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John Kerry can feel the heat. It’s a
sunny mid-July day in Naples, Italy, and
we’re sitting on the roof of his hotel over-
looking the Mediterranean.
As tourists on the other side of the patio
snap photos of Mount Vesuvius looming in
the background, Kerry is warning about the
fate of human life on earth. Kerry, 77, has
been on the public stage for decades as a
Senator, presidential candidate and U.S. Sec-
retary of State and, on paper, his latest role
representing the U.S. as President Biden’s
climate envoy may look like a demotion.
But Kerry rejects any question about why
he’s taken this role. The fate of civilization
is on the line, and he will
do anything he can to help.
“I’ve fought around war and
peace, and that was life and
death. This is already life
and death—and in growing
terms,” he says. “This is ex-
istential, and we need to be-
have like it.”
Despite the stifling heat
and humidity, the lobby of
the Excelsior hotel several stories below is
brimming with life unthinkable just a few
months before. Chatter in Arabic, Dutch and
Japanese can all be detected among the cadre
of diplomats who have descended here for
a gathering of energy and climate ministers
from the world’s biggest economies. It’s a
key meeting in the yearlong slog to COP26,
the U.N. climate conference set to take place
in Glasgow in November. A few miles away,
in the city center, thousands of protesters
are marching and chanting, insistent that
official proceedings aren’t moving fast enough. system
change: another world Is possIble, one sign reads.
The stakes are existential, but the debates at the Ex-
celsior can seem pedantic; in one conference room, ne-
gotiators are tussling over the wording of how coun-
tries should submit new climate plans. On the roof, I ask
Kerry about the various conflicts that some fear might
scuttle the COP26 talks—the U.S. rift with China, Eu-
rope’s plan to tax climate laggards and the demands
from developing nations that their rich counterparts
do more. Kerry takes each one in stride, responding to
every question with optimism that reason will prevail.
“I’ve always believed in diplomacy,” he says. “I believe
in the ability of people to sit down and try to work rea-
sonably together.” In the frenzied 24-plus hours of talks
that followed, Kerry’s team sought to
put that mantra into action, refus-
ing to let the two-day conference end
without an agreement. The results
were mixed: the U.S. helped broker a
key compromise to affirm the coun-
tries’ broad commitment to ambitious
climate-fighting measures but could
not win universal agreement on a spe-
cific commitment to phase out coal.
This year, the fate of our civilization
is being determined in bland convention-center meet-
ing spaces, slick corporate boardrooms and regal hotel
ballrooms, and wherever you go, it’s hard to escape Ker-
ry’s name. He comes up in conversations with the diplo-
mats, legislators and business personalities on the inside
as well as with the activists looking in. The dynamic is,
in part, a testament to Kerry’s role as an elder statesman
who is greeted with open arms by heads of government
in foreign capitals. But it’s also a recognition that even
after a Trump presidency that stomped on diplomacy
and global norms, governments want the multilateral
system to work—and for the U.S., which wrote the rulesTHE OPTIMIST’S
CHALLENGE
By Justin Worland/Naples, Italy
‘ We’refighting foreverything.’