11. Global Politics in the Anthropocene

2021 ◽  
pp. 251-273
Author(s):  
Stephanie Lawson
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Environmental Movement ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Global Environment ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Role Of The State ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Business As Usual ◽  
The Impact

This chapter studies how the scope of global politics has been extended over the last half century or so to include the impact of human industrial activity on the environment. The environmental movement and ‘green theory’ have grown out of concerns with the deleterious impact of this activity and the capacity of the planet to carry the burden of ‘business as usual’ in a world driven by the imperatives of endless growth. Many now believe that the impact on the earth’s systems is so significant that the present geological period should be recognized as the ‘Anthropocene’. Climate change is probably the most prominent issue associated with the Anthropocene at present, but it is not the only one. The chapter examines a range of issues in global environment politics, starting with the reconceptualization of the present period. It then moves on to an account of the environmental movement, the emergence of various ‘green’ ideologies and theories, and the politics of science. This is essential background for considering the role of the state and its sovereign powers in the context of global environmental politics.

Introduction

2013 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jessica F. Green
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environment ◽  
Global Environmental Problems ◽  
The Third ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Private Authority ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Private Actors ◽  
Ruffed Lemur

This book examines how the global environment is regulated and, in particular, the diversity of actors involved in addressing the problem of climate change. It considers the role of private actors, such as nongovernmental organizations and transnational networks, in global environmental politics. It shows that private actors are increasingly assuming duties normally associated with governments. They are taking on the role of regulators, as they create, implement, and enforce rules to manage global environmental problems. The book asks when and why private actors perform these regulatory roles. It cites three examples to demonstrate the diversity of private authority and the ways in which nonstate actors are serving as rule makers: the first deals with Walmart, the second is about the ruffed lemur, and the third relates to the Kyoto Protocol. The book distinguishes between two different types of private authority: delegated authority and entrepreneurial authority.

The Third World and Global Environmental Negotiations: Interests, Institutions and Ideas

2005 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 48-69 ◽  
Author(s):  
Marc Williams
Keyword(s):  
Climate Change ◽  
Third World ◽  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Collective Agency ◽  
The Third ◽  
Environmental Negotiations ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
The Third World

Marian Miller provided an engaging and persuasive analysis of the role of Third World states in global environmental negotiations. While Miller focused on the strategies of individual states, this article examines the collective agency of the Third World in global environmental negotiations. The first part of the article explores the debates on the continuing relevance of the Third World as a concept, and contends that the Third World retains relevance in the context of global bargaining processes. The second part of the article highlights the role of ideas and institutions in the continued reproduction of the Third World as an actor in global environmental politics. The final part of the article explores the ways in which the negotiations on climate change have tended to reproduce a distinctive Southern perspective.

Ecofeminism and Global Environmental Politics

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Juliann Emmons Allison
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Cultural Institutions ◽  
Women's Activism ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Ecological Philosophy ◽  
History Of ◽  
Francoise D'eaubonne

Ecofeminism can be described as both an ecological philosophy and a social movement that draws on environmental studies, critiques of modernity and science, and feminist critical analyses and activism to explicate connections between women and nature, and the implications of these relationships for environmental politics. Feminist writer Françoise d’Eaubonne is widely credited to be the founder of ecofeminism in the early 1970s. Ecofeminists embrace a wide range of views concerning the causal role of Western dualistic thinking, patriarchal structures of power, and capitalism in ecological degradation, and the oppression of women and other subjugated peoples. Collectively, they find value in extending feminist analyses to the simultaneous interrogation of the domination of both nature and women. The history of ecofeminism may be divided into four decade-long periods. Ecofeminism emerged in the early 1970s, coincident with a significant upturn in the contemporary women’s and environmental movements. In the 1980s, ecofeminism entered the academy as ecofeminist activists and scholars focused their attention on the exploitation of natural resources and women, particularly in the developing world. They criticized government and cultural institutions that constrained women’s reproductive and productive roles in society, and argued that environmental protection ultimately depends on increasing women’s socioeconomic and political power. In the current postfeminist and postenvironmentalist world, ecofeminists are less concerned with theoretical labels than with effective women’s activism to achieve ecological sustainability.

Leadership in Global Environmental Politics

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sanna Kopra
Keyword(s):  
Common Good ◽  
Environmental Politics ◽  
The United States ◽  
Environmental Issue ◽  
International Negotiations ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Wide Range ◽  
Leaders And Followers

There is wide consensus among global environmental politics (GEP) scholars about the urgent need for leadership in international climate negotiations and other environmental issue areas A large number of GEP studies elaborate rhetoric and actions of aspiring leaders in GEP. In particular, these studies seek to identify which states have sought to provide leadership in international negotiations on the environment, and how they have exercised this role in institutional bargaining processes at the international level. The biggest share of GEP studies generally focus on leadership in environmental governance within the United Nations (UN), and international negotiations on climate under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change in general, or the role of the European Union (EU) in those negotiations in particular. Many GEP scholars have also investigated the leadership role of the United States in international environmental regime formation, whereas there are no systematic investigations concerning China’s leadership in GEP. In addition to the states, GEP literature identifies a wide range of other actors as potential leaders (and followers) in environmental issue areas: international organizations, non-governmental organizations, corporations, cities, religious organizations, social movements, politicians, and even individuals. Since leadership is a social relation, a growing number of scholars have moved to study perceptions of leadership and to conceptualize the relationship between leaders and followers. GEP scholars also identify some qualitative aspects a leader must have in order to attract followers. Many empirical studies show that despite the EU’s aspiration to be a climate leader, it is not unequivocally recognized as such by others. At the same time, it seems that some forms of leadership, especially those based on unilateral action, do not necessarily require followers and recognition by others. In addition to the leader–follower relationship, the motivation of leadership constitutes one of the key controversies among GEP scholars. Some argue that self-interest is a sufficient driver of leadership, while others claim that leaders must act for the common good of a wider constituency (or at least be perceived to do so). To conclude, most scholars studying leadership in GEP regard structural leadership (based on material capabilities and hard power) as an important type of leadership. Much less attention has been paid to the social dimensions of leadership; this is undoubtedly a gap in the literature that prospective studies ought to fill.

