Transnational Legal Process and Discourse in Environmental Governance: The Case of REDD+ in Tanzania

2019 ◽  
Vol 44 (04) ◽  
pp. 1019-1050 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sébastien Jodoin
Keyword(s):  
Discourse Analysis ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Forest Degradation ◽  
Climate Justice ◽  
Ecological Modernization ◽  
Legal Process ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Global Institutions ◽  
Transnational Legal Process ◽  
Civic Environmentalism

Governments in developing countries have adopted policies, laws, and programs to reduce carbon emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+), with the funding and rules provided by global institutions and transnational actors. The transnational legal process for REDD+, entailing the construction and diffusion of legal norms that govern the pursuit of REDD+, has been driven by discursive struggles over the purposes and requirements of REDD+. At the global level, the development of legal norms for REDD+ has been primarily influenced by coalitions committed to the discourses of ecological modernization, civic environmentalism, and to a lesser extent, climate justice. Through discourse analysis of the transnational legal process for REDD+ in Tanzania, I show how domestic efforts to operationalize REDD+ have been dominated by a government coalition that has emphasized green governmentality, made few concessions to the discourse of civic environmentalism, and completely neglected the climate justice claims of Indigenous Peoples. This case study reveals how discourse analysis may enhance the study of transnational legal phenomena by drawing attention to the complex interplay of global and domestic discourses and its role in shaping legal norms and reinforcing or challenging structures of power and knowledge within and across legal systems.

Planting Trees to Mitigate Climate Change: Contested Discourses of Ecological Modernization, Green Governmentality and Civic Environmentalism

2006 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 50-75 ◽  
Author(s):  
Karin Bäckstrand ◽  
Eva Lövbrand
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Kyoto Protocol ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Central Element ◽  
Negotiation Process ◽  
Ecological Modernization ◽  
Tree Plantation ◽  
Mitigate Climate Change ◽  
Civic Environmentalism

Forest plantations or so-called carbon sinks have played a critical role in the climate change negotiations and constitute a central element in the scheme to limit atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations set out by the Kyoto Protocol. This paper examines dominant discursive framings of forest plantation projects in the climate regime. A central proposition is that these projects represent a microcosm of competing and overlapping discourses that are mirrored in debates of global environmental governance. While the win-win discourse of ecological modernization has legitimized the inclusion of sink projects in the Kyoto Protocol, a green governmentality discourse has provided the scientific rationale necessary to turn tropical tree-plantation projects operational on the emerging carbon market. A critical civic environmentalism discourse has contested forest sink projects depicting them as unjust and environmentally unsound strategies to mitigate climate change. The article examines the articulation and institutionalization of these discourses in the climate negotiation process as well as the wider implications for environmental governance.

scholarly journals Military Lawyers on the Battlefield: An Empirical Account of International Law Compliance

2010 ◽  
Vol 104 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-28 ◽  
Author(s):  
Laura A. Dickinson
Keyword(s):  
International Relations ◽  
International Law ◽  
Legal Analysis ◽  
Theoretical Level ◽  
Legal Process ◽  
Strategic Action ◽  
State Behavior ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Norm Internalization ◽  
Transnational Legal Process

International law scholarship remains locked in a raging debate about the extent to which states do or do not comply with international legal norms. For years, this debate lacked empirical data altogether. International law advocates tended to assume that most nations obey most laws most of the time and proceeded to measure state activity against international norms through conventional legal analysis. In contrast, international relations realists and rational choice theorists have argued that international law is simply an epiphenomenon of other state interests with little independent power at all. Meanwhile, constructivist and transnational legal process approaches have posited that international law seeps into state behavior through psychological and sociological mechanisms of norm internalization and strategic action. But even these studies tend to remain on a theoretical level, without on-the-ground data about which factors might influence compliance in actual day-to-day settings.

scholarly journals What Difference Does CBDR Make? A Socio-Legal Analysis of the Role of Differentiation in the Transnational Legal Process for REDD+

