This Master thesis analyses the European Union Emissions Trading Scheme (EU ETS). The aim is to analyse this instrument and its achievements. Emission allowances represent a new market instrument of the European Union's policy to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to combat the climate change. The first part of the thesis focuses on international climate negotiations, in particular on the Kyoto Protocol, which triggered the establishment of the EU ETS. The second part focuses on the system functioning and its achievements. The third part deals with the functioning of the EU ETS in the Czech Republic.

<p><p><strong>Abstract</strong></p><p><strong>Political Science, level III thesis</strong></p><p><strong>Spring semester 2010</strong></p><p><strong>Author: Emelie Alfredsson</strong></p><p><strong>Supervisor: Tomas Mitander</strong></p><p><strong><em>"A Changed Leadership? - A study of the EU leadership from a institutional standpoint, related to multilateral environmental negotiations"</em></strong></p><p>The EU has for a relatively long time considered itself a leader in the environmental policy area as a whole as well as in multilateral environmental negotiations. This study attempts to classify and identify the European leadership with the purpose of relating it to the institutional framework of the Union. The treaties of the European Union decide its ability to act and its institutions the right to engage in different policy areas, the environmental area being the focus of this study. With the recent ratification of the Lisbon treaty this study aims to make out if the type of leadership the Union showed during the Kyoto negotiations has changed with the new treaty, into a new type during the COP-15 meeting in Copenhagen. The results shows that the Union has kept the same type of leadership despite the change in treaties, though with great potential of changing leadership if or when the new reforms of the new treaty are better implemented. This result points to the fact that institutional changes have a small effect on the EU leadership and that other factors such as ability to unite the member countries may play a bigger role.</p></p><p><p><em>Keywords:</em> EU, leadership, multilateral environmental negotiations, Copenhagen, Kyoto</p></p>

The aim of this thesis is to study China's position regarding the global climate and the numerous topics discussed in the global meetings held during 1997, ending in the Kyoto summit in the same year. Chinas position during this year was evidently on the side of developing countries. China regarded topics such as technology transfer, emission trading and Commitments for the participating parties as very important topics which had to be considered. Chinas final position regarding these subjects was during 1997: - Increased funding and technology transfer resources to developing countries. - Objection to the inclusion of emission trading in the protocol. - No new commitments of any nature for developing countries. - National development is Chinas key issue.

There has been considerable debate within the field of Japanese intellectual history with respect to the influence of Nishida Kitarō (1870-1945) on the ideological foundations and philosophical justification of Japanese fascism. One of the most influential Japanese thinkers of the twentieth century and widely considered to be the father of modern Japanese philosophy, his contemporary relevance is considered to be at risk should these accusations be true. As such, contemporary scholars have attempted to show how Nishida’s philosophy was decidedly anti-fascist, and that he was in fact opposed to the actions of the wartime regime. However, as this thesis will argue, by considering Nishida’s philosophy within the larger historical context of global modernity one can see that his contemporary relevance lies in just that which allows one to consider his thought as fascist, his critique of modernity. Nishida was reacting to the transforming social and cultural landscapes that had followed the modernization of Japan initiated by the Meiji Restoration (1868). As a result, he attempted to posit a transhistorical ideal of Japanese culture, embodied concretely in the Emperor that could withstand the social abstractions of modernity. However, it was ultimately his failure to grasp his own conditions of possibility in the very modernity that he was critiquing that pushed his thought increasingly to the right, helping to fuel and legitimize the emerging fascist ideology.

After the Meiji Restoration of 1862, Western philosophy was imported and infused into Japanese culture and its intellectual climate. By the early 20th Century, Kyoto School philosophers and romantic authors sought to reaffirm Japanese culture, believed jeopardised by the hastened development of Western capitalist modernity. This movement became politically charged, and is not without fascist allegations. After the Second World War modernism again became a primary intellectual concern, as modernists and Asianists alike attempted to struggle with the idea of fascism in Japan. Works of Nishida Kitaro (1870-1945) and Watsuji Tetsuro (1889-1960), and the prewar contexts within which they were written, will be compared to the postwar thinkers Maruyama Masao (1914-1996) and Takeuchi Yoshimi (1910-1977). The purpose of this thesis is to examine how Japanese thinkers before and after the Second World War understood and responded to the global process of modernity, and how it relates to such political movements as liberalism and fascism.

The 2002 ratification of the Kyoto Protocol by the government of Canada represents an interesting case study in Canadian federalism. This thesis seeks to explore the perspective of the government of Saskatchewan during the debate surrounding the ratification of the Kyoto Protocol. In examining Saskatchewans perspective, this thesis uses the theoretical framework developed by Richard Simeon in Federal-Provincial Diplomacy: The Making of Recent Policy in Canada. In particular, the four major sources of intergovernmental conflict identified by Simeon, economic conflict, ideological conflict, political competition, and differences in perspective, will be used to examine Saskatchewans reaction to the ratification to the Kyoto Protocol. Climate change policy provides interesting insights into Canadian federalism. Constitutional authority in environmental policy is concurrently shared between both levels of government. At the same time, the federal government has authority to make international treaties, but requires provincial consent to implement those treaties in areas of provincial jurisdiction. Unlike other previous intergovernmental negotiations, the Kyoto Protocols ratification also introduces international elements and considerations to domestic federal-provincial relations, which have rarely been explored in academic literature surrounding Canadian federalism. As such, this thesis hopes to use the case study of Saskatchewans perspective on Kyotos ratification as a means of expanding on the relevance of Simeons framework through the consideration of unexplored international factors on Canadian federalism.

