12 Security as a Weapon: How Cataclysm Discourses Frame International Climate Negotiations

Delf Rothe

12.1 Introduction

I want to testify today about what I believe is a planetaryemergency – a crisis that threatens the survival of ourcivilization and the habitability of the Earth (Al Gore2007).

[…] apocalyptic imaginations are decidedly populist andforeclose a proper political framing […], ecology is thenew opium for the masses (Swyngedouw 2009).

In 2007 the issue of global climate change receivedunprecedented public and political attention culmi-nating in the award of the Nobel Peace Prize to AlGore and the Intergovernmental Panel on ClimateChange (IPCC). At the same time in scientific, politi-cal, and public discourse an image of climate changethat portrayed global warming as a security threatgained more prominence (Klare 2007: 355; Brauch2009). The question of the security implications of cli-mate change has also fuelled a series of scientific stud-ies (e.g. Brauch 2002; Barnett/Adger 2007; Klare2007; Podesta/Ogden 2008). These empirical studies,the first of them conducted as early as the 1990s,showed above all that there is no robust statistical ev-idence of a correlation between alterations in the cli-mate system and security concerns (Barnett 2009;Gleditsch/Nordås 2009; Salehyan 2008; Salehyan2008). However, these doubts did not restrict the in-fluence of the security argument in political dis-courses. Going even further, proponents of the Co-penhagen School (CS) of securitization warned asearly as 1998 against the negative impact of an expan-sion of security logic into different issues such as theenvironment. A securitization of environmental issues,such as climate change, could lead to the adoption ofexceptional measures, they feared. These could turnout to be inappropriate and even counterproductivein dealing with the environment. Yet, as different em-pirical studies have shown, despite discursive securiti-zation we have not so far seen these political implica-tions realized in climate politics (Brzoska 2009).

The starting point of this chapter is thus a twofoldparadox: first, while empirical knowledge about thesecurity implications of climate change is still inse-cure, this does not affect the growing public percep-tion of climate change as a security issue; second, thisdiscursive shift does not lead to the adoption of ‘ex-ceptional measures’ at the political level – thus oppos-ing the assumptions of the theoretical framework ofthe CS and experiences with other cases of securitiza-tion such as avian flu (Youde 2008) or internationalmigration (Huysmans 2000). At the heart of thischapter lies the question of why the storyline of cli-mate change as a security threat is so successful butdoes not lead to the political consequences that areassumed by the CS securitization framework. Thechapter is a promising and logical next step in an on-going disciplinary debate on the securitization of cli-mate change and its political implications. Previouscontributions to this debate (Brauch 2002, 2009;Brzoska 2009; Detraz/Betsill 2009; Trombetta 2008)have applied the original CS approach thoroughly,and shown that things in the empirical field of climatepolitics are more complex, as suggested in the frame-work.1 This chapter accounts for these empirical in-sights in that it provides a theoretical revision of theCS account in order to make it more applicable to thecomplex case of climate politics.

In doing so, it draws upon the insights of a post-structuralist discourse theory to overcome the short-comings of the CS as identified in the literature(Balzacq 2010). Rather than being the product of theutterances of single actors, securitization is better un-derstood as an argumentative process, where thestatements of different actors compete in a certaindiscursive or political arena. Through this perspective

1 For example, all studies agree that there is not one sin-gle security discourse in climate politics but rather dif-ferent competing concepts (e.g. Brzoska 2009; Brauch2009).

243J. Scheffran et al. (eds.), Climate Change, Human Security and Violent Conflict, Hexagon Series on Human and Environmental Security and Peace 8, DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-28626-1_12, © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2012

244 Delf Rothe

it will be shown that in the arena of international cli-mate politics the storyline of climate change as athreat is used by different actors as an ‘argumentativeweapon’ to give weight to their arguments, positionthemselves, or blame other actors. The question ofwhether a securitization succeeds, in this perspective,depends on the ability of actors to win others over totheir arguments, thereby establishing a discourse coa-lition giving weight to the demands they promote(Hajer 2006).

The explorative case study of the chapter is basedon a metaphor-based discourse analysis. The (pre-)ne-gotiation process of a post-Kyoto agreement hereserves as a most likely case example, as it concentrateson a period that has been characterized as beinghighly securitized in contrast to earlier periods of cli-mate discourse. Empirically, the study draws on 60newspaper articles from major German print mediafrom 2009 and 2007 (as a reference year), as well asspeeches from different political actors that gainedpublic attention in 2009.2

12.2 A Discourse-sensitive Account of Securitization

12.2.1 The Copenhagen School

The securitization approach of the so-called Copenha-gen School (Buzan/Wæver/de Wilde 1998; Wæver1995) has to be understood against the background ofa disciplinary debate about the expansion of securitypolitics into different policy fields such as economicsor the environment in the aftermath of the end of thecold war. The CS provided a novel perspective on thisdebate as it saw the widening of security not as an ob-

jective historical development but as the result of con-scious political action. By drawing on the linguisticSpeech Act Theory3, they developed the basic idea ofthe approach, namely that security problems do notjust exist out there but are intentionally constructed inthe process of articulating them (Buzan/Wæver/deWilde 1998). The account consists of very few basicconcepts: a ‘securitizing actor’, which can be politicaldecision-makers or other actors in an authoritative po-sition; a ‘securitizing move’ – i.e. statements that de-pict a certain reference object of reality as a securitythreat for another; and the relevant audience, whichjudges the plausibility of the construction and has tobe convinced in order for the ‘securitizing move’ tosucceed (Buzan/Wæver/de Wilde 1998: 2). In thisway, the ‘securitizing move’ is intentionally performedby the actor following a specific calculus: the con-struction of a political issue as existential and urgentlegitimizes the adoption of exceptional political in-struments to deal with it (Wæver 1995: 55).

Since its initial formulation (Wæver 1995) thisquite simple model has subsequently been revised andcomplemented. The focus was initially on the formu-lation of different facilitating conditions that couldexplain the success or failure of securitizations. Oneinternal condition, which refers to the ‘speech act’ it-self, is that the latter needs to be formulated on thebasis of a certain grammar of security.4 The two exter-nal conditions on the one hand refer to the social po-sition or authority of the speaker as well as thespeaker’s relation to the audience, and on the otherhand the characteristics of the constructed securityproblem exert an influence: the more this issue is gen-erally associated with notions of threat and danger,the likelier the securitization is to succeed (Buzan/Wæver/de Wilde 1998: 33). In a more recent publica-tion, Buzan and Wæver, as the main proponents ofthe CS, have provided another revision of the frame-work with respect to its spatial dimension (Buzan/Wæver 2009). In the original model the CS had sug-gested that a securitization in most cases will be re-stricted to the mid-range political level, i.e. the na-tional or at the most the regional level. In the 2009

2 Media articles qualify as primary sources as they are animportant arena for transnational climate discoursesand provide statements from very different politicalpositions. While it is justified to claim that the analysedsample is representative for discourses in ‘Western’industrialized countries, one could expect quite differ-ent findings when media from so-called developingcountries were added. This divergence is an issue for adifferent study and is not relevant for the argument ofthis chapter. The media sources comprised the Süddeut-sche Zeitung, the Frankfurter Rundschau, and the Tag-eszeitung, as well as the magazines Der Spiegel and DieZeit. The articles that were chosen dealt with the vari-ous pre-negotiations of COP15 in Copenhagen 2009.The speeches were made at the UN Summit on ClimateChange, 22 September 2009 in New York.

3 Speech Act Theory, which was developed by J. L. Austinand J. R. Searle, proposed that language does not con-sist only of propositions, i.e. statements that can bejudged true or false, but also of performatives, i.e. utter-ances through which certain actions are performed.

4 ‘Grammar of security’ refers to the established collectiveunderstanding of security that is dominated by the real-ist concepts of existential threats, exceptionalism,national responsibility, and military (re)action.

Security as a Weapon: How Cataclysm Discourses Frame International Climate Negotiations 245

article they present the possibility of how differentsmaller securitizations might be linked to more com-prehensive security discourses at the transnational oreven global level. These ‘macro-securitizations’, likethe discourse on the ‘global war on terror’, subse-quently affect all securitizations at lower levels, e.g.terrorism discourses inside national states. For ourpurpose this is of interest as the climate security dis-course could be regarded as exactly such a macro-se-curitisation.

