Is It the End of the COP as We Know It? An Analysis of the First Year of Virtual Meetings in the UN Environment and Sustainable Development Arena

The year 2020 started much like any other on the United Nations multilateral calendar. But then the COVID-19 pandemic forced the UN and the world to shut down. After the initial shock wore off, secretariats and governments began to contemplate how to conduct multilateral negotiations during a pandemic. As they created new virtual working methods, they also had to figure out how to maintain trust among delegations and in the process itself to ensure the outcomes of these meetings would be respected. To understand how UN meetings adapted to a virtual environment and maintained trust, this article analyzes a sample of 18 meetings of UN environmental and sustainable development bodies that took place in the 12 months between April 2020 and March 2021. The research examines these cases to see how these meetings were conducted, how they built the necessary trust, and what can be learned from this experience.

THE GROUNDS OF PROTECTIONISM IN INTERNATIONAL TRADE IN THE 21st CENTURY IN THE CONTEXT OF MULTILATERAL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS

As the importance of tariffs diminishes, to avoid underestimation, analysis of the dynamics of protectionism implies the use of more complex data. Hence, this research explores the Global Trade Alert database, which covers a wide range of measures used by countries within trade policy. Once the dynamics of protectionism in trade is presented, the analysis of its grounds might be undertaken to answer the question: what are the reasons for high levels of protectionist tendencies in the 21 st century? Is this a post-crisis repercussion only? Or is the failure of multilateral negotiations under the auspices of the WTO which, in turn, makes space for increased levels of protectionism? While many analyses highlight the indisputable impact of the crisis on the growing protectionist tendencies in the 21 st century, it has been over ten years since the crisis, which requires a search for alternate or additional premises. The hypothesis was therefore adopted that the failure of multilateral negotiations within the Doha Round may make space for increased protectionism in the 21 st century. Taking into consideration all of the negative consequences of protectionism, the analysis of its causes has a justification. Successful treatment requires a diagnosis of the sources of the problem; only once these are identified can an appropriate action be undertaken. The main conclusion from the research is that because of the diversification within the WTO, the multilateral liberalization agenda has been limited. Hence, “next generation” issues are addressed elsewhere, like within regional trade agreements, which, as a result, became very popular after 2001. However, RTAs should not be perceived as an alternative to liberalization under the auspices of the WTO, as they are not free from protectionist tendencies.

The Shifting Status of Cities in International Law? A Review, Several Questions and a Straight Answer

Witnessing the sometimes confusing and often nebulous debate on the position of cities in international law, one could wonder what cities are and what they do in contemporary international law. One could also wonder whether allowing cities to actively participate in the formation and implementation of international norms, and to contribute to international multilateral negotiations on issues of global concern such as sustainable development, climate change or human rights, does really imply a change in their status in international law. In this contribution, the reasons why cities are not subjects of international law, or better, why cities and local authorities still matter in international law because they are part of a State, are systematically assessed. Specific attention is paid to the status and role of transnational city networks. Before concluding, this article makes some final comments on the prospects for cities and transnational city networks in international law.

China's Participation in the Second Hague Conference and the Concept of Equal Sovereignty in International Law

Despite the Qing Empire's formal inclusion as a member of the Eurocentric community of states by the turn of the 20th century, its lack of full sovereign status was frequently reasserted in practice. This included proceedings where legal norms were unilaterally applied to it as an object of regulation, provoking a pursuit of agency. In particular, the unprecedented foreign occupation and administration of China after the Boxer crisis of 1899–1901 spurred efforts in pedagogy, legal reform, and diplomacy. Several such efforts subsequently overlapped at the Second Hague Conference in 1907. There, Qing diplomats for the first time influenced multilateral negotiations, and discovered a nascent solidarity with other “weak” states in Latin America and Asia. Joint struggle against great power initiatives sparked new conversations about the equality of states, however, major questions about the implications of sovereign status for genuine agency, and the contingent forms of international legal “progress,” remained unresolved.

