In an article co-authored with Tim R. Samples, Professor Stephen Kim Park examines how climate change is compounding the financial vulnerability of disaster-prone countries. “The Sovereign Climate Debt Trap and Natural Disaster Clauses” (American Business Law Journal, Vol. 61, No. 4, 2024) explores natural disaster clauses in sovereign debt contracts, which enable a government to temporarily suspend debt payments to its creditors following a disaster. This paper also analyzes the development and application of these clauses, noting their usefulness and shortcomings, in the context of ongoing debates about legal reform of the global financial system in response to climate change.

The working paper is available on SSRN here.