Making warming worlds: Future making between climate politics and science – The case of the Structured Expert Dialogue

Abstract

The Long-Term Global Goal (LTGG) is the focal point for addressing future climate change. This paper explores a specific institutional context: the Structured Expert Dialogue (SED) of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). Set up as a platform for interaction between experts and UN negotiators, the SED is a site where scientific information about the LTGG and net-zero was translated into actionable targets for policymaking. We identify different modes of anticipation in the SED - as scientific, lived future, and ethical/political - and explore how they emerged and played out. We ask how these different modes of anticipation produce a particular vision of a desirable future and legitimise ways of governing future climate change. We observe that the scientific and technical mode of anticipation is dominant and has shaped the definition of the LTGG, focussing on numerical targets and side-lining geopolitical and distributive consequences. We also see the science-based framing being re-politicised and challenged, and discuss how capacities to get a voice in the SED were unequally distributed. Based on our findings, we suggest that care is needed to design spaces in order to consider ethical and political consequences of the LTGG and rethink modes of participation and representation.