2016 ◽  
Vol 5 (2) ◽  
pp. 255-284 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sébastien Jodoin ◽  
Sarah Mason-Case
Keyword(s):  
Technical Assistance ◽  
Developed Countries ◽  
Legal Analysis ◽  
Legal Process ◽  
Public And Private ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
The North ◽  
Non Governmental Organizations ◽  
Transnational Legal Process

AbstractThis article offers a socio-legal analysis of the role played by the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities (CBDR) in the development, diffusion, and implementation of jurisdictional REDD+ activities throughout the developing world. It employs a qualitative research method known as process tracing to uncover whether and, if so, to what extent and how actors have used CBDR to support the emergence and effectiveness of the transnational legal process for REDD+. The article argues that the transnational legal process for REDD+ reflects a conception of CBDR in which developing country governments may take on voluntary commitments to reduce their carbon emissions, with the multilateral, bilateral, and private sources of financial support and technical assistance provided by developed countries, international organizations, non-governmental organizations, and corporations. This creative conception and application of CBDR has fostered the construction and diffusion of legal norms for REDD+ because it has influenced the interests, ideas, and identities of public and private actors in the North and South. However, the early challenges associated with the implementation of REDD+ reveal a worrying gap between the financial pledges made by developed countries and the costs associated with the full implementation of REDD+, as well as contradictions in the very way in which the responsibilities of various countries have been defined in the context of REDD+. The analysis has important implications for the transnational governance of REDD+, as well as for scholarship on the role of differentiation in the pursuit of effective and equitable climate change solutions.

scholarly journals The School Strike for Climate as people’s engagement in the transnational legal process and global constitutionalism

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-18
Author(s):  
Binendri Perera
Keyword(s):  
Hong Kong ◽  
New Technology ◽  
Legal Framework ◽  
Climate Justice ◽  
International Level ◽  
Legal Process ◽  
Global Constitutionalism ◽  
Legal Frameworks ◽  
Transnational Legal Process ◽  
Domestic Level

Abstract What is the significance of the School Strike for Climate from an international constitutional perspective? In this article, I compare the School Strike for Climate with the Hong Kong protests of 2019–20. Both these movements became necessary because of gaps in their countries’ respective domestic and international legal frameworks – what I term constitutionalism gaps. The immediate cause of each protest was how state and non-state actors exploited these constitutionalism gaps in the existing legal framework. Protests in Hong Kong were triggered by the attempt to enact an Extradition Law that threatened people’s autonomy, whereas the School Strike for Climate is a response to the failure of the state to deliver climate justice. Both these movements use similar strategies of advocacy and they have relied extensively on new technology. Based on this comparison, I argue that the School Strike for Climate promotes procedural and substantive values of constitutionalism at the international level, similar to the Hong Kong Protests at the domestic level. Through the School Strike for Climate, people seek to engage directly in the transnational legal process. In attempting to bridge the constitutionalism gap at the international level, the School Strike for Climate promotes values of global constitutionalism.

Contesting the greening of the urban growth machine: Ecological modernization and the promethean counter-discourse

2020 ◽  
pp. 251484862095232
Author(s):  
Emiliano Scanu ◽  
Geneviève Cloutier ◽  
Catherine Trudelle
Keyword(s):  
Urban Sprawl ◽  
Urban Growth ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Ecological Modernization ◽  
Quebec City ◽  
Sustainable Mobility ◽  
Transit System ◽  
Growth Machine ◽  
Better Than

Urban environmental governance and planning are increasingly characterized by the adoption of “sustainability fixes,” namely political compromises which try to conciliate economic and ecological goals in order to safeguard long-term growth. If sustainability fixes have been harshly criticized for being sociospatially selective, resistance to them does not always come from radical groups who demand stronger and fairer measures, but from actors who oppose the idea of sustainability because it goes against their interests, habits, or values. This paper focuses on this “contestation of the greening of the urban growth machine,” by presenting an empirical study of a sustainable mobility policy in Quebec City, Canada, which has given rise to a controversy opposing two divergent perspectives. The first is an ecological modernization discourse advocating for a green and attractive public transit system. The second is a promethean counter-discourse which supports the unconditional growth of automobility and urban sprawl. Results show that even if urban environmental policies are increasingly attuned to the “growth first” logic, they could still face strong opposition, especially from suburban and conservative interests. More generally, this paper shows that, in some contexts, sustainability fixes could be a “better than nothing” solution, namely a step toward fairer and greener cities.

