The State and Global Institutions

Abstract

As environmental problems become transboundary and global in nature, they require international agreements which are not only precautionary and take into account often-incomplete but changing scientific information, but which also establish environmental standards and means by which those standards can be met and verified. Environmental agreements and the procedures by which they are negotiated need to account for the interests of a range of ‘stakeholders’ including environmental non-governmental organisations, grass-roots movements, indigenous peoples, industry, financial institutions, scientific bodies and intergovernmental organisations as well as states and governments. Environmental governance, therefore, must at minimum be cooperative and collective.