12.2.2 Problematizing Securitization

In the discipline of International Relations (IR), thenovel and refreshing perspective of the CS has fuelledan intense theoretical debate. The debate has alsoproduced a series of criticisms of the CS’s account ofsecuritization. Summarizing the various points madein the literature, we are able to sift out three generalstrands of criticism. The first strand refers to the con-centration on single linguistic utterances as a meansof securitization (Stritzel 2007). These authors forexample argue for regarding securitization as a proc-ess rather than a single event and for including a vari-ety of different means from media visualizations topolicy tools and practices (Bigo 2007; Williams 2003;chap. 14 by Rørbæk). A second main point for manyauthors is the limited conceptualization of the actorsand audiences in the securitization process. It was, forexample, suggested that securitization could be under-stood as an inter-subjective process of argumentationbetween several securitizing actors and audiences(Balzacq 2010). Thirdly, adherence to a military secu-rity concept involving the identification of existentialthreats and the adoption of exceptional measures hasprovoked a lot of criticism for unnecessarily constrain-ing the account (McDonald 2008: 576). All these crit-icisms result from a complex combination of two ele-ments: first, security thinking in the tradition of CarlSchmitt and (neo-)realist scholars such as KennethWaltz (1979), and second, the partially contradictoryassumptions of discourse and ‘speech act’ theory onthe constructed nature of social meaning. In the fol-lowing, the aim is to identify contradictions and toshow possibilities for overcoming them by strengthen-ing the discourse-theoretical position inside the CS.

12.2.3 Speech Acts Versus Discourses

From a perspective that draws on the insights of post-structuralist5 discourse theories, many of the above-mentioned criticisms are self-evident. In line with the

CS, discourse theory starts from the assumption thatlanguage is not simply the representation of an al-ready existing objective reality but it is indeed the lin-guistic structure which constitutes the perceived real-ity in the first place. Yet, and at this point discoursetheory is often misunderstood, this does not meanthat there is no material reality at all. Rather, thepoint is that material facts do not have any meaningfor us until we give them a name or term, therebyputting them into a relationship with (the terms of)other things. This can be regarded as the structuralistcore (De Saussure 1967) of discourse theory: languageis a structure or system which produces the meaningof objects by relating and ordering them along twoaxes or logics – difference and equivalence (similar-ity).6 This also means that there is no natural relationbetween a term, or sign, and the object it denotes.The relation is arbitrary, as the meaning of any wordcan be seen as a social convention which is not fixed.Following this, one and the same term will have verydifferent meanings depending on the discursive con-text of its formulation. What we will understand as se-curity heavily depends on the context and on how theterm is uttered in different discourses. A banker maydenote security as “the guarantees for an investment”,while a computer scientist may speak of “the vulnera-bility of a network”. These denotations differ stronglyfrom the use of the term ‘security’ in a military con-text.

Post-structuralism now extends these basic as-sumptions in two ways that are decisive for our pur-pose. The first revision says that the discursive struc-ture is never ultimately fixed but can always bechanged through individual articulations – e.g. by in-troducing new concepts or by putting old ones into adifferent context just as in the case of a securitization(Glynos/Howarth 2007: 109–10). A discourse then isa spatially and thematically demarcated field in whichthe meaning of its elements is temporarily stabilized(Laclau/Mouffe 1985: 167). To phrase it precisely: adiscourse is “a specific ensemble of ideas, conceptsand categorizations that are produced, reproducedand transformed in a particular set of practices andthrough which meaning is given to physical and social

5 With the term post-structuralist discourse theory in thischapter, the author mainly refers to the work of ErnestoLaclau and Chantall Mouffe (1985).

6 For example, the meaning of security is constitutedthrough its potentially endless differentiation fromother phenomena, e.g. fear, social injustice, freedometc., and its equation with others, e.g. nationalism, exis-tential threat, physical integrity etc.

246 Delf Rothe

realities” (Hajer 1995: 44). In the case of climatechange, ideas and concepts, for example, are the no-tion of the climate as a complex system or the con-cept of vulnerability. Our contemporary understand-ing of climate change is produced within a set ofscientific practices such as modelling, which givemeaning and substance to the complex reality of cli-mate change. Discourses define and constrain whatcan reasonably be said and what counts as true for agiven issue at a certain time. Through this, they havea certain self-enforcing potential: if the articulations ina thematic field are repeated again and again they ap-pear as naturally given and gain a certain taken-for-granted status (Hajer 1995: 61). For a theory of securi-tization this has some very important implications.First, every securitizing move depends to a considera-ble degree on the already established discourses.Thus, the discursive context has at least to be incorpo-rated as a ‘context variable’. Second, an actor cannever fully control the discursive effects of that actor’sstatements as these always compete and/or link upwith a variety of utterances from other actors. In thisrespect, securitization is to be understood as an argu-mentative struggle in a certain discursive arena such asthe global climate change discourse. Thirdly, this tran-scends the very distinction between the securitizingactor and the audience in the CS. Rather than takingthe form of action and re-action, securitization is amutual interactive process.

The second revision of the structuralist account ofdiscourse was to abandon the notion of a fully consti-tuted subject as the origin of language and meaning(Howarth 2000: 44). For many theories – this holdstrue for linguistics as well as for social sciences – thehuman individual is seen as the origin of social phe-nomena. The individual intentionally determines themeaning of the sentences he or she articulates orchanges his or her social environment through pur-poseful actions. This also holds true for the theory ofsecuritization: here he or she is the securitizing actor,who intentionally constructs something as a securityissue. This implies that actors have fixed and givenidentities, beliefs, and intentions. For discourse the-ory this is a sheer impossibility: single individuals can-not be regarded as origins of social change since theirvery identity, and hence their beliefs, interests, and de-sires, are themselves dependent on the discoursesthey are embedded within (Gottweis 2003). From thisperspective every discourse provides a series of differ-ent subject positions7 that individuals take up andidentify with. Subject positions are the “places ofenunciation” (Howarth 2010: 313) in a certain dis-

course that enable individuals to speak and to beheard. The climate discourse, for example, providessubject positions such as climate scientist, climatesceptic, or environmental activist. The influence of asubject position also depends on the historically spe-cific discourse – for example, in the early 1990s ‘cli-mate sceptic’ was a widely accredited subject positionin global climate discourses. Today, this is no longerthe case.

Like all elements of discourse, subject positionsare not fixed or given but are established and/orchanged in a process of mutual positioning. Position-ing here refers to those speech acts or arguments ofactors that relate to and shape others’ identities. Thispositioning again works along the two dimensions ofdifference and equivalence. For example, the positionof climate sceptics depends on a breakaway move-ment from scientists that warns against the risk of cli-mate change. Yet to say that subject positions are po-tentially contingent does not exclude the possibility oftheir becoming temporarily fixed, e.g. by becoming in-stitutionalized in political or economic institutions.Such institutionalized subject positions are oftenequipped with a considerable moral and legal author-ity (Walter/Helmig 2008: 122). For a theory of securi-tization this means that instead of taking a strategi-cally behaving actor as the origin of a securitization,we should start by identifying the influential subjectpositions provided by the (climate and security) dis-courses which enable individual actors to define secu-rity threats. Furthermore, we should pay attention tothe positioning effects that security arguments canhave. To denote someone else as a threat is indeedone of the strongest positioning moves. An example isthe securitization of the carbon-intense economies ofthe Western world by the AOSIS states as a threat totheir survival.

12.2.4 Security and Politics

From a discourse-theoretical perspective, both the di-chotomization between politics and security and ad-herence to a realist security concept cannot be main-tained. If the relationship between a term and itscontent is arbitrary, as described above, it is not rea-sonable that the security concept should have any nat-ural immutable core. The prominent role of the ex-ception and a realist security concept for the CS hasbeen attributed to the influence of Carl Schmitt

7 The concept of subjectivity refers to the identity ofactors and corresponding behavioural norms.

Security as a Weapon: How Cataclysm Discourses Frame International Climate Negotiations 247

(Williams 2003). Schmitt had developed a conflictualconcept of politics, which sees the distinction be-tween friend and enemy at the heart of political ac-tion (Schmitt 1996). In national states, political enmi-ties become institutionalized and partly tamedthrough a stable order based on the sovereign’s mo-nopoly of force, the rule of law etc. Nevertheless,there is always the possibility for the state of order tobecome vulnerable, e.g. through revolutionary strug-gles. For the state of order to withstand this tempo-rary suspension, the political leader makes use of itsemergency powers. In this way, the leader identifiesan existential enemy which is blamed for threateningthe social order (Schmitt 1993). This concept has twoimplications that are important for us. On the onehand, while the exception is the moment of pure andabsolute enmity, normal politics is not free of friend-enemy distinctions (Schmitt regarded an absolute ab-sence of this distinction as the “death of politics”).Schmitt instead suggested taking the degree of enmityand friendship as a yardstick for the intensity of poli-tics. On the other hand, for Schmitt, the presence ofan enemy also has a positive political function, whichis to enable and guarantee the collective identity ofthe “inside” community.

