ABSTRACT
In principle, international law is characterised by the sovereign equality of states. In reality, however, states differ in many ways. Therefore, international agreements have long reflected the notion that states differ in capabilities to fulfil the commitments to which they have agreed. One prominent example of this concept is the principle of ‘Common but Differentiated Responsibility’, which was popularised by the Rio Declaration in 1992 and referred to in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its related Kyoto Protocol. The new climate regime based on the Paris Agreement is only gradually taking shape. There are critics who voice concern about the lack of substantial commitments, which were guaranteed by the former top-down differentiation of the UNFCCC and the Kyoto Protocol and are lacking now in this bottom-up process of self-differentiation entailed in the Paris Agreement.
