Examines the role that inequality plays in shaping post-Kyoto prospects for a North-South global climate pact. This work argues that global inequality dampens cooperative efforts by reinforcing the structuralist worldviews and causal beliefs of poor nations, eroding conditions of generalized trust, and promoting notions of fair solutions.

Roberts and Parks argue that global inequality dampens cooperative efforts by reinforcing the "structuralist" worldviews and causal beliefs of many poor nations, eroding conditions of generalized trust, and promoting particularistic notions of "fair" solutions. They develop new measures of climate-related inequality, analyzing fatality and homelessness rates from hydro-meterological disasters, patterns of "emissions inequality," and participation in international environmental regimes. Until we recognize that reaching a North-South global climate pact requires addressing larger issues of inequality and striking a global bargain on environment and development, Roberts and Parks argue, the current policy gridlock will remain unresolved.