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There has been a great deal of academic discourse about policy and governance choices embedded in the UNFCCC-based regimes for Climate Change action, and they point to the inefficiency and ineffectiveness of such regimes, which is often attributed to the fact that they hinge on the political authority of State actors and lack meaningful enforcement mechanisms. Against this backdrop, this paper argues that an alternative regime may be needed; and that for an effective regulatory framework for Climate Change action to emerge there needs to be a regulatory imperativeness similar to that upon which the Kimberley Process was created, where Non-State Actors play a leadership role. It also argues that in addition to regulatory imperativeness, the making and enforcement of the Kimberley Process provides helpful lessons towards crafting a more effective Climate Change remedial regime.

Target 16.6 of the 2015 Sustainable Development Goals (sdgs) seeks to create ‘effective, accountable and transparent institutions at all levels’ for the purpose of achieving sustainable development. Nevertheless, the inherent vagueness of the notions of transparency and accountability poses difficulties for achieving the target. This is why this article examines how these notions have been conceptualized in international legal discourse and applied in practice. It does so within the context of the trade in natural resources that finance armed conflict, which is considered detrimental to the development opportunities of developing countries. The article examines how two of the most important initiatives in this field, namely the Kimberley Process for the Certification of Rough Diamonds and the oecd Due Diligence Guidance for Responsible Supply Chains of Minerals from Conflict-affected and High-risk Areas, operationalize transparency and accountability. It posits that both initiatives fall short of establishing full accountability. However, notwithstanding their flaws and limitations, they make a valuable contribution to achieving target 16.6.

This paper investigates whether an increase in the international price of diamonds impacts violent activity in African countries that are diamond abundant and if so, through which mechanism(s). It concludes that an increase in the diamond price is positively related to violence in countries abundant in primary diamonds, but unrelated to violence in countries with secondary diamonds. This result makes it possible to distinguish between two potential theoetical mechanisms connecting resources and violence: insecure property rights raising the returns to conflict and the wage rate changing the opportunity costs of conflict. The findings support the latter, but not the former. Results are robust to using different diamond prices, instrumenting for diamond price and controlling for cyclical effects, but no to controlling for the presence of other resources.

Desde la puesta en marcha del Proceso de Kimberley, en el 2003, el comercio de diamantes entró en una nueva fase de supervisión a nivel internacional. La razón que motivó tal iniciativa fue la recurrente inestabilidad política que marcó a países como Sierra Leona y Angola, donde grupos armados utilizaban la explotación de este mineral como vía de financiamiento para socavar la estabilidad sociopolítica tras la búsqueda de acceder al poder por la vía de la fuerza. Con la entrada en vigor, el Proceso ha incorporado progresivamente a los diversos actores vinculados a la explotación de esta gema en sus intentos de intervenir y controlar la cadena de comercialización convirtiéndolo en un instrumento promotor de la paz a nivel global. From the beginning of the Kimberley Process in 2003, the diamond trade entered a new stage of international supervision. The main reason that triggered this initiative was the recurrent political instability that marked countries like Sierra Leone, and Angola, where some armed groups took advantage of the exploitation of this mineral to undermine the sociopolitical stability after trying to come into power by force. Through this enforcement, the process has gradually joined up several actors linked to the exploitation of this gemstone in their attempts to take part in and take control of this marketing chain, thus turning it into a worldwide promoting instrument of peace.