There has been considerable debate within the field of Japanese intellectual history with respect to the influence of Nishida Kitarō (1870-1945) on the ideological foundations and philosophical justification of Japanese fascism. One of the most influential Japanese thinkers of the twentieth century and widely considered to be the father of modern Japanese philosophy, his contemporary relevance is considered to be at risk should these accusations be true. As such, contemporary scholars have attempted to show how Nishida’s philosophy was decidedly anti-fascist, and that he was in fact opposed to the actions of the wartime regime. However, as this thesis will argue, by considering Nishida’s philosophy within the larger historical context of global modernity one can see that his contemporary relevance lies in just that which allows one to consider his thought as fascist, his critique of modernity. Nishida was reacting to the transforming social and cultural landscapes that had followed the modernization of Japan initiated by the Meiji Restoration (1868). As a result, he attempted to posit a transhistorical ideal of Japanese culture, embodied concretely in the Emperor that could withstand the social abstractions of modernity. However, it was ultimately his failure to grasp his own conditions of possibility in the very modernity that he was critiquing that pushed his thought increasingly to the right, helping to fuel and legitimize the emerging fascist ideology.

Les changements climatiques nous rappellent aujourd'hui que certains problèmes environnementaux ne connaissent pas de frontières et que les États doivent lutter ensemble pour les solutionner. Ce problème des plus préoccupants a même fait en sorte de rallier plusieurs États autour de la conclusion de la Convention-cadre des Nations unies sur les changements climatiques et du Protocole de Kyoto. Dans le contexte de ces accords, il est manifeste que les États, interdépendants, ne peuvent plus décider simplement par eux-mêmes ou pour eux-mêmes, mais doivent plutôt se joindre au concert de toutes les nations. Ceci touche inévitablement à la conception de leur souveraineté, dans laquelle l'indépendance est prépondérante. Il apparaît toutefois de plus en plus clair que le paradigme stato-centré ne convient plus à une analyse complète de l'exercice de la souveraineté des États. Le dépassement du cadre étatique est nécessaire à la fois en ce qui a trait à l'échelon auquel doivent être négociées les solutions, mais aussi, relativement aux acteurs qui doivent être intégrés dans les discussions. Nous avons d'une part constaté que les États recourent à la création d'institutions internationales pour tenter de régler le problème des changements climatiques, institutions dans lesquelles ils demeurent des entités souveraines. D'autre part, nous avons remarqué que l'intégration de nouveaux acteurs non étatiques dans les négociations, comme les organisations non gouvernementales (ONG), qui souhaitent infléchir les politiques publiques et le développement des accords internationaux dans le domaine des changements climatiques, se présentent de plus en plus comme un paramètre à considérer. La combinaison de ces deux composantes mène à un exercice de la souveraineté selon des modalités coopératives et participatives. ______________________________________________________________________________ MOTS-CLÉS DE L’AUTEUR : Souveraineté, Convention-cadre des Nations unies sur les changements climatiques, Protocole de Kyoto, Changements climatiques, Organisations non gouvernementales, Canada.

The 2002 ratification of the Kyoto Protocol by the government of Canada represents an interesting case study in Canadian federalism. This thesis seeks to explore the perspective of the government of Saskatchewan during the debate surrounding the ratification of the Kyoto Protocol. In examining Saskatchewans perspective, this thesis uses the theoretical framework developed by Richard Simeon in Federal-Provincial Diplomacy: The Making of Recent Policy in Canada. In particular, the four major sources of intergovernmental conflict identified by Simeon, economic conflict, ideological conflict, political competition, and differences in perspective, will be used to examine Saskatchewans reaction to the ratification to the Kyoto Protocol. Climate change policy provides interesting insights into Canadian federalism. Constitutional authority in environmental policy is concurrently shared between both levels of government. At the same time, the federal government has authority to make international treaties, but requires provincial consent to implement those treaties in areas of provincial jurisdiction. Unlike other previous intergovernmental negotiations, the Kyoto Protocols ratification also introduces international elements and considerations to domestic federal-provincial relations, which have rarely been explored in academic literature surrounding Canadian federalism. As such, this thesis hopes to use the case study of Saskatchewans perspective on Kyotos ratification as a means of expanding on the relevance of Simeons framework through the consideration of unexplored international factors on Canadian federalism.

The United States is the single largest contributor of greenhouse gas emissions. Its engagement is therefore critical to the success of any international effort to prevent man-made global climate change. It was therefore a huge step-back for the international community when President Bush soon after taking office in 2001 rejected the Kyoto Protocol. Despite a strong opposition the international community did not convince the Bush administration to reconsider its decision and re-engage in the Kyoto Protocol process. The objective of this thesis is to investigate which central elements that will increase a US inclination to participate in international agreements after the first commitment period in the Kyoto Protocol. These elements were found through a literature study of four peer-reviewed articles and an empirical analysis of four international partnership agreements. The overall conclusion is that there are several central elements that could increase a US inclination to participate in international agreements after the first commitment period in the Kyoto Protocol. These elements cover a wide range of disciplines from technology over research and development to business interests.