Stephen P. Mumme

Democratization, decentralization, and local environmental policy capacity: Hungary and Mexico

Abstract Democracy is thought to promote administrative and political decentralization in countries committed to its practice. This is particularly true in the area of environmental policy which is often associated with public participation, government accountability and responsiveness, environmental stewardship, and the accrual of local policy capacity for environmental protection. Most of the operating assumptions on the relationship between democratic governance and environmental decentralization are drawn from mature democracies, however, not from those emerging from authoritarianism. This study compares the institutional, fiscal, and political experiences of two recently democratized countries, Hungary and Mexico, to ascertain whether democratic transition has been associated with the accrual of local environmental policy capacity. Our findings show that democratic transition is favorably associated with the decentralization of environmental policy responsibility but that many impediments to local capacity accrual remain. Democratization should be treated as a necessary but insufficient condition for developing local policy capacity for environmental protection in countries newly emerging from authoritarian rule.

The Commission for Environmental Cooperation and Environmental Management in the Americas

environmental management in North America and the hemisphere at large. The agreement has spawned a series of new institutions that are already reshaping current practices and that have considerable promise for broadening the range of international commitments to environmental management in the Americas. The most prominent and most relevant of these is the Commission for Environmental Cooperation (CEC).

Trade Integration, Neoliberal Reform, and Environmental Protection in Mexico Lessons for the Americas

Among Latin American countries Mexico is a model of neoliberalisms environmental promise and pitfalls. Since entering the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA), it has undertaken extensive environmental reforms predicated on export-intensive industrialization and the growth of urban society. An examination of these reforms, their background and statutory changes, policy measures, and international commitments made in this area since NAFTA took effect provokes serious concern over their adequacy as the American nations ponder the costs and benefits of deeper enmeshment in hemispheric trade integration.

Environmental politics and policy in U.S.-Mexican border studies: developments, achievements, and trends

Abstract The study of environmental politics and policy on the U.S.-Mexican border is barely more than 30 years old. This interdisciplinary field has grown substantially since the 1970s, however, and now generates a substantial literature addressing a range of environmental media, politics, and policy problems within and across the international boundary. While most of this effort is descriptive and normative, focused on understanding institutional arrangements and practices, new areas of emphasis and new theoretical approaches have emerged in the 1990s that are attracting greater scholarly attention. This essay describes the development of the field from the 1970s to the present, pointing to particular achievements and trends that will doubtlessly shape future research in the area.

The Commission on Environmental Cooperation and the U.S.-Mexico Border Environment

This study evaluates the new Commission on Environmental Cooperation (CEC) for its potential to contribute to the improvement of the U.S.-Mexico border environment. Drawing on theories of agency influence applied to the CEC, the authors argue that the CEC is currently in a weak position to undertake significant new environmental initiatives along the U.S.-Mexico border. The CECs formal mandate and gaps in current institutional mandates may enable the CEC to become an important element in transboundary environmental management at the border if its member governments are willing to support it.

Rules and politics in international integration: Environmental regulation in NAFTA and the EU

Deepening global and regional integration has brought in its wake various public policies and public policy proposals. The comparative study of those public policies can shed light on variations amongst them as well as alert us to any common dynamics. Here we offer a systematic comparison of the environmental policies associated with North American and European integration by examining their procedural and substantive rules within their respective political contexts. Not surprisingly, we find that the two regions exhibit obvious differences in their procedural and substantive rules; they also, however, exhibit an important convergence towards market‐based environmental policies and ‘weak ecological modernisation’. This convergence, we suggest, is bound to influence future international environmental policies, given the preponderant role of the two regions in the world political economy.

Environmentalists, NAFTA, and North American Environmental Management

This essay reviews the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) for its potential contributions to an emerging environmental regime for Canada, Mexico, and the United States. The NAFTAdocument, it is argued, falls well short of meeting the core demands of the environmental lobby as expressed in various documents published in the spring and summer of 1992. It has nevertheless furthered the emergence of a North American environmental management regime by contributing to the mobilization of environmental organizations in the trade policy arena, subjecting existing environmental management arrangements to close scrutiny, generating innovative policy solutions to extant problems, and incorporating a limited number of environmental provisions within the NAFTA document.

Climate Change and U.S.-Mexico Border Communities

While the U.S.-Mexico border has been called a “third country” and has been identified as a distinct region (Anzaldua 1987), the challenges it faces are due in large measure to its high degree of integration into global processes of economic and environmental change. The border region is characterized by a so-called “double exposure” (Leichenko and O’Brien 2008)—meaning that environmental change in the region is driven by accelerated processes of global economic integration (such as foreign-owned industries and international migration) coupled with intensive climate change. It is critical to understand the drivers of climate-related vulnerability and capacities for adaptation in the region in the context of the region’s distinct history and contemporary challenges, shared climate regime, transboundary watersheds and airsheds, and interdependent economies and cultures.

The International Boundary and Water Commission Under Fire: Policy Prospective for the 21st Century

The venerable International Boundary and Water Commission, United States and Mexico, established by the landmark 1944 U.S.-Mexican Water Treaty, has come under fire in the past decade for a range of alleged institutional deficiencies. These deficiencies, ranging from the adequacy of its mandate to its organizational structure and management, are seen as limiting its diplomatic and administrative capacity to promote cooperative solutions to a range of binational water problems including drought, ecological conservation, and planning for sustainable water use and management in the 21st century. This article reviews this recent spate of criticisms and reform recommendations, addressing their feasibility and practicality. It argues that many of these proposals are treaty consistent and have sufficient merit to warrant serious consideration by the two governments.

Decentralization and Environmental Protection on Mexico's Northern and Southern Boundaries

This article examines and compares decentralization initiatives for environmental protection along Mexicos northern and southern borders. It suggests that in the north, environmental protection policy concerns tend to be human centered and urban oriented whereas in the south, the governments environmental protection effort is directed at managing natural resources and biodiversity. Furthermore, in the north, the international border functions as a catalyst, creating an external push for binational cooperation with environmental protection. In the south, the international borders are associated with social conflicts that complicate binational efforts to advance cooperation for environmental protection. These stark differences point to the need for Mexico to tailor environmental decentralization policies to the realities of particular regions and reduce urban bias.