It turns out that main champions of a stronger climate treaty are the 40-odd mostly tiny nations comprising the Alliance of Small Island States, which are threatened by potential sea level rise. The greenhouse theory is generally accepted by most politicians and by the informed public. More important, there is considerable imprecision about the possible consequences of climate change, notably concerning the timing, severity, and regional and local impacts. Some areas, e.g., vast regions of Russian Asia, could conceivably benefit in the medium term from a warming trend. The prospect of less snow to shovel in Minnesota or New England does not engender a public sense of crisis.
Similar uncertainty clouds the proposed actions to mitigate climate change.
To my mind, what's wrong with the climate negotiations is that we have wasted too much time over the past several years arguing about targets and timetables for greenhouse gas emissions reductions that have no scientific basis. These are political slogans, not rational goals. Their main effect has been to engender a determined backlash and make it easy for the coal and oil industries and their political allies to mislead the public and stalemate the negotiations. Even if such targets were accepted by the Conference of Parties in Kyoto, they are unenforceable under current conditions. There is no evidence that high immediate reductions are critical.