A Multi-level, Agent-based Model for Identifying the Factors that Enable or Constrain International Climate Change Negotiations

气候变化政策代表着一个规模和复杂性前所未有的全球性集体决策问题。然而，评估国际政策的科学方法往往遵循两条不同的分析路线，这两条路线对现实世界的环境都没有充分的指导意义。一种方法通常被称为综合评估模型，主要由经济学家和决策理论家追求，重点是评估各种温室气体减排方案的长期成本和收益。第二种方法源于博弈论者，侧重于评估可能导致有效合作气候协议的国际结构和条件。这两种类型的分析在很大程度上依赖于一个简化的假设，即国家经济是由完全理性的中央规划者精心策划的，尽管缓解成本、气候破坏和未来经济状况存在普遍的不确定性，但这些规划者拥有做出最佳决策的信息和能力。在现实中，任何国际气候协议的结果和执行都将是多个层面的利益相关者复杂相互作用的最终结果，这些利益相关者做出最佳决策的能力有限，并且拥有不同的信念、权力和激励结构。因此，现有的评估工具很可能忽略了一些可能促成或制约有效气候政策形成的重要因素。本项目将开发基于主体建模(ABM)的国际气候政策分析新工具，以促进对影响多方决策的不同力量进行更现实和同时的处理。该模型将既代表国际气候谈判进程，也代表与能源和气候变化相关的国内经济的关键动态。我们的模型要探索的一些关键问题包括：是否存在创新、适应或气候破坏的模式，这些模式是从ABM代表的经济体中出现的，而这些模式被传统评估所掩盖？解释国家一级的信念和激励的异质性以及国际一级的权力和脆弱性的异质性的ABM是否解释了历史上观察到的谈判结果？设计有效的国际谈判结构是否取决于国家经济之间或国家经济内部的异质性程度？这项研究将有助于向利益相关者--包括公民、利益集团、企业、政府和国际组织--提供信息，以便他们更好地了解全球决策者网络中的机遇。

Climate change policy represents a global, collective decision-making problem unprecedented in scale and complexity. Scientific methods for evaluating international policy, however, have tended to follow two separate lines of analysis, neither of which is fully instructive for real world settings. One approach, typically referred to as Integrated Assessment Modeling, is largely pursued by economists and decision theorists and focuses on assessment of the long-term costs and benefits of various greenhouse gas reduction scenarios. A second approach originates with game theorists and focuses on evaluating international structures and conditions likely to lead to effective cooperative climate agreements. Both types of analysis rely heavily on the simplifying assumption that national economies are orchestrated by perfectly rational central planners who have the information and ability to make optimal decisions despite the presence of pervasive uncertainty about mitigation costs, climate damages, and future states of the economy. In reality, the outcome and implementation of any international climate agreement will be the net result of a complex interplay of stakeholders at multiple levels who have limited ability to make optimal decisions and have differing beliefs, power, and incentive structures. Therefore, it is likely that the existing assessment tools overlook some important factors that may enable or constrain effective climate policy formation.This project will develop of new tool for international climate policy analysis based on agent-based modeling (ABM) that facilitates a more realistic and simultaneous treatment of the diverse forces which influence multi-party decisions. The model will represent both the international climate negotiation process, as well as the key dynamics of domestic economies relevant to energy and climate change. Some key questions to be explored with our model include: Are there patterns of innovation, adaptation, or climate damages that emerge from an ABM representation of an economy that are obscured by conventional assessments? Does an ABM that accounts for heterogeneity of beliefs and incentives at the national level and heterogeneity of power and vulnerability at the international level explain the negotiation outcomes historically observed? Does the design of effective international negotiation structures depend on the degree of heterogeneity occurring either between or within national economies? This research will help inform stakeholders -- including citizens, interest groups, businesses, governments, and international organizations -- so that they better understand the opportunities in a globally connected network of decision makers.