The construction of threats is thus a feature ofevery ordinary political process where collective iden-tities are constructed against the background of acommon enemy.8 Playing the security card in this re-spect can be seen as a highly effective weapon in a dis-cursive political struggle, e.g. to forge alliances, blameothers, or raise popular identification with certain is-sues. In all these functions securitization displays aclear politicizing bias. Yet there are also cases in whicha securitization will lead in the opposite direction to-wards a de-politicization or de-democratization. Thisis the case when security arguments are used to nar-row the corridor of political alternatives. Security nar-ratives, and the sense of urgency they bring about, caninvoke a notion of there is no alternative’, thereby si-lencing criticism or opposition. The existence of con-flicting alternatives can be regarded as the pulsing heartof politics (Mouffe 2005). Consequently ChantalMouffe has criticized contemporary forms of (global)governance that aim at reaching a deliberative consen-sus, and are often legitimized through the notion of acommon threat as inherently anti-democratic.9

12.2.5 The Rhetorical Face of Securitization

Another critical point applying to the account of secu-ritization, which has not been dealt with in the litera-ture so far, is the focus on the textual surface structureof language (what has been said). This hides the‘depth range’ of language, which comprises the di-mension of rhetoric (how something has been said).Different studies have highlighted the important roleof metaphors, in particular in the discursive construc-tion of reality (Howarth/Griggs 2008; Hülsse 2003;Walter/Helmig 2008). The prominence of metaphorsstems from their ability to produce equivalences oranalogies between different specialized discourses byproviding a common vocabulary (Sarasin 2003: 13–4).Through metaphors, we are able to use more accessi-ble and generally intelligible concepts to delineate andthus understand very complex empirical phenomena.

These assumptions correspond to the findings ofcognitive linguistics that metaphorical reasoning is thestructural organizing principle of human thought(Lakoff/Johnson 1980: 11). In an extended theory ofsecuritization, the study of metaphors of securityhelps us to understand how the security discourse islinked with other specialized discourses. Securitiza-tion at the rhetorical level represents a subtler, oftenunnoticed and therefore even stronger possibility ofimposing discursive changes, e.g. by picturing climatechange in metaphors of war and conflict.

12.2.6 A Different Account of Securitization

An account that is able to bring together these theo-retical considerations is the argumentative discourseanalysis developed by Maarten Hajer. FollowingHajer, political action is based on a continuous argu-mentative struggle, where alternative interpretationsof the world, political problems, and the right politi-cal solutions compete with each other. In this process,individuals will take up different subject positions toconstruct their arguments. In this way, they drawupon the present discursive vocabulary and knowl-edge. According to Hajer, this knowledge does notexist in an atomized fashion, but is organized throughso-called storylines. Storylines are short and con-

8 For an analysis of the use of the concept of ‘threat’ inrelationship to ‘challenge’, ‘vulnerability’, and ‘risk’ indifferent scientific communities, see Brauch (2011).

9 Following Mouffe (2005), consent always and necessar-ily rests upon the exclusion of some demands so thatthe existence of a real consensus ultimately remains anillusion. The absence of alternatives in consensual polit-ical settings meanwhile reduces the democratic legiti-macy of such policies.

248 Delf Rothe

densed narratives that give meaning to a certain as-pect of reality by reducing its complexity (Hajer 2006:69).10 Storylines often draw upon particular meta-phors which raise their intelligibility and plausibility.Argumentative action through the promotion of sto-rylines not only aims at framing a certain problem butalso at positioning other actors in the field, e.g. pollut-ers and sufferers in the climate change discourse. Ifwe understand securitization as an interactive argu-mentative process, this also implies that we need a dif-ferent criterion from the acceptance of the audiencefor the success of a securitization. In line with Hajer’stheory, this criterion can be found in the evolution ofa discourse coalition, i.e. a coalition of different ac-tors who identify with and promote the same set ofargumentative storylines (Hajer 2006: 70). When sucha discourse coalition is established, the acceptanceand authority of the promoted storylines increase.The influence of any set of storylines will increase themost if it is taken up by actors with antagonistic sub-ject positions, e.g. by oil businesses as well as by envi-ronmental non-governmental organizations (NGOs).If a storyline is publicly accepted, this retroactively in-creases the authority and credibility of the coalitionthat promotes it.

12.3 Actors, Coalitions, and Storylines in the Securitization of Climate Change

To study the securitization of climate change as anargumentative process, a methodical approach afterHajer (2003: 103) is followed and partly extended bythe inclusion of metaphor analysis. As a first step theinstitutional context of the securitization process andits related practices and subject positions will be iden-tified. Secondly, the dominant discursive vocabulary(storylines and metaphors) at the macro level will beanalysed. Thirdly, argumentation strategies and theevolution of different discourse coalitions will be ana-lysed. Finally, the political implications and conse-quences of this process will be discussed.

12.3.1 The Institutional Background of the Securitization Process

Social practices into which the discursive productionof climate change is embedded are characterized by arelatively high degree of institutionalization. This alsoholds true for the subject positions of the relevantspeakers in the discursive field. The signing of theUnited Nations Framework Convention on ClimateChange (UNFCCC) in 1992 gave birth to the interna-tional climate regime and thereby established a stableand continuous frame of reference for internationalclimate negotiations (Biermann 1998: 193). Crucial forthe orientation of future climate politics was the es-tablishment of the UNFCCC as an intergovernmentalinstitution, with its annual conferences of the parties(COP) as its general decision-making agency. This putclimate politics mainly into the hands of national gov-ernments. Politicians – often from the background ofWestern national environmental bureaucracies – arethus an influential and highly institutionalized subjectposition in climate politics. Besides these national ac-tors, the IPCC, through its incorporation into theUNFCCC architecture, became the most influentialactor in climate politics. The IPCC conforms to whatCallon and Latour have called a “macro-actor”(Callon/Latour 1981: 281). These are actors who bearthe sole ability to announce the state of facts in agiven political domain. Climate discourse and hencepolitics are highly dependent on the IPCC assessmentreports and their summaries for policymakers. We canthus identify climate scientists as a second influentialsubject position with a high degree of institutionaliza-tion in the climate discourse.

Yet, since the initial establishment of the climateregime, considerable changes with regard to the archi-tecture of international climate politics have takenplace. Due to increasing public awareness and percep-tion of climate change as a matter of justice or devel-opment, the number and influence of NGOs in cli-mate politics has risen. The number of NGOsparticipating in the annual COPs is growing as well asthe degree of cooperation among them (Carpenter2001: 319). Businesses have also changed their strategywith respect to climate politics. Businesses now try tointroduce themselves into the discourse, pursuing therole of reasonable actors (Global Leadership Forumon Climate Change 2009). At the same time two de-velopments can be noticed, first a higher prioritiza-tion of the issue and second a shift of competencefrom environmental ministries or organizations to na-tional leaders and hence organizations like the G8 or

10 An example is the greenhouse storyline that explainsand simplifies the complex phenomenon of climatechange.

Security as a Weapon: How Cataclysm Discourses Frame International Climate Negotiations 249

G20 (G8 2009). The phase which is analysed in thischapter is characterized by the so-called Bali Road-map. This defines a pre-negotiation process whichshould prepare for adopting a successor agreementfor the expiring Kyoto Protocol at COP 15 in Copen-hagen. Statements in this phase have to be seen as ar-guments in the negotiation process. Besides the offi-cial delegation meetings of the UNFCCC, severalfurther international meetings were held. The mostprominent was the UN summit in New York in Sep-tember 2009, which nearly 100 political leaders fromindustrialized and many developing countries at-tended.

