Tolis, Valeria

Valeria Tolis
Start date:
October 2016
Research Topic:
The role of the EU in the formation of the Paris Agreement on climate change
Research Supervisor:
Dr Hannah Hughes Prof Fabio Vighi
Supervising school:
School of Law and Politics,
Primary funding source:
ESRC Studentship

The fight against climate change can be a complex object of research that is commonly understood in terms of two related concepts of mitigation and adaptation, in a interplay of actors and institutions ranging from the global to the local. My research project aims at providing an understanding of the EU role in the Paris agreement on climate change. It suggests adopting a poststructuralist theoretical/methodological framework along three lines of enquiry which all share the perspective of the co-constitution of discourses and practices. In this respect, my project aims to analyse how the EU is actively engaged with mitigation within the ʻnew chapterʼ of the global climate regime, represented by the Paris agreement. Accordingly, a second and related key question aims to gain an understanding of what is the ʻEU” in relation to the negotiation of international climate politics. Consistently with a postrstructuralist perspective, therefore, it also aims at problematising the EU identity and subject positions by taking into account the mutual co-constitution (discursive and material) of global regime and internal climate policy. Finally, it attempts to assess whether the Paris agreement can represent a turning point with regard to the role of EU.