Where climate governance meets Sustainable Development: The monitoring of progress towards SDG 13. Focus on Europe

Human-driven alterations to the natural system led to the challenging phenomena known as climate change. These variations are threatening both the environment and humanity, requiring a global reaction. This thesis aims to provide an innovative approach to the understanding of international Climate Action, by focusing on the achievement of the SDG 13 instead of the 2030 Agenda on its entirety. This thesis, after a brief explanation of what climate change is and what its effects are, will investigate the process of climate governance from the beginning in the ‘70s, it goes from the Stockholm Conference to the establishment of the 2030 Agenda and continues the analysis through the post-2015 Conferences of Parties. This part aims to determine how the international community shifted the focus on Sustainable Development and how this resulted in the framework of the 2030 Agenda and the 17 Sustainable Development Goals, specifically of SDG 13 Climate Action. Moreover, this part outline how the goals and objectives of climate discussion changed over the decades, underscoring the success and the recurrent failures. Starting from this analysis, this thesis will go forward by monitoring the progress of SDG 13 Climate Action in Europe. This part will rely on the understanding of the European Sustainable Development report 2024, which provides a complete picture of how progress towards the SDGs. The thesis will finally focus on the countries and sub-region of Europe, analyzing a series of graphs and tables elaborated from data provided by the Report in order to reflect on the progress in Europe. This thesis will use both first and second sources to develop a critical understanding of the literature about climate change, climate governance and climate action.