After Azerbaijan: Understanding Autocratization and Climate Diplomacy at UN COP Negotiations

This talk examines the evolving dynamics of global climate governance in the Post-Paris Agreement era, with a particular emphasis on the role of autocratic regimes, including those in Central Asia such as Azerbaijan, in shaping climate diplomacy.

Drawing on insights from the UN COP26–29 negotiations, it defines the strategies and implications of autocratic engagement at these forums—highlighting the interconnected sustainability approaches of fossil fuel-dependent regimes in West Asia, such as the Arab Gulf states, Central Asia, and the most recent COP29 host country, Azerbaijan.

The talk challenges traditional North-South divides and regime-centric narratives to shed light on the blurred lines between democratic and authoritarian approaches in climate governance. It thus offers a richer understanding of the complexities and contradictions shaping contemporary climate diplomacy.

Discussant: Darzhan Kazbekova, Ph.D. candidate, social science, Maxwell School

Tobias Zumbraegel is a postdoc at Heidelberg’s Geography Institute since January 2023. Prior to this he worked as a researcher at the center for excellence Climate, Climatic Change and Society (CLICCS) at the University of Hamburg and the Germany-based think tank CARPO in Bonn. He studied history, political science and Middle Eastern studies in Cologne, Tuebingen and Cairo, and holds a Ph.D. (summa cum laude) from the Friedrich-Alexander University Erlangen-Nuremberg, which was awarded with the dissertation prize of the German Middle East Association.

Darzhan Kazbekova has an M.A. degree in international relations and a Ph.D. in international relations. Her most recent work position was as a deputy director of the Institute for Applied Research, Academy of Public Administration under the president of the Republic of Kazakhstan. Darzhan’s research interests are focused on environmental policy formation, stakeholder analysis, and theoretical frameworks of policy analysis in the case of Kazakhstan.