scholarly journals A faultline in neoliberal environmental governance scholarship? Or, why accumulation-by-alienation matters

2019 ◽  
Vol 3 (2) ◽  
pp. 552-579 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alexander Dunlap ◽  
Sian Sullivan
Keyword(s):  
Developing Countries ◽  
Ecosystem Services ◽  
Political Ecology ◽  
Security Policy ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Social Engineering ◽  
Forest Degradation ◽  
Payments For Ecosystem Services ◽  
Critical Geography ◽  
Progressive Politics

This article identifies an emerging faultline in critical geography and political ecology scholarship by reviewing recent debates on three neoliberal environmental governance initiatives: Payments for Ecosystem Services, the United Nations programme for Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries and carbon-biodiversity offsetting. These three approaches, we argue, are characterized by varying degrees of contextual and procedural – or superficial – difference, meanwhile exhibiting significant structural similarities that invite critique, perhaps even rejection. Specifically, we identify three largely neglected ‘social engineering’ outcomes as more foundational to Payments for Ecosystem Services, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries and carbon-biodiversity offsetting than often acknowledged, suggesting that neoliberal environmental governance approaches warrant greater critical attention for their contributions to advancing processes of colonization, state territorialization and security policy. Examining the structural accumulation strategies accompanying neoliberal environmental governance approaches, we offer the term ‘accumulation-by-alienation’ to highlight both the objective appropriations accompanying Payments for Ecosystem Services, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries and offsetting and the relational deficiencies accompanying the various commodifying instrumentalizations at the heart of these initiatives. We concur with David Harvey’s recent work proposing that understanding the iterative and consequential connections between objective/material and subjective/psychological dimensions of alienation offers ‘one vital key to unlock the door of a progressive politics for the future’. We conclude (with others) by urging critical geography and political ecology scholars to cultivate research directions that affirm more radical alternatives, rather than reinforcing a narrowing focus on how to improve Payments for Ecosystem Services, Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries and offsetting in practice.

Grabbing “Green”: Markets, Environmental Governance and the Materialization of Natural Capital

2013 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-15 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catherine Corson ◽  
Kenneth Iain MacDonald ◽  
Benjamin Neimark
Keyword(s):  
Social Relations ◽  
Capital Accumulation ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Natural Capital ◽  
Forest Degradation ◽  
Green Economy ◽  
Market Mechanisms ◽  
Theoretical Perspectives ◽  
The Social ◽  
Empirical Material

Over the past two decades, the incorporation of market logics into environment and conservation policy has led to a reconceptualization of “nature.” Resulting constructs like ecosystem services and biodiversity derivatives, as well as finance mechanisms like Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation, species banking, and carbon trading, offer new avenues for accumulation and set the context for new enclosures. As these practices have become more apparent, geographers have been at the forefront of interdisciplinary research that has highlighted the effects of “green grabs”—in which “green credentials” are used to justify expropriation of land and resources—in specific locales. While case studies have begun to reveal the social and ecological marginalization associated with green grabs and the implementation of market mechanisms in particular sites, less attention has been paid to the systemic dimensions and “logics” mobilizing these projects. Yet, the emergence of these constructs reflects a larger transformation in international environmental governance—one in which the discourse of global ecology has accommodated an ontology of natural capital, culminating in the production of what is taking shape as “The Green Economy.” The Green Economy is not a natural or coincidental development, but is contingent upon, and coordinated by, actors drawn together around familiar and emergent institutions of environmental governance. Indeed, the terrain for green grabbing is increasingly cultivated through relationships among international environmental policy institutions, organizations, activists, academics, and transnational capitalist and managerial classes. This special issue of Human Geography brings together papers that draw on a range of theoretical perspectives to investigate the systemic dimensions and logics mobilizing green grabs and the creation of new market mechanisms. In inverting the title – “grabbing green” instead of the more conventional green grabs – we explore how “the environment” is being used instrumentally by various actors to extend the potential for capital accumulation under the auspices of “being green.” Using a diversity of empirical material that spans local to global scales, the papers reveal the formation of the social relations and metrics that markets require to function. They identify the “frictions” that inhibit the production of these social relations, and they link particular cases to the scalar configurations of power that mobilize and give them shape.