Cancer and Global Environmental Politics: Proposing a New Research Agenda

2005 ◽  
Vol 5 (3) ◽  
pp. 6-13
Author(s):  
Peter Dauvergne
Keyword(s):  
Environmental Change ◽  
Research Agenda ◽  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environmental Change ◽  
World Health ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Cancer Rates ◽  
New Research ◽  
The Impact

More than six million people die of cancer every year. Over the next two decades, the World Health Organization predicts global cancer rates will rise to 10 million deaths annually. What is the impact of the global political and economic processes of environmental change on cancer rates? Why, given the strong intuitive reasons to worry about the carcinogenic effects of global environmental change, is there so little research on this topic? What is the political role of science, corporations, nongovernmental organizations and international institutions on cancer research and cancer rates? What is the impact of global patterns of trade, financing, production and consumption on research and rates? This article charts the current social science literature on cancer and global environmental change with the hope of encouraging scholars of global environmental politics to pursue a new research agenda around questions like these.

scholarly journals Green Industrial Policy and the Global Transformation of Climate Politics

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-19
Author(s):  
Bentley Allan ◽  
Joanna I. Lewis ◽  
Thomas Oatley
Keyword(s):  
Industrial Policy ◽  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Politics ◽  
Value Chains ◽  
Climate Politics ◽  
Green Industry ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
State Practice ◽  
Green Industrial Policy

Abstract The rise of green industrial policy has injected purpose and competition into global environmental politics. Efforts to build green industry have raised the economic and geopolitical stakes of environmental issues as states seek to position their firms in global value chains and reshore strategic industries. This could help to generate the technologies and political momentum needed to accelerate global decarbonization. At the same time, these green interventions confront status quo interests and a variety of brown industrial policies. To help make sense of this new landscape, this introduction to the special issue defines green industrial policy and situates it within domestic political economy, social policy, and global geopolitics. We present six new studies that demonstrate and explore the global politics of green industrial policy. To illustrate the kinds of effects and implications of green industrial policy we are interested in exploring, we show how green industrial policy has transformed climate politics. Changes in state practice, ideas about the environment and economy, and technological cost declines came together to produce a new opportunistic and competitive climate politics. We then identify areas for further investigation as we call for a new climate politics research agenda, integrating green industrial policy more intentionally into studies of global environmental politics.

Invasive Species in Post-2020 Global Environmental Politics

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-11
Author(s):  
Jesann Gonzalez Cruz ◽  
McKenzie F. Johnson
Keyword(s):  
Political Economy ◽  
Global Governance ◽  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Environmental Security ◽  
Power Dynamics ◽  
Research Attention ◽  
Global Political Economy ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
The Impact

Abstract As goods and people more rapidly traverse our interconnected world, invasive alien species (IAS) are increasingly frequent, ecologically damaging, economically significant, and culturally concerning. Through examinations of IAS, global environmental politics (GEP) scholars can more deeply engage long-standing and newly emerging research problems within the three areas of global governance, global political economy, and environmental security. First, GEP scholars can use IAS research to further develop insights about the impact of problem structure on global governance. Second, examining IAS dispersal risks and associated costs, as well as intercountry variation in management responses, can generate insights about North–South power dynamics in the global political economy and how distributive conflict is likely to shape future invasion risk. Third, notions of environmental security in GEP scholarship can be challenged and further developed by examining the conceptualization and operationalization of “biosecurity” amid increasingly diverse multispecies assemblages. Greater research attention to IAS in GEP is long overdue, and we intend for this article to open novel pathways for GEP interdisciplinary research on IAS.

Does Bureaucracy Really Matter? The Authority of Intergovernmental Treaty Secretariats in Global Environmental Politics

2006 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 23-49 ◽  
Author(s):  
Steffen Bauer
Keyword(s):  
Organizational Design ◽  
Environmental Politics ◽  
Case Study Research ◽  
World Politics ◽  
Montreal Protocol ◽  
Vienna Convention ◽  
Global Environmental Politics ◽  
Global Environmental ◽  
Organizational Theories

Although a number of scholars acknowledge the relevance of intergovernmental bureaucracies in world politics, International Relations research still lacks theoretical distinction and empirical scrutiny in understanding their influence in the international arena. In this article I explore the role of intergovernmental treaty secretariats as authoritative bureaucratic actors in global environmental politics. I employ organizational theories and sociological institutionalism for comparative qualitative case study research that traces variances at the outcome level of two environmental treaty secretariats, the secretariats to the Vienna Convention and the Montreal Protocol (“Ozone Secretariat”) and the UN Convention to Combat Desertification (“Desertification Secretariat”). While the organizational design of both secretariats is similar, their institutional histories and outcomes differ markedly. Looking for possible explanations for these differences I focus on the activities of both secretariats and how they relate to the authority they enjoy vis-à-vis the parties they serve.

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