng Deng

∗

& Chiyuan Chen

∗∗

In order to address climate change, the international community established a

regulatory framework in addition to adaptation and mitigation strategies being at its

core, and adopted “common, but differentiated responsibility” as the fundamental

principle behind the international climate change regime. However, the climate

change regime has reached an impasse in recent years. This paper suggests that

“common and symmetrical responsibility” should become the central organizing

principle of the future climate regime in order to resolve disagreements among

countries and encourage the initiative by the international community. This paper not

only provides an analysis of the “bridging mechanism for adaptation and mitigation,”

based primarily on the allocation of quantified emissions, limitation and reduction

commitments and the sharing of multilateral climate funds, but also discusses the

“cut-or-fund” scheme and “cut-and-fund” scheme in in developed and developing

States, respectively under this mechanism.

Keywords

Climate Change, Bridging Mechanism, Mitigation, Adaptation, CBDR,

Symmetrical Responsibility

Common and Symmetrical

Responsibility in Climate

Change: A Bridging

Mechanism for Adaptation

and Mitigation

∗ Associate Professor of Tsinghua University, Beijing, China. LL.D. (Tsinghua). ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0001-

9158-5312 The author may be contacted at: denghf@tsinghua.edu.cn / Address: School of Law, Tsinghua University,

Haidian District, Beijing 100084 P.R. China.

∗∗ Researcher at the Center for Environmental, Natural Resource and Energy Law, Tsinghua University, Beijing, China.

LL.B./LL.M. (Tsinghua). ORCID: http://orcid.org/0000-0002-4181-5367 The author may be contacted at: chency14@

mails.tsinghua.edu.cn / Address: Center for Environmental, Natural Resource and Energy Law, School of Law,

Tsinghua University, Haidian District, Beijing 100084, P.R. China.

DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.14330/jeail.2016.9.1.05

NOTES & COMMENTS