Meet the Acronym That Just Might Save the World

It’s 12 letters long. Good luck pronouncing it.

Clouds: <a href="http://www.shutterstock.com/pic-94137733/stock-photo-sky-clouds-background.html?src=OVjxEz8yhK9X17QZy06vuQ-1-99">Bplanet</a>/Shutterstock; photoillustration: James West/Climate Desk


This story was originally published by The Atlantic and is reproduced here as part of the Climate Desk collaboration.

The United Nations climate-change negotiations do not hide from acronym.

No, they sprint toward it, arms stretched, yelling “Take me!” Spend some time reading technical press coverage and you’re sure to encounter IPCC, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Stay a little longer and you’ll hit LDC (“Least Developed Countries”) and SIDS (“Small Island Developing States”). Even COP21 of the UNFCCC, the event’s name, embraces acronym: It’s the 21st Conference Of the Parties under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.

For a long time, I thought ADP was the most impressive of all. ADP names the diplomatic process scheduled to end in Paris. Since it began in 2011 in Durban, South Africa,the nations gathering this week are technically titled the “Ad Hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action.”

Now I know I was wrong—naively, ludicrously wrong. While reading a bulleted summary of the Paris climate negotiations last week, I found the following masterpiece:

United States: Supports agreement with differentiation. Need this to create an agreement which is strong and durable. Supports CBDRILONCWRC. No one size fits all approach.

CBDRILONCWRC. There it is—see it, touch it, bathe in it. Let all those hard consonants fall off your tongue. Try adding vowels to make it pronounceable: Cabdriloncwerck. Kiss your fingertips every time you say it. The world is on fire but at least we got a scrumptious acronym in the process.

Yet CBDRILONCWRC turns out to be pretty important. According to Ryan Mearns, a Kiwi university student who has become one of the conference’s most important (if unofficial) scribes, it stands for “Common But Differentiated Responsibility In Light Of National Circumstances With Respective Capability.” This describes, in so many words, how the UN now hopes to limit carbon emissions: not with mandatory cutbacks, but with voluntary national commitments. Instead of handing down orders from on high, the UN expects every nation to bring their best dish to the party. If an agreement comes out of Paris, we’ll have this principle to thank.

So, Cabdriloncwerck? More like Cabdrilonc-work it.

I guess.

More Mother Jones reporting on Climate Desk

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

WE CAME UP SHORT.

We just wrapped up a shorter-than-normal, urgent-as-ever fundraising drive and we came up about $45,000 short of our $300,000 goal.

That means we're going to have upwards of $350,000, maybe more, to raise in online donations between now and June 30, when our fiscal year ends and we have to get to break-even. And even though there's zero cushion to miss the mark, we won't be all that in your face about our fundraising again until June.

So we urgently need this specific ask, what you're reading right now, to start bringing in more donations than it ever has. The reality, for these next few months and next few years, is that we have to start finding ways to grow our online supporter base in a big way—and we're optimistic we can keep making real headway by being real with you about this.

Because the bottom line: Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism Mother Jones exists to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we hope you might consider pitching in before moving on to whatever it is you're about to do next. We really need to see if we'll be able to raise more with this real estate on a daily basis than we have been, so we're hoping to see a promising start.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate