Governmentality in the battle against climate change : Governmentality regimes in the Global North and the Global South

Abstract: Climate change is the worst long-term security issue humans has ever faced. The discourse around the problems and solutions connected to it are predominantly coming from the Global North. On the other hand, it is the Global South who are experiencing the impacts of a changing climate, in the form of floods, droughts, heatwaves, and lack of food, water, and energy. This asymmetrical relationship has rendered the Global South the vulnerable subjects in the current governmentality regime of climate change. Through a governmental lens, this paper analyses the similarities and differences in how climate change as a security and IR issue is problematized, and especially what solutions are seen as viable, across and between the North-South divide. This understudied relationship and its implications, is in this paper exposed and tackled. It shows that the Global North are slowly shifting the responsibility of coping with climate change away from the large GHG emitters, and on to the individuals in the Global South that are worst affected by the consequences of a changing climate. The recently updated NDCs within the Paris agreement supports this view and make up a key part of this paper.