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This course examines contemporary international environmental problems from the angle of global governance. The major themes to be addressed include (1) how individuals and groups shape local-global dynamics of international environmental politics; (2) how economic, political, and social processes at multiple domains shape global environmental changes; and (3) the challenges of international environmental governance and the possible state/international policy formulations to address the challenges. The course aims at combining theory and practice in the study of international environmental governance in various issue areas such as overpopulation, pollution, energy use, climate change, and environmental security.
This book focuses on the ways international economic processes affect environmental outcomes. It examines the main actors and forces shaping global environmental management, particularly in the developing world. The book maps out an original typology of four contrasting worldviews of environmental change—those of market liberals, institutionalists, bioenvironmentalists, and social greens—and uses them as a framework to examine the links between the global political economy and ecological change. This typology provides a common language for students, instructors, and scholars to discuss the issues across the classical social science divisions.
This book provides a comparative study of the role of international organizations in environmental governance. It includes a range of case studies including the World Bank, UNEP and the OECD, and presents quantitative and qualitative research that advances understanding of international organizations in the field of international relations. Part One studies how international organizations have adapted their core functions, procedures and policies in order to support the new and emerging issues of environmental policy at all levels. Part Two focuses on the emergence of new organizations created exclusively for the support of environmental policy-making. Part Three covers the new and growing area of public-private cooperation.
This book puts forward a distinctive theoretical approach and analytical framework for studying business as an international actor in the environmental field, and provides detailed case studies of the most important environmental challenges in recent years- the protection of the ozone layer; the politics of global climate change; and the regulation of agricultural biotechnology. The chapters on ozone depletion, climate change and agricultural biotechnology were written in chronological order, tracing the evolution of international policy-making and linking it with the changing dynamics of business power and business conflict. The three case studies concentrate primarily on business actors from North America and Europe.
This book reviews the first ten years of the United Nations Global Compact, a strategic policy initiative that encourages businesses to support ten universal principles in the areas of human rights, labor standards, the environment, and anti-corruption. Part One reflects on the four key issue areas. Part Two discuss different participant groups and engagement mechanisms. Part Three discusses Global Compact governance and the COP policy. Part Four discuss the role of Global Compact Local Networks in connecting the broad policy goals and initiatives at the global level with concrete action on the local and regional level. The final chapter summarizes findings and outlines challenges.
This book takes a political economy approach to understanding the role of business in global environmental politics. Part One examines recent theoretical developments, reviews debates, and constructs a neo-Gramscian conceptual framework. Part Two analyzes place firms and corporate strategy centrally in their analysis of international environmental governance. Part Three examines the business influence from regional dimensions. Part Four highlights the various mechanisms by which private actors establish private regimes of governance, and points to some problematic implications regarding participation in governance processes and the distribution of costs and benefits. The book concludes with themes, insights, and experiences from the sectors, issues, and regions explored in previous chapters.
This is a collection of essays commenting on the interdisciplinary field of trade and the environment, aimed at understanding the relationship between international trade in a globalizing world and its effects on the natural environment. Divided into three sections- trade and environmental quality, trade and environmental politics, and trade and environmental policy, the book provides in-depth case studies of nations and regions in addition to broader overviews of the field, including the United States, the European Union, China, India, and Mexico as well as East Asia, Latin America, and Africa.
This book offers a broad overview of research on interplay management and institutional complexes that provides important insights across the field of global environmental governance. It examines international institutional interplay and its consequences, focusing on two important issues: how states and other actors can manage institutional interaction to improve synergy and avoid disruption; and what forces drive the emergence and evolution of institutional complexes, sets of institutions that cogovern particular issue areas. It offers both theoretical and empirical perspectives, and ranges from analytical overviews to case studies of institutional interaction, interplay management, and regime complexes in areas including climate change, fisheries management, and conservation of biodiversity.