Lastly, there is the subject position of security offi-cials and security professionals, which until 2007 wasnot really present in the climate discourse. Yetthrough reports and interventions that were widelyperceived by the public, they managed to integratethemselves into the climate discourse without any ex-ternal assistance. I

In the field of security politics, government offi-cials from Germany (WBGU 2007), Great Britain11,and the USA12 are among the most active players inthe climate discourse. NATO has also discovered cli-mate change as an important issue and is currently be-coming more active in the field.13 A report on climatesecurity by the Center for Naval Analysis14, an Amer-ican security think tank with close connections to thePentagon, has received the most publicity. In Europe,the German Advisory Council on Global Change hasshaped the debate with an influential report (WBGU2008). There are further non-governmental actorsfrom a broader security policy context such as theBritish International Alert (IA) or the AmericanCenter for Strategic & International Studies (CSIS)that were major drivers of the debate (see table 12.2).

12.3.2 Metaphors of Climate Change

As nobody is able to directly perceive the complexphenomenon of climate change, a system of concep-tual metaphors and simplifying storylines is neededfor people to be able to think about and communicateover climate change. The most dominant way of fram-ing climate change in the empirical material isthrough metaphors of war and struggle. The war met-aphoric of climate discourse comprises several sub-concepts such as climate change is an enemy/weapon; is a criminal; is a catastrophe or a threat.15

Sometimes an even more dramatic version of thethreat metaphor is used, which is climate change is anapocalypse – a concept of danger that is structuredaround several biblical signifiers. As climate change isan enemy or threat, logically there is a need for de-fenders. This corresponds to the often-used conceptclimate politics is a struggle. In the empirical materialtwo different dimensions of the metaphorical framecan be identified. The first dimension constructs pol-itics as one party in the struggle against the enemy cli-mate change, while the second dimension paints apicture of a struggle between different countries overtheir responsibility for global warming, as well as theircontribution to climate politics.

In addition to these dominant framings of climatechange and climate change politics, there are furthermetaphors that are directly related to them. One ofthese is climate change is a disease. There is a strongaffinity to the war metaphors that stems from theircommon roots in human experience with the fragilephysicality of the body or the contingency of life(Sarasin 2003: 191–2). Similarly, the two metaphoricalconcepts of climate change is a test or challenge andclimate change is a game/sport are deductions of themore general concept of struggle. Whereas theformer concept of a challenge stresses the commonfate of humanity, the latter is mainly used to stress thetough negotiation process – e.g. through the meta-phor of climate poker. Further related concepts drawon the sports metaphors mentioned as well as on met-aphors of motion that help explain the temporal di-mensions of climate change. The first of these meta-phors is climate politics is a journey which rewritespolitical progress in spatial terms. Following this fram-

11 National Security Strategy of the United Kingdom,2008: “Security in an interdependent world”; at: <http://interactive.cabinetoffice.gov.uk/documents/security/national_security_strategy.pdf> (24 April 2010).

12 U.S. Government, White House: National SecurityStrategy of the United States of America, March 2006,at: <http://www.strategicstudiesinstitute.army.mil/pdffiles/nss.pdf> (20 April 2010).

13 Anders F. Rasmussen, 2009: NATO Secretary Generalat the NATO Parliamentary Assembly, Edinburgh, 17November 2009; at: <http://www.nato.int/cps/en/SID-6AC1AA22-4B68D4FB/natolive/opinions_59214.htm?selectedLocale=en> (24 April 2010).

14 Center for Naval Analysis, 2007: National Security andthe Threat of Climate Change; at: <http://securityandclimate.cna.org/report> (12 April 2010).

15 To differentiate metaphors as broader discursive con-cepts from concrete linguistic metaphors, the formerare written in capitals. You will find textual examples forthe metaphorical concepts from the empirical materialin table 12.2 (Appendix).

250 Delf Rothe

ing, the warming earth as well as countries are vehi-cles, which are supposed to be in a race or run againsteach other. Thus, the earth is moving horizontally –which metaphorically represents the time dimensionof global warming – whereas climate politics standstill. Now, on this horizontal axis different points ofno return exist. An example of such a point is the per-ception of COP15 in Copenhagen as the ultimatechance to get the earth on to a track of sustainable de-velopment and the perception of the 2º C target as ademarcation of chaos. These metaphors expressivelyhighlight the urgency dimension of climate politics.Ultimately, there is a surprisingly marginal metaphorwhich portrays the earth or climate as a threatenedobject.

12.3.3 Discourse Coalitions and Storylines

A thorough look at the empirical material can showthat speakers who have a voice in the discourse can beallocated to a set of six to seven different subject po-sitions. These are climate scientists (especially IPCC),political elites and/or delegation leaders from indus-trialized countries, politicians from developing/smallisland states, security actors and security think tanks,NGOs, and to a lesser degree transnational busi-nesses.16 Furthermore, due to their major significanceanother subject position for climate celebrities is in-troduced: examples are Al Gore, Ban Ki-Moon or Yvo

de Boer. These are characterized by a perceived neu-trality, a high moral authority, and institutional influ-ence due to their social position (e.g. as UN or UN-FCCC general secretary). The analysis of empiricalmaterial shows that in the period from 2007–2009,actors from all the subject positions drew on sto-rylines that promoted the danger of climate changeand identified it as a threat, enemy, or apocalypse. Inthis storyline, climate change has the role of the anti-hero or enemy, who will at an uncertain future pointin time turn against humanity and threaten the earthas we know it. We can notice further that different ac-tors use the storyline in slightly different versions topromote quite dissimilar arguments. Summarizing thevarious individual arguments articulated in the mate-rial, four ideal type sets of storylines can be identified.It can be assumed that the subject positions that pro-mote the respective sets of storylines constitute a dis-course coalition.

A first discourse coalition could be called alarm-ist. It basically puts forward the urgency or time di-mension of the dangerous climate change storyline.The coalition comprises climate scientists and criticalNGOs, but to some lesser extent also the other sub-ject positions in climate politics. It revolves around

Figure 12.1: The metaphorical vocabulary of climate discourses. Source: The author.

16 Table 12.2 in the Appendix lists the subject positionsfound in the texts and gives examples of the individualspeakers that were assigned to them.

Security as a Weapon: How Cataclysm Discourses Frame International Climate Negotiations 251

the concepts of climate change as an apocalypse,challenge, journey, and a race/run: “[...] the journeyis long. The journey is hard. And we don’t have muchtime left to make it.”17 The metaphors of motion aremainly used to highlight the time dimension of cli-mate politics as time is running out: “We have to limitit to 2.0 degrees and if we don’t succeed, it will be adisaster.”18 The basic argument that accompanies analarmist narrative is the need for urgent action. An-other argument is that the severity of the problem canonly be solved by world leaders who are steering thevehicles which are in a race against climate change.

For NGOs as well as for climate scientists thealarmist storyline can be regarded as a means of rais-ing awareness in the first place. The motional meta-phors of the alarmist storyline (climate change as arace) are intentionally ‘exploited’ for the purposes ofpositioning. As climate politics is a race/run along ahorizontal axis or climate change is an enemy that isheading towards us, actors are able to metaphoricallyposition themselves along the spatial axis of climatepolitics. Particularly brave or wise actors like the EUare forerunners or pioneers, others – especially theUSA – are accused of lagging behind. The security

concept used by the alarmist coalition thus is one thatclearly draws upon the notion of existentialism.19 Yetdue to the prominent role of the time factor it also of-ten refers to the notion of global risk – a threat lyingin the future that can be mitigated through precau-tionary actions. This risk paradigm is ultimately repre-sented by the (artificial) 2.0 °C demarcation betweena manageable climate change and an uncontrollableone.

Slightly different is a second discourse coalitionthat can be called globalist. It differs from the alarm-ist one through privileging the spatial dimension ofclimate change over its time dimension. Its storylinesare established along the metaphors of climatechange as a threat and as an enemy of humanity. Asone feature of dangerous climate change is its spatialde-boundedness, it abolishes the differences andboundaries between countries, regions, and humans:“This is a test of our ability to work together as na-tions facing common challenges in this new globalera. If we falter, the Earth will itself be at risk […].”20

The globalist storyline is mainly promoted by politi-cians and climate celebrities. It is obvious that the sto-

Table 12.1: Discourse coalitions drawing on storylines of a dangerous climate change. Source: The author.

Storylines Subject position Arguments

Alarmist: Dangerous climate change (above 2.0 °C) is causing apocalyptic and incalculable effects (climate change as war or challenge and climate politics is a race).

