Last week, Ban Ki-moon, the Secretary General of the United Nations, told the Chatham House (a London based think tank) that too much time was being wasted debating who deserved the blame for global warming and not enough time working on constructive solutions.
He stated, "What I would like to stress is rather than looking at past historical responsibilities, we need to look at historical responsibilities in the future." As a result of this international blame game, many countries refuse to enter environmental treaties.
For example, the Bush administration has claimed that one of the main reasons that they refuse to sign the Kyoto Protocol is that it is fatally flawed without requirements from large developing nations such as China.
On the other side, the chairman of China's National Development and Reform Commission, Ma Kai, argues that developing nations must be given the opportunity to develop without suffocation from international measures.
Furthermore, rich countries were the most responsible for greenhouse gases produced over the past century so they have a greater responsibility to do more to alleviate climate change problems.
The verbal conflict over global warming between China and the United States is an obvious example of what Mr. Ban observes as the problem.
The biggest problem with the climate change debate today is that the decision makers are embroiled in a question of blame, whether humans are to blame for climate change or which country should do more to curb their carbon emissions.
Yet this is counterproductive, especially if two countries (such as China and the United States) recognize global warming as a problem that they have to solve, regardless of who caused it.
Even within the United States, much of the debate is centered on the wrong question of blame. In a National Journal Insiders February 2007 poll of 113 members of Congress, 95 percent of Democrats believed that global warming was man-made while 84 percent of Republicans did not believe beyond a reasonable doubt that global warming was man-made.
However, on the question of what actions they would support to reduce global warming, 58 percent of Democrats supported a greater reliance on nuclear energy and 95 percent supported an increased spending on alternative fuels. The Republicans also supported nuclear energy (90 percent) and alternative fuels (71 percent).
Despite this apparent agreement, climate change continues to be a controversial issue. A good explanation of this is that Democrats and Republicans are still embroiled in a debate of whether climate change is anthropogenic.
The bottom line is that regardless of who caused climate change, we can all agree that polluting the air with smoke from coal factories is bad.
We know that breathing in that brown cloud over Phoenix can cause us to cough and give asthmatic people fits. Who really cares, then, who caused that smog? Instead, decision makers from both ends of the political spectrum must come together to find ways not to solve a controversial global warming issue, but to live more cleanly (which is something that we can all agree upon).
On the international stage, developing countries need to find ways to "reconcile the need for development with the need for environmental protection," as Mr. Ma said.
By cooperating and focusing on solutions instead of pointing fingers, we will create a cleaner earth and a more sustainable way of living.
Reach the columnist at:uven.chong@asu.edu.
