DISTINGUISHING BETWEEN INSTITUTIONAL
AND ENVIRONMENTAL EFFECTIVENESS IN
INTERNATIONAL ENVIRONMENTAL AGREEMENTS
Gabriela Kütting
*
Session Overview:
This Session locates the subject matter of international
environmental negotiation within its wider social context in order to help
participants understand their role in environmental policy-making and inter-
national politics in general. This aim is achieved through the discussion of
various social and contextual systemic forces that influence decision-making
and explain its constraints.
(This presentation is based on previously published work by the author see: G. Küt-
ting (2000), “Distinguishing between institutional and environmental effectiveness
in international environmental agreements: the case of the Mediterranean Action
Plan”, International Journal of Peace Studies, Vol. 5(1), pp. 15-33.)
1. Introduction
In the international political science literature, conventional regime -
centric approaches to the study of agreement effectiveness are based on
rather narrow definitions of effectiveness that do not find their source
in environmental concerns. In the existing literature, the motivations for
studying effectiveness are predominantly directed at studying the effect
of an agreement or its diplomatic history rather than its potential for en-
vironmental improvement (Bemauer, 1995; Haas et al, 1993; Levy 1993;
Young, 1994). This institutional school of thought sees effectiveness as
an issue of institutional performance and not environmental improve-
ment. Its writers are mainly regime theorists of various persuasions and
as such focus on the vital importance of international institutions/agree-
* Dr. Gabriela Kütting, Department of Political Science and Center for Global
Change and Governance, Rutgers (Newark) University (formerly of University of
Aberdeen).