All Immediate response Copenhagen!We need to keep climate change below 2.0 C.

Globalist: Climate change threatens the whole world and is thus a test for humanity (climate change is war/climate change is a test).

Politicians (industrialized countries)Climate celebrities

Developing countries have to contribute a share.We need a global agreement immediately.

Developmental: Climate change is threatening the survival and the development of developing countries (climate change is a threat/enemy).

Politicians (Developing countries)NGOsBusiness

Support of developing countries with funds and technology;ambitious and immediate mitiga-tion of industrialized countries.

Climate Conflict: Climate change fuels conflicts over resources and migration which threaten international security, (Climate change as a threat to national security)

Security officials and profession-als

A global early warning system for conflicts;establishment of a networked security.

17 Barack Obama: “Speech at the United Nations Summiton Climate Change”, New York, 22 September 2009; at:<http://www.un.org/wcm/webdav/site/climatechange/shared/Documents/USA.pdf> (19 April 2010).

18 Nicolas Sarkozy: “Speech at the United Nations Summiton Climate Change”, New York, 22 September 2009; at:<http://www.un.org/wcm/webdav/site/climatechange/shared/Documents/090922Discoursclimat.pdf> (19 April2010).

19 Unlike other security concepts like human security thataccount for risks with varying degrees of danger, thealarmist discourse frames climate change as a threat tothe existence or survival of the whole planet.

20 Gordon Brown: “Speech to the Major EconomiesForum”, London, 19 October 2009; at: <http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page21033> (19 April 2010). The quo-tations in this paragraph serve as paradigmatic examplesbut constitute only a very small proportion of the totalnumber of expressions in the empirical material.

252 Delf Rothe

ryline is used to promote international cooperation inclimate politics. Faced with a common enemy, hu-manity unites and stands up together to defeat the ex-ogenous challenger. This is often dramatized by poli-ticians when they state that climate change is a testwhich humanity has to pass: “Global climate changehas a profound impact on the existence and develop-ment of mankind, and is a major challenge facing allcountries.”21 It thus has strong positioning effects as itconstructs a collective identity of nations and peoplein face of the climate catastrophe. This is a strong ar-gument against the common distinction between pol-luters and developing countries in international cli-mate politics. The globalists draw upon aninternational if not universal security concept that re-frames climate politics as a matter of (global) collec-tive defence.

In opposition to this globalist storyline there is adiscourse coalition between the subject positions ofpoliticians from developing countries and (develop-mental) NGOs. The coalition, which is called develop-mental, promotes a storyline that again depicts cli-mate change as a dangerous enemy. Yet in this versionthe industrialized countries bear the responsibility fornature becoming ‘evil’. Threatened are mainly the sur-vival and economic well-being of the developing coun-tries. The storylines promoted revolve around theconcept of human security. With respect to the argu-ments promoted, we can further differentiate a mod-erate and a radical faction of the developmental coa-lition. The radical version, for example advocated bysome AOSIS members, securitizes the industrializedcountries as a threat for their survival. This links, forexample, to arguments calling for strong internationalsupport for adaptation in vulnerable regions. In themoderate version the threat is not the Western worldbut again the external enemy of climate change. Here,one concept often represents the possibility of rescue:‘sustainable development’. While being radically am-biguous, the term has been established as a major ar-gument for the compatibility of economic growth andthe protection of the environment.22 Again, the devel-opmental storylines are also used for the positioningof identities in climate politics. While the developingcountries position themselves or are positioned as vic-tims, industrialized states as the polluters are accom-plices in climate change wrongdoings.23

The last coalition of actors promotes a set of sto-rylines that draws upon a narrow, national, and mili-tary concept of security and can be called the climateconflict coalition. The basic argument establishes acausal chain between climate-change-related instabilityand diminishing human security in the global Southand the security concerns of industrialized countriesin the global North. In this respect human insecurityresults from a high degree of negative climate impacts(such as rise in sea level, droughts, etc) combinedwith a lack of governmental coping capacity to dealwith the impacts of climate change. The passive andhelpless victims in this narrative turn out to be danger-ous for the industrialized countries as they bear thepotential of violent conflicts and migration that couldspread internationally: “[...] as a result of climate-in-duced migration and poverty in the poorest countries,[there will] almost inevitably [be] greater conflict.”24

Climate change, through the spread of migration, vio-lent conflict, and/or terrorism, becomes in these nar-ratives a national security threat for the Westernworld. The coalition mainly comprises subject posi-tions of Western political leaders, climate celebrities,and security professionals and officials. Interestingly,even subject positions one would not expect to jointhe climate conflict discourse coalition, such as envi-ronmental NGOs, can be found here. This gives thearguments even more weight: “Failure to agree astrong, effective deal in Copenhagen will acceleratethe demise into competing smaller entities, resourcewars, disruption, refugees, and natural catastro-phes.”25

21 H.E. Hu Jintao: “Speech at the United Nations Summiton Climate Change”, New York, 22 September 2009; at:<http://www.un.org/wcm/webdav/site/climatechange/shared/Documents/China.pdf> (19 April 2010).

22 See David Zuzuki Foundation, Germanwatch,Greenpeace, IndyAct, National Ecological Centre ofUkraine, WWF International, 2009: “A CopenhagenClimate Treaty 1.0. A Proposal for a CopenhagenAgremment by Members of the NGO Community”; at:<http://www.greenpeace.de/fileadmin/gpd/user_upload/themen/klima/NGO_Treaty_Overview.pdf> (20 April2009).

23 Mohamed Nasheed: “Speech at the United NationsSummit on Climate Change”, New York, 22 September;at: <http://www.un.org/wcm/webdav/site/climatechange/shared/Documents/Maldives.pdf> (19 April2010).

24 Gordon Brown: “Speech to the Major EconomiesForum”, London, 19 October 2009; at: <http://www.number10.gov.uk/Page21033> (19 April 2010).

Security as a Weapon: How Cataclysm Discourses Frame International Climate Negotiations 253

12.3.4 Political Implications

We can see that the securitization of climate change isa highly contested, interactive process where differentargumentations and very different security conceptsare applied. The framing of climate change as a secu-rity threat in a narrow sense makes up only a part ofthis broader discursive struggle. This is in line withthe findings of different studies on the securitizationof climate change (Brzoska 2009; Detraz/Betsill2009; Trombetta 2008). In this respect it is not sur-prising that up till now we have not seen the adoptionof exceptional measures to mitigate the risk of climatechange as we had to suggest following the CS’s ac-count of securitization. What kind of measures will beapplied in the future depends on the question ofwhich discourse coalition will enforce its storylines asthe correct interpretation of the climate change issue(this does not exclude the possibility that differentconcepts and arguments might coalesce).

Contrary to previous studies of the securitizationof climate change, it is argued here that there are nev-ertheless noticeable political implications of the proc-ess described. These implications appear to be contra-dictory, but with regard to the theoretical backgroundpresented above this contradiction disappears. On theone hand, the process of securitization from 2007 onhas certainly led to a considerable politicization of cli-mate change in the sense of a Schmittian concept ofpolitics. This means that the intensity of public identi-fication with the issue of climate politics has risen.This has shifted climate change towards an issue of‘high politics’, which is further exemplified by the par-ticipation of national leaders in COP15 in Copenha-gen in December 2009, where a sense of urgency andexistentialism was continuously present at the negoti-ating table. This culminated in a highly emotional andcontroversial concluding debate – bringing the post-Kyoto negotiations close to failure. The more thedebate heated up, the more the different speakersdrew upon securitizing storylines to highlight theimportance of their agreement or to accuse the otheractors’ proposals of not being ambitious enough.26

At the same time scholars such as Eric Swynge-douw (2010) have pointed to the fact that the promi-

nence of narratives of a dangerous climate changeleads to a steady de-politicization of international cli-mate governance. On the basis of the present empiri-cal study this can be explained as follows. Althoughcontrary in their conclusions the different storylinesdraw on the same discursive vocabulary to promotetheir arguments. Thus they share a certain commondenominator, which is the construction of climatechange as an external enemy. Put in CS terms, the dif-ferent securitizations of climate change link up to auniversal globalist macro-securitization, constructingclimate change as a global threat and ‘humankind’ asa threatened reference object. This simplifying sto-ryline offers a basis for a variety of specialized dis-courses for communicating. Through this, it becomespossible to condense the incredibly complex scientificand socio-economic causes and processes of climatechange into a few basic metaphors (Swyngedouw2009: 7). The existence of the macro-securitizationdiscourse at the same time constrains and structurespossible arguments at lower political levels. At thesame time this leads to the paradox that antagonisticactors such as security officials and climate activistsdraw on the same storyline of a dangerous climatechange for their arguments. Even actors such as oilcompanies refer to the common threat storyline(Global Leadership Forum on Climate Change 2009).Even critical voices such as NGOs now speak the lan-guage of dangerous climate change.27

