Stepan Wood

Transnational Business Governance Interactions: Conceptualization and Framework for Analysis

This special issue demonstrates the importance of interactions in transnational business governance. The number of schemes applying non-state authority to govern business conduct across borders has vastly expanded in numerous issue areas. As these initiatives proliferate, they increasingly interact with one another and with state-based regimes. The key challenge is to understand the implications of these interactions for regulatory capacity and performance, and ultimately for social and environmental impact. In this introduction, we propose an analytical framework for the study of transnational business governance interactions. The framework disaggregates the regulatory process to identify potential points of interaction, and suggests analytical questions that probe the key features of interactions at each point.

What Ever Happened to Canadian Environmental Law

This Article examines the history of Canadian environmental law in order to explain why it has become a laggard in both legal reform and environmental performance. Canadian environmental law has long been of interest to scholars worldwide, yet its record is often poorly understood. The Article contrasts recent developments with the seemingly progressive initiatives of the 1970s, and analyzes these trends in light of their political, economic and governance context, as well as the wider critiques of environmental law. It argues that there is considerable room for Canadian governments to adopt more robust methods of environmental law, including following pioneering reforms advanced in other countries. However, even with such steps, further environmental degradation might not be averted unless Canadians are prepared to accept more fundamental changes to their economic systems and social values.

Climate Law and Developing Countries

With contributions from over 20 international scholars from developing and developed countries, the book tackles both long-standing concerns and current controversies. It considers the positions of developing countries in the negotiation of a new international legal regime to replace the Kyoto Protocol and canvasses various domestic issues, including implementation of CDM projects, governance of adaptation measures and regulation of the biofuels industry.

Introduction: Climate Law and Developing Countries

While all regions will eventually feel the eff ects of climate change, it will have a disproportionately harmful eff ect on developing countries – and in particular poor communities who are already living at or close to the margins of survival. Changes in the climate will amplify the existing challenges posed by tropical geography, a heavy dependence on agriculture, rapid population growth, and a limited capacity to cope with an uncertain climate. The world is already likely to fall short of the Millennium Development Goals for 2015 in many regions of the world. Climate change threatens the long-term sustainability of development progress. . . . The challenge now is to limit the damage, both by mitigation and adaptation.