The limits of information revelation in multilateral negotiations: A theory of treatymaking

States negotiate over the specific terms of multilateral treaties because those terms determine states’ willingness to ratify the treaty. In some cases, a state might decline to ratify a treaty it otherwise supports because specific terms are too far from those it prefers. States and inter-governmental organizations negotiating treaties would like to uncover the minimal terms needed to secure the ratification of key states, but under what circumstances will those states candidly reveal those terms? Using a spatial representation of the issues in a treaty negotiation, we use mechanism design to determine what information states will reveal in a treaty negotiation. We find that states are willing to reveal how they would like tradeoffs between different issues to be resolved but not the minimal terms they require for ratification. Further, negotiations cannot always separate types that need concessions to ratify from other types that would like concessions but would ratify the treaty even if they do not receive them. These findings provide insight into how treaty negotiations can succeed or fail, and they lay the theoretical groundwork for a new line of empirical research on how multilateral treaties are negotiated.

Rethinking the (CP)TPP as a Model for Regulation of Chinese State-Owned Enterprises

ABSTRACT This paper challenges the widespread view that the Comprehensive and Progressive Agreement for Trans-Pacific Partnership (CPTPP) provides the most advanced rules for regulating China’s state-owned enterprises (SOEs). It argues that compared to China’s existing World Trade Organization (WTO) obligations, particularly those specifically tailored to it, the CPTPP SOE chapter does not provide more rigorous or workable rules but rather has narrower applications and more carve-outs. More recent US/EU free trade agreements (FTAs) are largely based on the CPTPP SOE chapter. While these FTAs also seek to address some deficiencies in the CPTPP SOE chapter and gradually expand the rules on subsidies and SOEs, the expanded rules are balanced by the inclusion of extensive exceptions. This balanced approach may be used to facilitate multilateral negotiations of SOE rules, but if this approach is adopted, WTO Members will need to be prepared to negotiate with China on replacing the potentially very broad and rigid China-specific WTO rules with more balanced new rules that apply to all members. The likely consequence would be softer rather than stronger disciplines on Chinese SOEs.

The EU as a global negotiator? The advancement of the EU’s role in multilateral negotiations at the UN General Assembly

This paper aims to account for the EU’s role in multilateral negotiations at the UNGA by looking at the negotiations on the enhanced observer status. During the negotiation process, the EU experienced significant opposition and had to accept an intermediate setback in form of a postponement of the vote. Despite this, the EU’s enhanced observer status was adopted by the UNGA in May 2011 as resolution 65/276. This research contributes to the understanding of the EU as an actor in multilateral negotiations and the interaction between state and non-state actors. I argue that the EU is in the process of establishing itself as an active and recognized actor at the UN and determining its role as a highly integrated regional organization and non-state entity in the state-centric environment of the UNGA. I analyse the negotiation process and the final agreement through the lenses of a bargaining approach and as an alternative, mutual recognition as global justice.

A Bargaining-Based Model of Security Design

This paper studies how security design affects project outcomes. Consider a firm that raises capital for multiple projects by offering investors a share of the revenues. The revenue of each project is determined ex post through bargaining with a buyer of the output. Thus, the choice of security affects the feasible payoffs of the bargaining game. We characterize the securities that achieve the firm’s maximal equilibrium payoff in bilateral and multilateral negotiations. In a large class of securities, the optimal contract is remarkably simple. The firm finances each project separately with defaultable debt. Welfare and empirical implications are discussed. (JEL C78, D21, D86, G12, G32)

Territorialization of the REDD + strategy in the Bribri indigenous people, Talamanca, Costa Rica

This article explores how the attempt of implementing REDD+ affects the livelihoods and nature valuation of the Bribri indigenous people in Talamanca, Costa Rica. The analysis is done using a case study, discourse analysis and collective hermeneutics in documents and interviews produced by international, national, and local social actors. Controversies in the REDD+ strategy have been manifested in the initiative’s de/re/territorialization processes. These processes are legitimized by technocratic discursive strategies associated with climate change mitigation, produced in multilateral negotiations, and adapted by national institutions for purposes not aligned with the interests of the communities. It is concluded that the implementation of REDD + in indigenous territories in Costa Rica gives way to i) the commoditization of nature, participation and traditional forms of governance; ii) the consolidation of a climate eco-governmentality based on the fragmentation of nature; iii) building representations of vulnerable and impoverished indigenous people, and thus justifying intervention in their territories.