A landmark fund for climate reparations is beginning to languish

At the annual United Nations climate conference in Dubai last year, the world’s countries launched a long-awaited fund for global climate reparations. This so-called loss and damage fund, which is supposed to compensate developing countries for the unavoidable harm wrought by climate change, received more than $650 million in pledges during the conference. It was lauded as an historic commitment to climate justice. The fund’s strongest advocates — small island nations, African countries, and climate justice activists — intended it to help the poor nations that have been hit hardest by climate change pay for the many billions of dollars in damage that their negligible carbon emissions did little to cause. They argued that early-industrializing wealthy countries, which have emitted the lion’s share of carbon emissions historically, have a moral imperative to support developing nations coping with the effects of climate change. But in the nearly 10 months since the UN conference, the fund hasn’t raised much beyond the initial $650 million pledge, save for an $11.7 million pledge from Austria and a $7 million announcement from South Korea. Other wealthy nations have stayed largely silent on the subject of additional donations to the fund. And now that the spotlight...