The role of the State is still crucial to twenty-first century environmental policy making. The State through its various different organizations is involved in implementing policies related to the direct and active manipulation of the environment (Wilson, 1997). The State devises a set of rules governing the access and withdrawals of the resource stock (Grafton, 2000). For example, forest officials, such as the Forestry Commission in the United Kingdom directly manages and exploits state owned forests. The State’s indirect environmental management policy role is often considered the most important. The distinctive feature of the State is that it has control through coercion in a given territory. Through the perspective of environmental management policies, this is important as the State is lawfully in a -position to force non-State environmental managers in the pursuit of its own policy and environmental outlook (Wilson, 1997). State policies designed to regulate logging on private and publicly owned land are enforced through legal acts and contravention of these regulations could lead to prosecution. These official policies require non-State environmental managers to alter their practices in line with rules set by the state (Wilson, 1997; UK Forestry Standard, 2011). Therefore, State environmental management policies are designed to control the environmental management practices of other groups associated with taking from and adding to the environment. The uniqueness of the State’s policy making role is that it holds great responsibility for the promotion of the common good for all within the national territory and has the authority to fulfil this. Consequently the State plays an enormous role in environmental policy making. Alt... ... middle of paper ... ...nge. The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the United Nations Convention on Biological Diversity are both environmental regimes established under the auspices of the United Nations. Agreements such as these provide a criterion for positive environmental action whereas their related protocols outline specific ways to address particular features of the overall environmental problem. Under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Kyoto Protocol assigns emission reduction targets to States, aiming to reduce global warming. The internationalism of environmental management is predominantly constructed upon the commitment, negotiations and agreements between individual States. This new structure of environmental management reflects the growth of a global civil society and has mobilised States at the international level.
The Kyoto Protocol is a protocol to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), aimed at fighting global warming to lessen climate change. The UNFCCC is an international environmental treaty with the goal of achieving the "stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system’’
Because of human and nonhuman connections to specific places including knowledge, experience and community, using a sense of place and permanence as a green transnational multilateral initiative could be a successful step towards green democracy and ecological citizenship. Robyn Eckersley offers the suggestion of a constitutionally entrenched principle that would enhance ecological and social responsibility: the precautionary principle. I suggest connecting localized, place-specific boundaries with the principle. This addition is meant to aid in fostering ecological citizenship, expanding the moral community, and creating a responsible society. This addition would also be meant to unite a transnational issue that all nations could agree upon. This would create a binding multilateral principle that would be thoroughly accepting of specific ecological needs and characteristics of specific places.
When creating an international environmental policy, many factors come into play. The political and economic situations around the world affect how international environmental policy is made. Politicians will make decisions on policies, including environmental ones, based on what the popular thing to do is instead of what is best for the environment. If it is an election year, politicians will especially make decisions based on public opinion instead of making decisions that would reflect what is best for the environment. Another factor when making environmental policies is environmental disasters. They may require immediate polici...
Realists heavily criticize the idea of a collective attempt to prevent environmental work, taking into consideration heavy economic powers such as the United States (the only nations to not attend the Kyoto conference) concluded that it wasn’t in their best interests to change their production for the sake of the environment, especially during times of constant economic expansion through capitalism. The reaction of this major powerhouse strongly backs realists. Although it has seen problems the problem of climate change has been address by the United Nations. The UN’s reaction to environmental concerns strongly backs liberalist idea in that “liberal societies have become a fertile ground for the promotion of ecological attitudes and environmental philosophy” (De Shalit, 1995: 49). Evidence highlighted by the Rio Summit, Montreal and Kyoto Protocol’s (UNEP, 2012) claim that the UN has effectively dealt with fighting and recognizing problems such as deforestation and climate
...ction of a state’s purpose as its responsibility to its citizens. Ultimately – Environmental Security aims to increase state, community and individual ability to cope with limited natural resources, and risks, conflicts and changes due to environmental factors. What is most worrisome to anyone who observes these matters form a security perspective is not any single concern, but the totality of the increasing impact of the disruptions caused by a flawed modern industrial systems and its reach into all parts of the biosphere. Competition for resources and territory, diminishing access to food and water and threats to sovereignty has brought about changes in military planning and foreign policy as well as adaptations in the international legal system, with climate change and environmental security very much shaping the nature of 21st century International relations.
