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Christiana Figueres (Vol University of Massachusetts Boston ScholarWorks at UMass Boston Center for Governance and Sustainability Center for Governance and Sustainability Publications 11-2014 Climate Champion: Christiana Figueres (Vol. 1. Issue 2) Global Leadership Dialogues University of Massachusetts Boston Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarworks.umb.edu/cgs_pubs Recommended Citation Global Leadership Dialogues, Volume 1, Issue 2: “Climate Champion: Christiana Figueres.” 2014. Center for Governance and Sustainability, University of Massachusetts Boston. This Occasional Paper is brought to you for free and open access by the Center for Governance and Sustainability at ScholarWorks at UMass Boston. It has been accepted for inclusion in Center for Governance and Sustainability Publications by an authorized administrator of ScholarWorks at UMass Boston. For more information, please contact [email protected]. GLOBAL LEADERSHIP DIALOGUES Insights and Inspirations from Change Leaders Climate Champion CHRISTIANA FIGUERES Christiana Figueres was appointed as the executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) by UN Secretary- General Ban Ki-moon on May 17, 2010. She has been involved in climate-change negotiations since 1995 as a member of the Costa Rican negotiating team, as a representative of Latin America and the Caribbean on the executive board of the Photo: Clean Development Mechanism, and as vice president of the Bureau of the Confer- ence of the Parties. Figueres began her life of public service as minister counselor at the embassy of Costa Rica in Bonn, Germany, in 1982. She then served as director of inter- national cooperation in the Ministry of Planning in Costa Rica and as chief of staff to the minister of agriculture. From 1994 to 1996, she was director of the Technical Secretariat, Renewable Energy in the Americas (REIA), and in 1995, she founded the Center for Sustainable Development of the Americas (CSDA), a nonprofit think tank for climate-change policy and capacity building, which she directed until 2003. CENTER FOR GOVERNANCE AND SUSTAINABILITY Volume 1, Issue 2 JOHN W. McCORMACK GRADUATE SCHOOL OF POLICY AND GLOBAL STUDIES UNIVERSITY OF MASSACHUSETTS BOSTON www.umb.edu/cgs GLOBAL LEADERSHIP DIALOGUES VOLUME 1, ISSUE 2: CHRISTIANA FIGUERES A widely published author, Figueres has also been a frequent advisor to the private sector on how to play a leadership role in climate-change mitigation. She holds a master's degree in anthropology from the London School of Economics and a certificate in organizational development from Georgetown University. Her father, José Figueres Ferrer, served three terms as president of Costa Rica. He is often referred to as the founder and father of modern democracy in his nation; his notable accomplishments include the dissolution of the Costa Rican military. Her mother, Karen Olsen Beck, served as the Costa Rican ambassador to Israel and was later elected to the Costa Rican legislative assembly. Secretary Figueres was the keynote speaker at the 46th commencement ceremonies at the University of Massachusetts Bos- ton on May 30, 2014, where she received a doctorate of laws, honoris causa, for her "advocacy on behalf of our planet and its most vulnerable populations." This brief is adapted from two interviews with Figueres – by Maria Ivanova, associate professor and co-director of the Center for Governance and Sustainability at UMass Boston in May 2014, and by Ira Jackson, dean of the John W. McCormack Graduate School of Policy and Global Studies, for WUMB Radio's Commonwealth Journal in April 2013. Christiana, you were just honored with an honorary degree and were our commencement speaker at UMass Boston. What does this mean to you as a person, as an of- ficial in the environmental field, and as a public servant? It is very moving to me. As I mentioned at the beginning of the commencement speech, my grandfather always wanted me to get a PhD. He meant a real one, of course, so I have cheated a little bit here, but he would probably forgive me for that. So it was a meaningful experience. What was particularly moving, though, was the spirit that reigned in the commencement ceremony: We heard so many stories of absolutely fantastic, inspirational young people who have not let life get them down, but rather have really taken the challenges that life has given them in stride and kept on going. These people are now true The golden toad of Monteverde, Costa Rica. beacons of inspiration for themselves, for their families, and for their peers. So today certainly renewed my hope in rainforest in Costa Rica where there was a little golden the next generation. toad that was endemic to that rainforest. I