The Bush Sr. administration, although eventually signing the UNFCCC at the Earth Summit in Rio, was initially very hesitant to sign any environmental agreements, let alone even attend the summit in the first place. There were very good reasons for Bush and his administration to feel this way. For one, the U.S. was undergoing a recession during the time of the Earth Summit (Howe 179). Due to this, there were many calls for reductions in foreign aid, and most climate agreement propositions at the time revolved around developed countries offering aid to developing countries so that they could more easily implement sustainable development. Additionally, there was the very likely possibility that signing an environmental agreement that included foreign aid wouldn’t result in anything, as Congress could easily decline to approve budgets for new foreign aid (180). All of this was piled on top of the fact that this was a presidential election year and even attending the Earth Summit would expose him to even more criticism, lowering his chances of re-election. Rio had the possibility of failing, and Bush didn’t want to be associated with that failure.
The Kyoto Protocol also faced some pushback from within the U.S., although this time less so from the presidential administration, which was Clinton’s at the time. One such source of pushback was the Congress, which the Republican party had gained control of by 1994 (189). Congressional Republicans argued against taking measures against climate change, saying that one, the current climate trends were due to natural phenomena and therefore would be resolved by a natural self-correcting system, and two, attempting to correct it would result in an economic crisis which wouldn’t be worth it given the present evidence they perceived as unfounded (188). During this time, Congress began cutting the budgets of many programs and agencies, including those concerning sustainable development. At the same time, labor organizations began lobbying towards congress, expressing concerns about the reliability of science and how the economy would fare under the demands of climate agreements. This eventually led to the unanimous passing of the Byrd-Hagel resolution, which severely hindered the ability for treaties limiting greenhouse gasses to be ratified. Additionally, the Kyoto Protocol was slightly different in that it only gave developed nations targets to achieve for greenhouse gas emissions, alongside the cooperation between developed and developing nations. This lowered the support among U.S. politicians, since it would have seemed disadvantageous to the U.S.
The United States tends to resist international agreements on climate change often because they require cooperation with developing nations, which can alter the economy unfavorably for the U.S. More importantly, however, considering the politicization of science described by Howe, taking steps to avoid climate change can be seen as much more of a political move than it otherwise would have (8). The way that climate change has been framed in politics has made arriving at solutions very difficult, and much of the science itself backing it up has become a subject of political debate instead of scientific. This has made the signing of international treaties very difficult for the U.S., since opposition from either the executive branch or legislative branch could result in the treaty not being signed.
Will Wright 