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ESPM 169 - Power Politics II: North-South Relations and the CBD
October 8, 2002
continuing our look at states as key actors in IEP: interactions with each other, state-society relations
Admin matters:
- Thursday lecture - Joerg
- section reading
- no office hours this week
- giving first assignment back at end of class
1. N-S conflicts seen as one of the biggest divides in IEP. Why?
- ecological imperialism: resource extraction, waste shipment
- wrong problems prioritized by North; within the problems chosen, had to be pushed to deal with equity concerns
- relationship between poverty and environmental degradation: poverty causes environmental degradation, and becoming wealthier a way to improve the environment
- at the same time, wealth and over-consumption lead to environmental degradation
- N-S conflict very clearly set environmental problems in wider contexts: local land rights; globalization and development
S. countries have been able to push these at the bargaining table
something of a blame game; tied up also with problems of globalization and indebtedness
but, sustainable development emerged as driving principle
good to look from both sides; finally, "southern" perspectives becoming more common in literature, or rather, books on IEP not written by westerners
also clear that unitary perspectives not always the best, nor making assumptions about governments, populations on either side of the divide (e.g. hazardous waste trade)
finally, differences at the negotiating table not always mirrored on the ground, e.g. in implementing BD policies
2. Pulling together where N-S issues have come up in class so far
BD a particularly rich area to look at some of the differences, divergences and problems in relationships between rich and poor countries
a. The Summits
- redefining the agenda - poverty and human needs prioritized at WSSD
b. The CBD and Biosafety protocol
- source of leverage: much of the world's BD located in the South
- managed to change agenda: to genetic resources, sovereignty, biosafety and GM foods, technology transfer at favorable rates
c. GEF and environmental aid
- international institutions - UN, UNEP, WB etc.
- capacity building
- criticisms of GEF
- conservation policies
South and North each trying to get the other to change behavior in different ways; some middle ground reached
3. Name some Countries
- rich countries, transition economies, newly industrializing countries, "4th world", HIPCs
4. One way of charting N-S relations
a. colonialism
- up to late 1940s, 1950s
b. independence and modernization
- paternalistic - 1950s and 60s
c. 1970s: underdevelopment and dependency theory
- antagonism and conflict; finding a voice
- underlain with "south is good" rhetoric from elements in North; "essentializing"
G77: "Group of 77" (now much larger) emerged in the UN General Assembly in 1974
- following success of OPEC and the failure of alternative development strategies such as import substitution industrialization)
- a way of asserting power and furthering development
- Aim: to work towards a New International Economic Order (NIEO); to form producer groups and to increase the price of commodity exports relative to manufactured exports, and the right to nationalize MNCs
adopted as a charter of Economic Rights and Duties of States by UN in December 1974
- ultimately did not succeed; splits among participants etc. (and these days, almost unthinkable).
- however, established the G77 as an important UN bloc of states; now much larger, and often votes together or in subsets
d. 1980s and 1990s:
- neoliberalism vs. sustainable development
international economic and environmental arenas
e. relations now (or now understood as being) more complex:
- influence of south
- differentiation
- attention being paid to the "large middle" of world politics; squeezed by the very poor and the very rich
- transnational alliances (not unproblematic) - e.g. indigenous movements
- shared governance - though still a lot of conflict
- also structural constraints
5. Ways in which the N-S construct is misleading:
a. the "sustainable middle" (Conca, 2001): most of the world falls between the hugely wealthy, over-consuming top billion and the desperate barely subsisting lowest billion - therefore close to 4 billion people who lead relatively sustainable lives - not eating large amounts of grain fed beef, or owning single-passenger cars or masses of consumer durables
- this class, however, most at threat if prevailing distribution patterns continue
- many countries contain all three groups
b. Hence, differentiation within countries: links made at a variety of levels, e.g. environmental movements
c. Types of politics, political access and control
strong and weak civil societies
different political institutions and policy-making processes
struggles for southern environmental groups as much against their own governments, often using allies from the North
- Kenya and Indonesia examples as extremes
- India and GEF - displacement of local communities
evidence that BD-related issues playing a part in recent elections and political events: see Handout
- Brazil - Lula (Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva) stance for a GM-free Brazil
- Venezuela - Pres. Chavez calling for "BD OPEC" among Latin countries
- Madagascar?
rise of local/indigenous movements (and networks) in BD agenda - Tuesday's class