Landing the Paris Climate Agreement

Praise

Included in the Financial Times’s Best Books of 2024: Environment


“A page-turning tale about the herculean international effort required to negotiate the kind of agree­ment built for, and essential to, confronting climate change…Obama once framed the Paris Agreement as representing ‘the best chance we have to save the one planet we’ve got:’ This book allows the reader to better appreciate all that was done to achieve that singular goal as well as the enormity of work that remains.”
—Science

“An admirably readable insight into the byzantine world of climate negotiations.”
—The Financial Times

“By the end of the book, the reader is left with the feeling that climate negotiation is a hell of a difficult job; the understanding that the job is vital to our planet’s future; and enormous gratitude that we have people like Stern to do it.”
—Earth.org

“US Special Envoy for Climate Change Todd Stern’s insightful environmental history Landing the Paris Climate Agreement covers how the groundbreaking global pact came to be, explains its significance, and outlines the next steps…A legacy project, Landing the Paris Climate Agreement is an incisive history text covering one instance of world leaders coming together to combat climate change.”
—Foreword Reviews

“A crash course in the intricacies of multinational climate change policy.”
—Kirkus Reviews

“Stern (a fellow at the Brookings Institute and the Asia Society) served as President Obama’s chief negotiator on climate change, and his connections and negotiating skills are impressive. His book provides a painstakingly detailed account of the international meetings, accords, and negotiations that led to the Paris Climate Agreement. It was 2015 when the U.S., along with 200 other countries committed to it; 2020 when the U.S. officially withdrew from it; and 2021 when the U.S. rejoined the pledge to cut greenhouse gas emissions, which cause global warming. This history includes arguments about transparency and definitions of mandates, enforcement, and treaties. Stern describes how every country came to the table with a different agenda and a different goal, which was expected to create epic levels of tension.”
—Library Journal


“Stern has written an indispensable history of the genesis, the whys, and the wherefores of the Paris agreement, indispensable both to supporters and critics and therefore for members of the incoming Trump administration as they consider, for a second time, future American participation in the agreement.”
—RealClearEnergy.com