As was argued above in the theoretical part, thepresentation of an external enemy is the basis for acommon identity. Yet in the case of international cli-mate politics this leads to the blurring of fundamentalsociopolitical antagonisms between the different ac-tors in the negotiations. Furthermore, the notion ofnecessity and urgency closes the window of opportu-nity for political options that lie beyond the architec-ture of the climate regime in the framework of theUNFCCC and its policy instruments, notably the flex-ible mechanisms of the Kyoto Protocol. This does notmean that dispute and conflict would be silenced inthe climate negotiations, otherwise it would not be sodifficult to agree on a post-Kyoto climate regime.Rather, the macro-securitization of climate change has

25 David Zuzuki Foundation, Germanwatch, Greenpeace,IndyAct, National Ecological Centre of Ukraine, WWFInternational, 2009: “A Copenhagen Climate Treaty 1.0.A Proposal for a Copenhagen Agremment by Membersof the NGO Community”; at: <http://www.greenpeace.de/fileadmin/gpd/user_upload/themen/klima/NGO_Treaty_Overview.pdf> (20 April 2009).

26 The different speeches can be viewed here: <http://cop15.meta-fusion.com/kongresse/cop15/templ/ovw.php ?id_kongressmain=1&theme=unfccc#> (18 January2011).

27 US Africom, 2009: “A New Approach to Global FoodSecurity and Hunger”, at: <http://www.africom.mil/getArticle.asp?art=3569&lang=0> (20 April 2010); Green-peace et al. 2009.

254 Delf Rothe

supported the widely-acknowledged view that there isno alternative to a global climate deal and its politicalinstruments. This means at the same time that funda-mental disputes and antagonisms are channelled intoa very narrow set of abstract and technical matters.This became obvious at COP16 in Cancun, where thehighly controversial negotiations revolved aroundquestions such as: should we allow for an averagewarming of 2.0 °C or 1.5 °C? How should CO2 poten-tials be measured? Should carbon capture and storagebe included in the Clean Development Mechanism –or not?28 This equally means that fundamental politi-cal decisions concerning the functioning of the capi-talist system, the Western way of life, and the impos-sibility of infinite growth are excluded. The consen-sual setting regarding the danger of the climate crisisprevents the development and discussion of real polit-ical alternatives based on a democratic decision-mak-ing process.

12.4 Conclusions

A twofold puzzle was noted above: on the one hand,climate change is more and more seen as a securityproblem, while empirical findings do not necessarilysupport this assumption. On the other hand this secu-ritization of climate change has so far not led to theadoption of ‘exceptional measures’ in climate politics.Now we are able to solve this puzzle by adding themissing pieces to the securitization account. Securiti-zation is neither the result of growing evidence of thesecurity implications of climate change nor is it an in-tentional manipulation of reality by political elites. Inthe theoretical part of this section it was shown thatsecuritization can best be described as the emergenceof transnational discourse coalitions who share theuse (of different versions) of a climate security sto-ryline for argumentative purposes. Furthermore, itwas suggested that a securitization does not take placesolely at the surface structure of language but also atthe lower rhetorical level. In the empirical part, it wasshown that climate discourses are structured by meta-phorical storylines that revolve around the concepts

of war, struggle, and security. Different actors in cli-mate politics use these storylines to promote theirown arguments and claims. It was argued that the se-curitization of climate change can be regarded as a cu-mulative by-product of this argumentation processand that it is not an intentional strategy of nationalleaders.

The result of this process can be seen in the evo-lution of a macro-securitization representing climatechange as a global threat for humankind. On the onehand this has led to the intensification and politiciza-tion of climate politics. On the other hand it could beseen as part of a broader trend towards the de-politi-cization of international climate governance. Thepresentation of climate change as an external enemyfosters a counterproductive focus on an internationalagreement as the only solution to climate change.This means that fundamental questions about the or-ganization of our society and economy are not raised.In this respect an ever-growing number of interna-tional climate activists have stopped calling for astrong international agreement and instead made acase for the shutdown of the Copenhagen process soas to develop alternative solutions to the climate cri-sis. For the research community dealing with climatechange and security issues, the findings of this chapterhave three major implications. Firstly, caution isneeded about how politically relevant research find-ings are presented and their possible unintended con-sequences. Secondly, positive sociopolitical visionsshould be developed that depart from apocalyptic se-curity scenarios as well as from the technocratic fram-ing of the UNFCCC setting. Thirdly, further studiesof the political impacts of a securitization of climatechange are needed which should cover a longer timespan in order to establish the possible long-term ef-fects of the securitization process. The studies shouldalso include a wider range of policy fields such as de-velopment or security politics to account for possiblespillover effects and interactions with international cli-mate politics.

28 UNFCCC, 2010a: “Outcome of the work of the Ad HocWorking Group on long-term cooperative action underthe Convention”, at: <http://unfccc.int/files/meetings/cop_16/application/pdf/cop16_lca.pdf>; UNFCCC,2010b: “Outcome of the work of the Ad Hoc WorkingGroup on Further Commitments for Annex I Partiesunder the Kyoto Protocol”, at: <http://unfccc.int/files/meetings/cop_16/application/pdf/cop16_kp.pdf> .

Security as a Weapon: How Cataclysm Discourses Frame International Climate Negotiations 255

Table 12.2: Structural metaphors and their textual expressions (translated from German). Source: The author.

Structural Metaphors Textual/Linguistical Expressions

EMISSIONS ARE OBJECTS (TRADABLE GOODS)

To cap emissions; establishment of a carbon market; emissions do not have a price tag (Zeit 50/2007); “deposit emissions in the atmosphere”; a run between growth and emis-sions (Zeit 49/2007); climate diplomacy now has a language and a currency: CO2(-cer-tificates) (Zeit Online 5.11.2009);

CLIMATE CHANGE AND/OR IMPACTSARE WAR

ARE AN ENEMY/WEAPON

ARE A CRIMINAL ARE THREATS

a) FOR HUMANITYb) FOR DEVELOPING COUNTRIESc) FOR CERTAIN SECTORSd) FOR SECURITY

Victims of CC; campaign of destruction; climate refugees (Spiegel 47/2007); CC will rav-age huge parts of the world; humanity has to arm for the defensive battle (Spiegel 05/2007 ); developing countries suffer from climate change; industrialized states have to fight against drought; 25 million climate refugees today – more than caused by war (Spiegel 15/2007); agriculture will suffer; massive problems with water supply; pests are gaining ground; threats for human health (Spiegel 5/2007); the most serious security threat in the world; more threatening than international terrorism; (Spiegel Online 6.6.2007); CC fuels conflicts; CC causes waves of migration; destabilizes states (Spiegel Online 6.6.2007) a challenge for humanity: prevent the earth from tipping into chaos (FR 07.11.2009); an irreversible catastrophe (FR-Online 30.10.2009); […] otherwise whole landslides are in danger of dehydrating (Süddeutsche 19.09.2009); emission of danger-ous greenhouse gases like CO2 (Süddeutsche 22.10.2009); disunited into the catastro-phe (TAZ 13.06.2009); to dominate or control climate change; fight the impacts (Zeit Online 5.11.2009); who is braking the fight against climate change (Die Zeit 45/2009); dramatic mega-droughts are threatening; hurricanes and other extreme weather catas-trophes will distress not only Asia but US coastline as well (Die Zeit 42/2009); USA obliged to fight against dangerous climate change (Zeit Online 28.10.2009); the serious-ness of the situation (Süddeutsche Online 30.10.2009); if there is no agreement in Copenhagen this will mean the maximum credible accident (Zeit Online 28.03.2009)

CLIMATE CHANGE IS A BIB-LICAL APOCALYPSE

Scientists warn against scenarios of horror; an exodus of biblical dimensions (Spiegel 15/2007); mass migration of biblical dimensions (Die Zeit 42/2009); environmental sins of the industrialized states (FR-Online 25.08.2009); climate-pope Al Gore prophesies […] (FR 07.11.2009)

