Pessimism around the potential outcome of the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Paris this year is beginning to emerge, despite encouraging US-China discussions.

As participating countries prepare for the United Nations Paris Climate Change Conference in December, alarm bells have been set off by UN chief Ban Ki-Moon. He set a surprisingly negative tone after the US-China discussions on climate change began to raise hopes for a better round of global discussions, using a recent media appearance to warn that discussions leading up to the Paris conference were moving at a “snail’s pace”. This warning has once again raised a series of complex global governance concerns that were extremely visible in Copenhagen 2009, and threaten to engulf the Paris conference in 2015.

Last year the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its fifth assessment report (AR5), which once again reaffirmed and bolstered the broader scientific community’s arguments of a cohesive scientific consensus on climate change. This begs the question: what is causing global governance efforts to significantly slow down, or even falter, when it comes to tackling climate change? The answer is the almost pathological focus by governments on the level of scientific consensus, and extreme levels of inattention to a range of issues within the global governance processes. However, this article is not trying to delegitimise the IPCC. The IPCC has a crucial role in continuing to provide cognitive resources to governments and policy-makers on the national/global stage.

A fundamental issue arises when trying to encourage nationally focused politicians to address global problems. At the Copenhagen conference in 2009, there was an overwhelming sense of anxiety shown by political leaders attempting to protect their national objectives in discussions and needing to maintain sovereignty in the global arena, and there’s the potential for déjà vu heading into Paris. A stark example of this anxiety remerging has played out in the Australian media recently. Media reports have shed light on the sitting government, headed by Prime Minister Tony Abbott, and the growing internal political party debate over how Australia’s national emissions reduction target should be balanced against its national economic objectives. The Australian climate delegation has been labelled as “black sheep” in recent climate talks and exquisitely highlights these national anxieties re-emerging on the global stage. National leaders must ask themselves heading to Paris if their continued anxiety about protecting national objectives is putting short-term politics ahead of long term sustainability, potentially making future climate conferences meaningless.

However one must also ask if all the blame can be placed on national governments alone. The answer to this is a resounding no. One must question the larger role of ‘society’ as a whole. Western societies have enjoyed the benefits of rising welfare conditions for the last few generations, and have tended to sideline or boldly dismiss concerns about the future consequences of their actions via the ballot box. Democratic politics decides the fate of politicians in a large number of developed countries, fuelling political leaders to dis-incentivise dramatic action on global climate change. The ability to change governments with a vote can be used as a powerful tool for positive change, yet has increasingly been used over the last few decades as a way to threaten political demolition if idealised standards of living are altered.

If negotiations once again slow down as Ban Ki-Moon is warning, and anxieties rise, the role of Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) and social movements will once again be crucial in the Paris conference outcome. While it is clear that national governments remain the top global decision-makers, the expanding influence of non-governmental global actors will test the legitimacy of the conference. As was highlighted in Warsaw in 2013, the climate conference was subjected to the single largest walk out by civil society organisations in history. NGOs and social movements critically panned the conference for showing a lack of ambition and slow movement. The walkout in 2013 raised questions over the legitimacy of a global forum being able to deal with climate change.

Heading into the Paris conference, effective action on global climate change sits on a knife’s edge. So far, global governance processes have only fuelled failure. However, there are ways to move forward. Fatih Birol, chief economist for the International Energy Agency, has proposed a continual five year review of any agreement that emerges from the Paris conference. This proposal is a welcome development. Considering there are currently no plans for revising the outcomes made in the Paris conference until after 2030, and there have only been four major climate conferences since 1992, a continual five year review process goes a long way to help work on the major governance issues.

Making climate conferences a regular political event allows for significant opportunities to help incorporate climate change into the national focus.The pressure to achieve everything in one conference would be replaced with a less contentious arena providing the potential for compromise and progression. More frequent reviews would also help to keep climate change in the spotlight, helping to inform and positively change societal incentives towards addressing climate change. The Paris conference has to face these global governance challenges head on. If it doesn’t, Paris will be forgotten as one of those “contentious conferences”.

Charles Bryant is a Second Year Masters student enrolled in the Sir Walter Murdoch School of Public Policy and International Affairs at Murdoch University. His current academic focus has been on Global Governance, International Relations and International Political Economy.