Overview

This timely book brings much-needed clarity to the concept of 'environmental governance' as manifested in the global regulatory domain. The author argues that despite being used as a fashionable term by many - including economists, political scientists, environmentalists and, increasingly, lawyers - its theoretical contours and conceptual content remain unclear, incoherent, and inconsistent. In addressing this problem, the book begins by describing globalization as a general context of governance. It comprehensively interrogates and clarifies both the governance and global governance concepts, and then explains aspects and components of global environmental governance. Finally it investigates the role of law in global environmental governance.Providing a much-needed definition of environmental governance and global environmental governance, this comprehensive study will appeal to academics and researchers, post-graduate and under-graduate students, intergovernmental organizations such as UNEP, WTO, IUCN, as well as governments and governmental agencies involved with environmental regulation.

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9781781002520

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Reviews

'This book, in examining the relationship between global environmental governance and environmental law, provides an important and timely contribution to the quest to fashion a more viable approach to regulating the relationship between humanity and the environment. While the term governance is much employed in international environmental law scholarship, its conceptual underpinnings have not, on the whole, been adequately addressed in the legal sphere and understanding of the symbiotic relationship between the two areas has suffered as a result. This book makes a welcome start to tackling these issues and, it is to be hoped, will trigger renewed vigour in this socially and legally vital area of inquiry.' - Karen Morrow, University of Swansea, Wales, UK 'For years, scholars of international law and international relations have developed parallel literatures. In Global Environmental Governance, Louis Kotze offers a common conceptual, theoretical, and normative ground in the global environmental field. As a skillful lawyer, he dissects terminology, explains core assumptions, and constructs causal chains. But he does not stop there. His shrewd analysis of power and authority, individual incentives and collective action, management and regulation builds a bridge between law and politics as disciplines concerned about what global environmental governance is and how it can be improved.' - Maria Ivanova, University of Massachusetts, US 'In search of shelter from the buffeting blasts of climate change, biodiversity loss, resource depletion, famine and disease, states and public agencies, community representatives, resource users, advocacy networks and citizens huddle together under the vast and varied institutional umbrellas of environmental governance. Louis Kotze's innovative study systematically describes the role of environmental law as the springs, stretchers, ribs and handles of the decision-making umbrellas we so desperately hope will hold firm when they are opened up in times of need.' - Jamie Benidickson, University of Ottawa, Canada 'The concept of global environmental governance has been part of the lexicon in accounts of global environmental politics for some time. Yet to date it has escaped comprehensive assessment from a legal perspective. This groundbreaking work fills this gap in the literature. It offers a masterful analysis of the theoretical underpinnings of the environmental governance, and highlights the critical importance of environmental regulation in ensuring that environmental governance lives up to its promise as a means for achieving truly ecologically sustainable development.' - Tim Stephens, University of Sydney, Australia

Author Information

Louis J. Kotzé, Research Professor, North-West University, South Africa and Senior Professorial Fellow in Earth System Law, University of Lincoln, UK

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