Does Sharing Know its Limits? Thoughts on Implementing International Environmental Agreements: A Review of National Environmental Policies, A Comparative Study of Capacity-Building
By Mark A. Drumbl
INTRODUCTION
When nations lack capacity, they may find themselves unable to implement policy decisions. In such situations, even the most grandiose of edicts and transformative of enactments remain hortatory, modifying only the paper upon which they are written. Lack of capacity has been particularly troublesome in environmental policy. Many environmental commitments remain more apparent than real, often notoriously so. As a result, many pronouncements in favor of the polluter-pays-principle, sustainable development, and the precautionary principle are, notwithstanding good intentions, often simply not applied in practice.
As environmental problems are increasingly perceived as global in effect, the responses thereto tend to be multilateral in focus. In recent years, there has been a proliferation of international agreements geared to combat a broad swath of environmental problems. This proliferation has led to a situation in which “multilateral conventions are [now] the most commonly used vehicles for establishing new international regulatory regimes in the environmental field.” Just as capacity to enforce beguiles domestic environmental initiatives, so, too, does it thwart international commitments.
When nations lack capacity, they may find themselves unable to implement policy decisions. In such situations, even the most grandiose of edicts and transformative of enactments remain hortatory, modifying only the paper upon which they are written. Lack of capacity has been particularly troublesome in environmental policy. Many environmental commitments remain more apparent than real, often notoriously so. As a result, many pronouncements in favor of the polluter-pays-principle, sustainable development, and the precautionary principle are, notwithstanding good intentions, often simply not applied in practice.
As environmental problems are increasingly perceived as global in effect, the responses thereto tend to be multilateral in focus. In recent years, there has been a proliferation of international agreements geared to combat a broad swath of environmental problems. This proliferation has led to a situation in which “multilateral conventions are [now] the most commonly used vehicles for establishing new international regulatory regimes in the environmental field.” Just as capacity to enforce beguiles domestic environmental initiatives, so, too, does it thwart international commitments.
