Date of Award
1998
Document Type
Thesis
Abstract
This thesis begins with an examination of the context of risk in which multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) are being drafted and implemented. Through a discussion of the relationship between the characteristics of multinational corporations and the phenomenon of globalisation, the impetus behind globalisation practices is revealed. This is then contextualised with an examination of the contribution of the chemical industry toward the parallel globalisations of production and environmental harm. A discussion of trade and investment liberalisation instruments is then undertaken to illustrate the current hierarchy between these instruments and MEAs. This analysis reveals the present incompatibility of these instruments and suggests the need, from an environmental perspective, to reconceptualise the relationship. An examination of two emerging chemical management conventions for Prior Informed Consent and Persistent Organic Pollutants further illustrates the difficulties in drafting environmentally effective MEAs and discusses possibilities for change, such as the need to utilise a precautionary approach. The thesis concludes by finding that the present hierarchy of interests, in which MEAs are secondary to those of trade and investment instruments, must be reversed in light of the serious implications of continuing to maintain the status quo.
Recommended Citation
Robin Lynne Cowling, What a Wonderful World: Multilateral Chemical Management Conventions, Liberalisation Policies and the Chemical Industry (LLM Thesis, Dalhousie University, 1998) [unpublished].