A gender justice approach to eliminating Sudan’s Savannah belt’s vulnerability to climate change

2016 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 539-558 ◽  
Author(s):  
Mey Eltayeb Ahmed
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Best Practice ◽  
Local Community ◽  
Forest Degradation ◽  
Climate Justice ◽  
Social Forestry ◽  
Policy Document ◽  
Ample Evidence ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Vulnerability To Climate Change

Purpose Arguing that a gendered invisibility surrounding climate justice contributes to the overall vulnerability and burden placed upon the ability of women from disadvantaged communities, the purpose of this paper is to demonstrate the importance of developing a participative gender framework for climate justice with the potential to address the policy and programme vulnerability gap within climate change and conflict in Sudan’s Savannah Belt. Design/methodology/approach In utilising gender responsive discourse analysis, along with setting out the history of gender engagement within social forestry, this paper examines both the method of Sudan’s reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD+) development and its content. Findings The paper’s findings demonstrate that the REDD+ programme in Sudan provides ample evidence of the importance of integrating climate justice and gender approaches to policy, programming and projects through ensuring women and local community participation at all levels and interaction within policy and programme development, along with its implementation. Research limitations/implications The paper is theoretical in nature but did draw upon case studies and consultations, and the author was involved in some of the research. Originality/value The paper provides a positive and arguably original example of social forestry within the Savannah Belt and its utilisation as a best practice that has fed into Sudan’s REDD+ Proposal/Policy Document so as to potentially drive and streamline similar such initiatives across Sudan.

scholarly journals PENGATURAN TINDAK PIDANA DALAM UNDANG-UNDANG NOMOR 32 TAHUN 2009 TENTANG PERLINDUNGAN DAN PENGELOLAAN LINGKUNGAN HIDUP (Tinjauan Fiqh Al- Bi’ah)

2017 ◽  
Vol 6 (2) ◽  
pp. 173
Author(s):  
Muhammad Ridwansyah
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Protection ◽  
Research Method ◽  
Environmental Governance ◽  
Environmental Law ◽  
Descriptive Analysis ◽  
Secondary Data ◽  
Legal Norms ◽  
Criminal Sanctions ◽  
The Law ◽  
The Government

The setting of environmental law in Indonesia has started to improve since the Law Number 32 of 2009 on Environmental Protection and Management contains criminal act for every person who violates the provisions. It is stated in Article 98, 99, 100. This research method is a library or literature research which is conducted to gather secondary data in the field of environmental law and fiqh al-bi’ah. This research is normative law research while the nature of this research is descriptive analysis. It aimed to give a systematic illustration on legal norms that was found in law number 32 of 2009 and environmental fiqh accurately and the criminal sanctions review used in both arrangements. In this study there were two questions first, how is the arrangement of criminal act in Law No. 32 of 2009 on Environmental Protection Management. The second is whether the concept of fiqh al bi’ah is in line with Law No. 32 of 2009 on Environmental Protection Management. The result from this study is that the criminal act contained in the Law No. 32 of 2009 on Environmental Protection Management has not been enough to trap the environmental destroyer so that the government is expected to revise the unsuitable articles. Furthermore, the result of this research shows the similarity concept between fiqh al bi’ah and environmental governance in Indonesia. The concept offered by fiqh al bi’ah is a part of maqashidul syari’ah where Islam strongly recommended to maintain the environment. Keywords: environment, Fiqh Al-Bi’ah, Maqashidul Syari’ah

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