The Kyoto protocol is an international agreement designed to address the global problem that is climate change, by trying to reduce the emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases. Kyoto is at present signed by 192 parties, 191 of which are states while one is a regional economic integration organisation (UNFCCC) [1]. International agreement is necessary to address this important issue, since climate change affects every single country of the world and can lead to dangerous interferences with the climates system if action is not taken (Y. Feng et al 2008) [3]. The Kyoto protocol was very specific and stated that “The Kyoto Protocol is a legally binding agreement under which industrialized countries
World Commission on Environment & Development. (1987). Our common future. New York: Oxford University Press.
Environmental issues expand into a global level, and it is not likely tackled by the country itself. A raising awareness on the environmental matter among nations, the cooperation between nations is essential. In the three articles, they have adopted different approaches to address the environmental issues. However, three of them view the problem not only in signal angle, either with inter – discipline or multi – level perspective. The authors of the three essays have indicated governments play an important role for managing those
[WCED] World Commission on Environment and Development. 1987. Our common future. New York: Oxford University Press. 444p.
In The Development of Environmental Regimes: Chemicals, Wastes, and Climate Change, the authors provide a simple framework to analyze the development of global environmental regimes (GER) which ultimately addresses why states sometimes agree to cooperate on global environmental issues despite divergent interests. The chapter is divided into five subsections but begins with an introduction to explain the five processes involved in the development of GERs. The authors address questions such as who forms GERs and how are they formulated. Next, they apply the processes involved in the development of GERs to four case studies that are linked to global environmental issues: ozone depletion, hazardous waste, toxic chemicals, and climate change, respectively. The authors conclude that states and non-state actors can come together to address global environmental issues but not without obstacles.
In conclusion, however, although EU adopt legally binding directives and regulations, but still it lacks the capacity to control practical implementation, as well as the effective sanctioning mechanism. Similarly in EU mobilization is stronger which has promoted cooperation among environmental groups and better distribution of funds which help strengthen other environmental groups resulting into better implementation of EU environmental Policy and therefore, the anticipated dilemma in EU environmental governance can be inevitable.
. ISO 14001 is a management standard, it is not a performance or product standard. The underlying purpose of ISO 14001 is that companies will improve their environmental performance by implementing ISO 14001, but there are no standards for performance or the level of improvement. It is a process for managing company activities that impact the environment.
An imperative output of the environmental assessment process is Environmental Management Plans (The World Bank, n.d.). Environmental Management Plans are one of the twenty two commonly used tools to be utilised for the process of realising the principles of integrated environmental management, as set forth by the Department of Environmental Affairs and Tourism (DEAT (a), 2004).
According to the Commission on Global Governance (1995), global governance refers to “the sum of the many ways individuals and institutions, public and private, manage their common affairs. It is the continuing process through which conflict or diverse interests may be accommodated and cooperative action may be taken”. Some main actors involved in the process of global governance include states, international organizations (IOs), regional organizations (ROs) and non-governmental organizations (NGOs). Global governance implements in various issue areas including security, economic deelopment, environmental protection and so on. Different states and organizations have different or even conflicting interests. Yet as globalisation continues and the world becomes more inter-connected than ever before, global governance or cooperation among different actors is increasingly taking a more significant role in the international stage. Some critics view global governance quite negatively as they believe that the current system lacks efficiency and effectiveness. In this paper, however, I shall argue that global governance is carried out more effectively in maintenance of world security and promotion of economic development while less effectively in environmental protection and preservation. Thus, despite limitations of the existing mechanism, global governance is still largely a postive development in world affairs.
...nces of habitual ecological legal principles. This is mostly so because environmental law itself is of moderately recent vintage, and as a result there has been little time for dependable state perform to enlarge, either in rejoinder to solemn declarations by IGOs or from side to side the all-purpose reception of norms set out in many-sided treaties. On the other hand, the processes described above have in additional areas, and in exacting that of human rights, been particularly creative in the formation of customary law, and there is consequently every cause to wait for that the similar will apply in admiration of ecological principles. http://www.unu.edu/unupress/unupbooks/uu25ee/uu25ee0a.htm References http://www.law.cornell.edu/topics/international.html http://indylaw.indiana.edu/library/InternatlLaw1.htm http://www.unu.edu/unupress/unupbooks/uu25ee/uu25ee0a.htm