CLIMATE CHANGE IS A DIS-EASE

An epidemic of humans; fever of the earth; illness of the planet; earth falls victim to (Spiegel 05/2007 ); a wave of dengue fever floods south-east Asia (Spiegel Online 15.7.2007); the global fever-curve; (Zeit Online 5.11.2009). Climate collapse (Die Zeit 44/2009)

CLIMATE CHANGE IS A TEST/A CHALLENGE

A baptism by fire (Spiegel 18/2007); no nation can solve it on its own; (Spiegel Online 24.9.2007); CC is an unequalled challenge for humanity (Die Zeit 50/2007); in Copenha-gen the world community plans to solve its greatest test (Zeit Online 5.11.2009); a histor-ical caesura (Die Zeit 44/2009); the most important summit of the whole of human his-tory (Süddeutsche 31.10.2009)

CLIMATE POLITICS IS A STRUGGLE

AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE

BETWEEN COUNTRIES

[…] global struggle against climate change (Spiegel Online 24.9.2007); dramatic damages if we do not act forcefully; defence against climate impacts; (Spiegel Online 24.9.2007); states must consensually agree on a direction of march; search for allies; (Zeit 49/2007); common preventive measures are needed (Zeit 19/2007); spearhead of climate protec-tion (FR 26.10.2009); EU sees itself as a climate-protection pioneer (Süddeutsche Online 30.10.2009); EU members struggle against binding commitments to support developing countries financially (Süddeutsche 11.09.2009); France and Germany increase pressure on international community (Süddeutsche 19.09.2009); increasing mistrust; this does not sound dramatic but is a bomb for climate politics; G77 as well as the USA are threat-ening to blow Copenhagen (TAZ 10.10.2009); Copenhagen could decide whether states will seriously continue fighting climate change (Süddeutsche Online 7.11.2009); in the USA there “rampages” a struggle about climate change; united against the marching energy lobby (Zeit Online 5.11.2009); an army of negotiators (FR 07.11.2009)

CLIMATE CHANGE IS A SPORT/A GAME

Winners and losers of CC (Spiegel 19/2007a); 100 losers of climate change (Spiegel Online 30.11.2007); Climate-poker (Die Zeit 44/2009); a new start (FR-Online 01.06.2009); until the finals from 7th to 18th December (Zeit Online 22.09.2009b)

256 Delf Rothe

References

Balzacq, Thierry, 2010: “A Theory of Securitization: Origins,Core Assumptions, and Variants”, in: Balzacq, Thierry(Ed.), Securitization Theory: How Security ProblemsEmerge and Dissolve (London – New York: Routledge):1–30.

Barnett, Jon; Adger, Neil W., 2007: “Climate Change,Human Security and Violent Conflict”, in: PoliticalGeography, 26,6: 639–655.

Barnett, John, 2009: "The Prize of Peace (Is Eternal Vigi-lance): A Cautionary Editorial Essay on Climate Geopol-itics", in: Climatic Change, 96, 11–6.

Biermann, Frank, 1998: Weltumweltpolitik Zwischen NordUnd Süd (Baden-Baden: Nomos).

Bigo, Didier, 2007: “Detention of Foreigners, States ofException, and the Social Practices of Control of theBanopticon”, in: Rajaram, Prem Kumar; Grundy-Warr,Car (Eds.): Borderscapes: Hidden Geographies and Pol-itics at Territory’s Edge (Minneapolis: University ofMinnesota Press): 3–34.

Brauch, Hans Günter, 2002: “Climate Change, Environmen-tal Stress and Conflict – AFES-PRESS Report for theFederal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conserva-tion and Nuclear Safety”, in: Federal Ministry for the

CLIMATE POLITICS IS A JOURNEY

EARTH AND COUN-TRIES ARE VEHICLES

CLIMATE POLITICS IS A RACE/RUN AGAINST CLI-MATE CHANGE

A breakthrough is needed (Spiegel Online 2007); to brake, boost CC (Spiegel 19/2007a); CC cannot be stopped any more – at best it can be slowed (Spiegel Online 17.11.2007); the world has got to “work the switches” to avert dangerous CC; (Zeit Online 30.03.2007); Bali is the last chance to slow CC down; world needs an electric shock (Zeit 49/2007); countdown for rescuing the world; […] so that world does not trespass on the red line of climate scientists (Zeit Online 5.11.2009); the signs of currently unbraked cli-mate change are alarming (Zeit Online 20.10.2009); some states press ahead (Die Zeit 44/2009); the climate has to wait (Zeit Online 20.10.2009); climate polluters which cur-rently slow down and then suddenly accelarete (FR 07.11.2009); struggle against global warming proceeds slowly (Süddeutsche 22.10.2009); even the poorest countries have to take this path (Die Zeit 44/2009); politics moves like a sluggish tanker; (FR-Online 01.06.2009);

EARTH/CLIMATE IS A THREATENED OBJECT

The planet cannot carry away all the CO2 in such a short time (Spiegel 19/2007b); Res-cuing the climate (11/2007); worldwide climate protection (Zeit 50/2007);

Table 12.3: Subject positions and representative speakers. Source: The author.

Subject-Positions Representative Speakers

Politicians: Industrial-ized countries

Wolfgang Schäuble, German Finance Minister; Alistair Darling, British finance minister; Jonathan Pershing, deputy head of US delegation; Karl Falkenberg, European Commission gen-eral secretary for the environment ; Karsten Sach, German delegate; Barack Obama; Angela Merkel; Nicolas Sarkozy; Gordon Brown; Susan Rice, UN Ambassador of the USA; David Kennedy, head of the British Climate Council; Sigmar Gabriel, German Environment Minister; Arkadi Dworkowitsch, chief economic advisor of the Russian President.

Politicians: Victims or Developing countries

Marcus Stephen, head of government of the small island state Nauru; Mama Konaté, delegation leader of Mali; Bruno Sekoli, head of the alliance of least developed countries (LDC); Group of AOSIS (small island states); environment ministers of 10 African nations; African delegations; Yu Qingtai, speaker of the Chinese delegation.

NGOs Jason Anderson, Campaign leader of the WWF; Thomas Hirsch, climate expert of ‘Bread for the World’; Greenpeace; WWF climate expert Renate Günther; Christoph Bals of Germanwatch; Sven Harmeling of Germanwatch; Global Humanitarian Forum; Martin Kaiser of Greenpeace; Parag Khanna (New America Foundation); Sonja Meister of Friends of the Earth Europe; Jan Kowalzig of development organization Oxfam; Eileen Claussen, chief of the US think tank Pew Center on Global Climate Change; Karsten Smid, Greenpeace.

Climate Science German Advisory Council on Global Change (WBGU); IPCC; Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK); Hans Joachim Schellnhuber, German WBGU member.

Climate Celebrities Ban Ki-Moon; Al Gore; Nicholas Stern; Yvo de Boer.

Transnational Busi-ness

Corporate Leaders Group on Climate Change (incorporating about 500 leaders of transnational businesses such as the Shell Group, Philips, Unilever, German Telekom, Sky TV, the Lloyds Banking Group, AXA, Vodafone etc.).

Structural Metaphors Textual/Linguistical Expressions

Security as a Weapon: How Cataclysm Discourses Frame International Climate Negotiations 257

Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety(Ed.): Climate Change and Conflict. Can climatechange impacts increase conflict potentials? What is therelevance of this issue for the international process onclimate change? (Berlin: Federal Ministry for the Envi-ronment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety,2002): 9–112; at: <http://www.afes-press.de/pdf/Brauch_ClimateChange_BMU.pdf>.

Brauch, Hans Günter, 2009: “Securitzing Global Environ-mental Change”, in: Brauch, Hans Günter; OswaldSpring, Úrsula; Grin, John; Mesjasz, Czeslaw; Kameri-Mbote, Patricia; Behera, Navnita Chadha; Chourou,Béchir; Krummenacher, Heinz (Eds.), 2009: Facing Glo-bal Environmental Change: Environmental, Human,Energy, Food, Health and Water Security Concepts.Hexagon Series on Human and Environmental Securityand Peace, vol. 4 (Berlin – Heidelberg – New York:Springer-Verlag): 65–102.

