Global Environmental Agreements and International Trade: Asymmetry of Countries Matters

The experience of the last ten years of global environmental negotiations suggests that a new and different approach to international cooperation is required if we are to achieve sustainable development. While multilateral environmental agreements have provided a valuable framework for building a consensus on broad objectives, their implementation requires a focus on the underlying activities that cause environmental degradation. Moreover, globalization encourages the development and use of innovative technologies, leading to a large degree of overlap between global environmental concerns and national sustainable development objectives. These shifts require wholly new perspectives that are based less on determining responsibilities and more on supporting mutually reinforcing transformations. The new approach also looks beyond the state to other stakeholders as contributors to achieving sustainable development.

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Multilateral Environmental Agreements: A Key Instrument of Global Environmental Governance

European Union External Environmental Policy ◽

10.1007/978-3-319-60931-7_2 ◽

2017 ◽

pp. 19-38

Author(s):

Tom Delreux

Keyword(s):

Environmental Governance ◽

Environmental Agreements ◽

Global Environmental Governance ◽

Multilateral Environmental Agreements ◽

Global Environmental

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Environment and Sustainable Development

The Oxford Handbook of United Nations Treaties ◽

10.1093/law/9780190947842.003.0013 ◽

2019 ◽

pp. 200-228

Author(s):

Marie-Claire Cordonier Segger ◽

Alexandra Harrington

Keyword(s):

Sustainable Development ◽

Environmental Agreements ◽

International Governance ◽

Multilateral Environmental Agreements ◽

The Sustainable Development ◽

Global Environmental Problems ◽

System P ◽

Global Environmental ◽

Development Goals

This chapter considers the UN contributions to treaty-making in practice on the environment and sustainable development. It begins with a brief survey of the crafting and “clustering” of multilateral environmental agreements as international responses to emerging global environmental problems. Specifically, this chapter considers the role of the UN in this process, focusing on successive waves of treaty-making over recent decades. It suggests that the UN has played a very important role in negotiations in this field, and continues to serve as a crucial and valuable actor in the implementation and refinement of these treaties and the broader problem-based clusters, in spite of very limited resources. This chapter identifies several key treaties that address a selection of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs,) leading to a concluding consideration of how international accords in this field are, in turn, contributing to the UN Charter. It suggests that, without the UN-facilitated treaties, many SDGs could be considered “hollow,” dependent on voluntary collaborations, and devoid of reliable regimes to achieve their targets. Not all relationships are equally integrated. Fragmentation, duplication, unintended overlapping of obligations or even conflicts may exist. As international governance becomes more sophisticated and complex, these interrelated instruments can be negotiated, implemented, and interactionally refined across multiple nested levels. To this end, this chapter argues that adoption of the SDGs may support greater coherence across the UN system.

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