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Since the establishment of the Climate Convention and its recent Paris Agreement, capacity building has been considered as a fundamental prerequisite for achieving the goals of the climate regime. Various institutional architectures have been explored, while the 2015 Paris Climate Conference (COP21) established the Paris Committee on Capacity-Building aiming to address needs and gaps, along with promoting current, emerging, and further capacity-building efforts. Efforts to build capacity have been underway for decades but have largely failed in their objectives as they were not designed from, and rooted in, the local context. Drawing from the author's more than 40 years of personal experience in capacity building in Africa, this paper sheds light on the systemic challenges involved in building capacities. Arrangements that do not entail working on, or being led by, an agenda set by those in capacity needs are not, by definition, capacity mobilization or capacity building efforts. It is argued that capacity is tied to self-reliance and self-determination and thus ability to set and pursue the recipient's own agenda must be at the core of development narratives. Key policy insights Self-reliance and self-determination are at the core of capacity development. Therefore, countries need to set and pursue their own agenda by creating and following a bottom-up and inclusive development narrative. Intellectual, financial, and other important resources need to fall under the control of local leadership. Partnerships and networks of research centres think tanks and similar institutions in the South should be created and maintained to build capacities. Climate change, while a global issue, must be addressed based on a deep understanding of the local and national contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]