Brauch, Hans Günter, 2011: “Concepts of Security Threats,Challenges, Vulnerabilities and Risk”, in: Brauch, HansGünter; Oswald Spring, Ursula; Mesjasz, Czeslaw; Grin,John; Kameri-Mbote, Patricia; Chourou, Bechir; Birk-mann, Jörn (Eds.), 2011: Coping with Global Environ-mental Change, Disasters and Security – Threats, Chal-lenges, Vulnerabilities and Risks. Hexagon Series onHuman and Environmental Security and Peace vol. 5 (Ber-lin – Heidelberg – New York: Springer-Verlag): 61–106.

Brzoska, Michael, 2009: “The Securitization of ClimateChange and the Power of Conceptions of Security”, in:Security and Peace, Special Issue on Climate Changeand Security, 27,3: 137–145.

Buzan, Barry; Wæver, Ole, 2009: “Macrosecuritisation andSecurity Constellations: Reconsidering Scale in Securiti-sation Theory”, in: Review of International Studies,35,2: 253–276.

Buzan, Barry; Wæver, Ole; De Wilde, Jap, 1998: Security: ANew Framework for Analysis (Boulder: Lynne RiennerPublishers).

Callon, Michael; Latour, Bruno, 1981: “Unscrewing the BigLeviathan: How Actors Macro-Structure Reality andHow Sociologists Help Them to Do So”, in: Knorr-Cet-ina, Karin; Cicourel, A.V. (Eds.): Advances in SocialTheory and Methodology: Toward an Integration ofMicro and Macro-Sociologies (London: Routledge):277–303.

Carpenter, Chad, 2001: “Businesses, Green Groups and theMedia: The Role of Non-Governmental Organizationsin the Climate Change Debate”, in: InternationalAffairs, 77,2: 313–328.

De Saussure, Ferdinand, 1967: Grundfragen Der Allge-meinen Sprachwissenschaft (Berlin: Walter de Gruyter).

Detraz, Nicole; Betsill, Michele M., 2009: “Climate Changeand Environmental Security: For Whom the DiscourseShifts”, in: International Studies Perspectives, 10,3(August-October 2009): 303–320.

G8, 2009: Responsible Leadership for a Sustainable Future,Declaration of the G8 2009 Summit in L’alquila; at:

<http://www.g8italia2009.it/static/G8_Allegato/G8_Declaration_08_07_09_final,0.pdf> (20 April 2010).

WBGU (German Advisory Council on Global Change),2008: World in Transition – Climate Change as a Secu-rity Risk (London: Earthscan).

Gleditsch, Nils.P.; Nordås, Ragnhild., 2009: "Ipcc and theClimate-Conflict Nexus", in: IOP Conference Series:Earth and Environmental Science, 6.

Global Leadership Forum on Climate Change, 2009: TheCopenhagen Communiqué on Climate Change; at:<http://www.copenhagencommunique.com/the-com-munique> (28 March 2010).

Glynos, Jason; Howarth, David R., 2007: Logics of CriticalExplanation in Social and Political Theory (London:Routledge).

Gore, Albert Arnold, 2007: Testimony before the UnitedStates Senate Environment & Public Works Commit-tee, Washington, DC, 21 March 2007; atn: <http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Files.View&FileStore_id=e060b5ca-6df7-495d-afde-9bb98c9b4d41>.

Gottweis, Herbert, 2003: “Theoretical Strategies of Post-structuralist Policy Analysis: Towards an Analytics ofGovernment”, in: Hajer, Maarten A.; Wagenaar, Hen-drik (Eds.): Deliberative Policy Analysis. UnderstandingGovernance in the Network Society (Cambridge: Cam-bridge University Press): 247–265.

Hajer, Maarten A., 1995: The Politics of Environmental Dis-course: Ecological Modernization and the Policy Proc-ess (Oxford: Clarendon Press).

Hajer, Maarten A., 2003: “A Frame in the Fields: Policymak-ing and the Reinvention of Politics”,in Hajer, Maarten;Wagenaar, Hendrik (Eds.): Deliberative Policy Analysis:Understanding Governance in the Network Society(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press): 88–112.

Hajer, Maarten A., 2006: “Doing Discourse Analysis: Coali-tions, Practices, Meaning”, in: van den Brink, Margo;Metze, Tamara (Eds.): Words Matter in Policy and Plan-ning: Discourse Theory and Method in the Social Sci-ences (Utrecht: Netherlands Geographical Studies): 65–74.

Howarth, David, 2000: Discourse (Buckinghamshire, Eng-land [u.a.]: Open Univ. Press).

Howarth, David, 2010: "Power, Discourse, and Policy: Artic-ulating a Hegemony Approach to Critical Policy Stud-ies", in: Critical Policy Studies 3, 3-4309–35.

Howarth, David; Griggs, Steven 2008: “Metaphor, Cata-chresis and Equivalence: The Rhetoric of Freedom toFly in the Struggle over Aviation Policy in the UnitedKingdom”, in: Carver, Terell; Pikalo, Jernej (Eds.): Polit-ical Language and Metaphor (London: Routledge):197–211.

Hülsse, Rainer, 2003: “Sprache Ist Mehr Als Argumenta-tion”, in: Zeitschrift für internationale Beziehungen,10,2: 211–246.

Huysmans, J, 2000: “The European Union and the Securiti-zation of Migration”", in: JCMS: Journal of CommonMarket Studies, 38,5: 751–777.

258 Delf Rothe

Klare, Michael T., 2007: “Global Warming Battlefields: HowClimate Change Threatens Security”, in: Current His-tory, 106,703: 355–361.

Laclau, Ernesto; Mouffe, Chantal, 1985: Hegemony andSocialist Strategy: Towards a Radical Democratic Poli-tics (London: Verso Books).

Lakoff, George; Johnson, Mark, 1980: Metaphors We LiveBy (Chicago: University of Chicago Press).

McDonald, Matt, 2008: “Securitization and the Construc-tion of Security”, in: European Journal of InternationalRelations, 14,4: 563–587.

Mouffe, Chantal, 2005: On the Political (London – NewYork: Routledge).

Podesta, John; Ogden, Peter, 2008: “The Security Implica-tions of Climate Change”, in: The Washington Quar-terly, 31,1: 115–138.

Salehyan, Idean, 2008: “From Climate Change to Conflict?No Consensus Yet”, in: Journal of Peace Research, 45,3315.

Sarasin, Philipp, 2003: Geschichtswissenschaft Und Diskur-sanalyse (Frankfurt am Main: Suhrkamp).

Schmitt, Carl, 1993: Politische Theologie: Vier Kapitel ZurLehre Von Der Souveränität (Berlin: Duncker & Hum-blot).

Schmitt, Carl, 1996: Der Begriff Des Politischen (Berlin:Duncker & Humblot).

Stritzel, Holger, 2007: “Towards a Theory of Securitization:Copenhagen and Beyond”, in: European Journal ofInternational Relations, 13,3: 357–383.

Swyngedouw, Eeik, 2010: “Apocalypse Forever? Post-Politi-cal Populism and the Spectre of Climate Change”, in:Theory Culture & Society, 27, 2–3 (March): 213–232.

Swyngedouw, Erik, 2009: “Climate Change as Post-Politicaland Post-Democratic Populism”, Paper for the Cofer-ence of the German Political Science Association, Kiel

Trombetta, Maria J., 2008: “Environmental Security and Cli-mate Change: Analysing the Discourse”, in: CambridgeReview of International Affairs, 21,4 (October-Decem-ber): 585–602.

Wæver, Ole, 1995: “Securitization and Desecuritization”, in:Lipschutz, Ronnie D. (Ed.), On Security (New York:Columbia University Press): 46–86.

Walter, Jochen; Helmig, Jan, 2008: “Discursive MetaphorAnalysis: (De)Construction(S) of Europe”, in: Carver,Terell; Pikalo, Jernej (Eds.): Political Language and Met-aphor: Interpreting and Changing the World (London –New York: Routledge): 119–131.

Waltz, Kenneth N., 1979: Theory of International Politics(New York: McGraw Hill).

Williams, M. C., 2003: “Words, Images, Enemies: Securitiza-tion and International Politics”, in: International Stud-ies Quarterly, 47,4(December): 511–531.

Youde, Jeremy, 2008: “Who's Afraid of a Chicken? Securiti-zation and Avian Flu”, in: Democracy and Security, 4,2:148–169.