Graeme Auld

Forest certification (eco-labeling) programs and their policy-making authority: explaining divergence among North American and European case studies

In recent years, transnational and domestic non-governmental organizations have created private standard setting bodies whose purpose is to recognize officially companies and landowners practicing ‘sustainable forest management’. Eschewing traditional state processes and state authority, these certification programs have turned to the market to create incentives and force compliance to their rules. This paper compares the emergence of this non-state market driven (NSMD) phenomenon in the forest sector in eight regions in North Am40erica and Europe. We specifically seek to understand the role of forest companies and landowners in granting competing forest certification programs ‘legitimacy’ to create the rules. We identify distinct legitimation dynamics in each of our cases, and then develop seven hypotheses to explain differences in support for forest certification. 2002 Elsevier Science B.V. All rights reserved.

Direct Targeting as an NGO Political Strategy: Examining Private Authority Regimes in the Forestry Sector

In recent years, International Political Economy literature on politics beyond state has emphasized the role of non-governmental organizations (NGOs) in broader policy processes, both national and international. In addition to their impact on states, NGOs influence the policies of non-state actors such as firms via public and private politics. Dissatisfied with the progress firms have made in response to public regulation, NGOs have sponsored private authority regimes in several issue areas and pushed firms to participate in them. Across the world, the contest between NGOs and firms has provoked substantial behavioral and programmatic changeincluding widespread participation in these private authority regimesamong firms seeking to escape NGO pressures. Using firm-level data, this paper examines why direct targeting has not led firms in the U.S. forest products sector to participate in an NGO-sponsored private authority regime, the Forest Stewardship Council. This global regime has been adopted widely in Europe, but U.S.-based forestry firms have tended to favor a domestic industry-sponsored regime, the Sustainable Forestry Initiative. Our analysis suggests that the desire of firms to maintain control over their institutional environment in light of hostile relations with NGOs has led US-based firms to favor the Sustainable Forestry Initiative.

Private or self-regulation? A comparative study of forest certification choices in Canada, the United States and Germany

Forest certification is perhaps the best example of a voluntary governance structure for addressing environmental spillovers. Competing forest certification schemes have evolved. At the global level, the International Organization for Standardization (ISO) 14001 certification and Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) certification focus on environmental processes and sustainable management of forestland, respectively. Regional/domestic schemes have been started by industry and/or landowners to compete with the FSC system. The main difference between FSC certification and the others is that the FSC relies on regulation by a non-state private regulator, while the others employ a form of self-regulation. In this study, survey data from firms in Canada, the United States and Germany are used to investigate factors that cause firms to prefer and/or choose a particular certification scheme. The findings indicate that market access is an important reason why forest firms certify, but it is an insufficient reason for them to pick the FSC system despite opinion polls that reveal a preference for FSC-style certification. Rather, firms prefer (participate in) FSC certification because they perceive it to confer environmental benefits, while those choosing another certification scheme do so on economic grounds. Finally, as companies become increasingly aware of their certification options, they are less likely to pursue FSC certification.

The institutional design of forest certification standards initiatives and its influence on the role of science: the case of forest genetic resources

In the 1990s a wide array of non-governmental certification initiatives emerged as a way to promote the sustainable management of resources in sectors such as fisheries and forestry. In this paper, we examine two related questions about these initiatives: how does the institutional design of certification initiatives affect the way science is used in the development of certification standards and in whose interest is science employed? Using the empirical case of forest certification and the specific standards various initiatives have created to address the management of forest genetic resources, we show how structural aspects of decision-making processes affects the standards adopted and the rationalization for their appropriateness. Two basic models of decision-making-stakeholder participation and technical expertise-are discussed in relation to three certification initiatives active in North America-the Canadian Standards Association, the Sustainable Forestry Initiative and the Forest Stewardship Council. By examining the standards these initiatives set for the management of forest genetic resources, we illustrate how two dimensions of science-uncertainty and the logic of cause and effect-are used to rationalize cautious and rigid versus flexible and discretionary standards for the management of forest genetic resources. Our findings indicate that the design or structure of certification decision-making processes, and their embedded balance of authority, mediate the form of standards initiatives will justify on the basis of science.

Governance for the Environment: The emergence of non-state market-driven (NSMD) global environmental governance: a cross-sectoral assessment

Introduction The failure of states and intergovernmental processes to address some of the most important environmental problems facing the planet – explanations of which can often be traced back to “tragedy of the commons” or “collective action” dilemmas (see Delmas and Young in their Introduction to this volume) – has resulted in the proliferation of alternative nongovernmental approaches. Often grouped under the broad rubric of “corporate social responsibility” (CSR) these efforts comprise an array of initiatives including self-regulation (see King and Toffel, Chapter 4, this volume), voluntary environmental agreements (Khanna and Brouhle, Chapter 6, this volume), and public–private partnerships. Just how these innovations might become enduring and effective features of global environmental governance is arguably one of the most critical questions facing scholars and practitioners in the global era. This chapter focuses on one of the most unique nongovernmental institutional innovations that has attracted the attention of both practitioners and scholars: certification systems that attempt to reward environmentally responsible business practices through positive recognition and market incentives. That they do not appeal to the state for rule-making authority, but instead derive authority from evaluations of stakeholders who choose whether to demand such products, has led Cashore (2002) and Cashore, Auld, and Newsom (2004) to refer to them as “non-state market-driven” (NSMD). With certification institutions, firms are often coerced and cajoled by problem-focused environmental groups or, in some cases, mission-driven but incapacitated governmental officials or agencies.

Micro-Level Interactions in the Compliance Processes of Transnational Private Governance

Transnational private governance has emerged in multiple issue areas to promote responsible business practices. While most studies assess its rule-setting function, much less research has been done on the compliance-assessment function. This chapter examines the various actors that are involved in this process—auditors, individual assessors and, to a lesser extent, accreditors—and their respective interactions. Using the Marine Stewardship Council as an empirical case, the chapter examines the level of competition among accredited auditors and assessors, and the degree of organizational interdependence. It argues that while the number of accredited auditors has increased over time, the degree of competition is rather limited, while auditors are also much less operationally independent than expected due to the mobility of assessors across auditors. As such, this chapter contributes to the TBGI literature by providing a micro-level perspective addressing interactions among governance actors within a transnational private governance regime and their potential influence on regime effectiveness.