Beyond leading by example: enhanced EU-LAC climate cooperation—the case of Brazil, Chile and Mexico

Abstract This article analyses the impact of the European Green Deal (EGD) on the EU’s claim to climate leadership, the extent to which this affects cooperation between the EU and Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC), and how the EDG could help enable the net-zero transition. The EGD restates the EU’s quest for climate leadership which has heretofore been prominently ideational and exemplary (directional). However, the EGD’s implementation is expected to have a significant impact on partner countries. Both conflict and cooperation could arise amid shifting geopolitical alliances and insufficient climate action. Building on the literature on the EU’s climate and EGD diplomacy, expert analyses, closed-door working groups and elite interviews, this article contends there is scope for the EU to transcend directional climate leadership and deepen entrepreneurial (coalition-led) and structural leadership, both through coercion and assistance, and makes the case for expanding cooperation with Latin America. The main conclusions are: (1) for the EU to retain its climate leadership it needs an overarching green deal diplomacy strategy that helps LAC countries adapt to the European decarbonisation strategy; (2) Enhanced entrepreneurial (diplomatic) and structural leadership (through assistance) can result from strengthening climate governance in areas such as climate laws, scientific advisory boards, citizens participation and policy instruments including taxonomies and emission trading systems; (3) structural leadership through assistance could also be strengthened by ramping up climate finance (e.g. via a revised Global Gateway), furthering climate-proof trade agreements and supporting just transition initiatives.