saw these little You have the top UN position – arguably the top global toads during their mating season, which was a spectacular position in any organization – in the climate-change field. sight. They looked like little golden coins. By the time my As President John F. Kennedy once said, with great pow- daughters were the same age as I was when I saw them, er comes great responsibility. What made you decide to the species had disappeared. It had gone extinct. So in accept this daunting responsibility? my lifetime I have already seen a species disappear. When I found out about this, I asked the scientists in Monte- More than power, it definitely is responsibility. The power verde what was going on. At the time they told me that we here lies with the nation-states. It is they who have to do not know exactly what it was, but they said there was make the decisions. All we do in the climate secretariat something about the temperature of the surface of the is support the climate analysis that governments need to rainforest that affected the extremely sensitive skin of the make their decisions. It is very much a supportive and animals and this resulted in a fungus that they could not technical responsibility that we have. For myself, what survive. At that time nobody was calling anything climate made me accept this responsibility is actually a personal change, but I realized – oh my goodness – that the planet story. When I was very young, my parents took me to a that I inherited from my parents was being visibly, measur- 2 3 GLOBAL LEADERSHIP DIALOGUES VOLUME 1, ISSUE 2: CHRISTIANA FIGUERES Christiana Figueres with schoolchildren in Durban, South Africa, in 2011. ably diminished and it occurred to me that this was huge of these dots and to bring it down to the individual level. with respect to the planet that I am passing on to my chil- I wanted to impress upon the students that this is not a dren. At that point I said, “I cannot just sit back and not responsibility we can export to governments or to large do something about it.” So here we are many years later. corporations or to city governments. This is a responsi- bility we all have to share and it does require behavioral We need hope if we are going to tackle the wicked prob- change on all of our parts. It is not easy, but frankly we lem that is climate change. At the commencement cere- do not have any options. If we want to have any sense mony at UMass Boston, you had at your fingertips 4,000 of integrity, we need behavior change. We have already graduating students and you addressed them as peers, created a mess for our kids, but if people do not change as agents of choice. How would you suggest that those their behavior it will become a mess that they may not be of us in academia empower young people? What can we able to get out of. Right now we still have the option of do to aid you in your role at the global level? managing the impacts if we stay under the two degrees One of the most difficult things to work on when it comes Celsius increase in temperature. If we do not get to global to climate change is that it seems both a daunting chal- peaking of emissions in this decade and to global climate lenge and a challenge that is very far away. It seems far neutrality in the second half of the century, the effects will away in time, in geography, in impacts. And none of that be unmanageable. is true. The fact is we are seeing the impacts now – in And it is your job now to prod governments to get to that the United States and in every other country. So the most point, is it not? difficult thing is how you motivate individuals to commit themselves to making changes. The easy thing is for Yes, but not just governments – prod corporations, prod people to say that climate change is the responsibility of civil society, prod companies…. I never stand up and governments and the governments need to take care of speak without challenging everyone to do more. During it. There is an assumption that as citizens we do not have the Conference of the Parties we had in Durban in 2011, I any responsibility. What I was trying to do during the com- went one afternoon to see a little theater performance that mencement speech was to draw the connection among all the local school was putting on for fourth, fifth, and sixth 3 GLOBAL LEADERSHIP DIALOGUES VOLUME 1, ISSUE 2: CHRISTIANA FIGUERES graders. Part of the piece was a song that they kept on repeating throughout the show. The lyrics from that song stay with me to this day: “Do more, do more, do more. And when you have done everything you can, do more…” This is indeed the message you sent today at UMass Boston – we are educating the people that are going to go out and do more.
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