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Welcome to the first ISDRS Newsletter for 2012! NEWSLETTER ARCHIVE: www.isdrs.org/ CONTENTS, ISSUE 1, 2012 Page 1 Editorial 3 2 From the President 4 3 Vice-President’s Report 6 4 ISDRC18, Hull University, 24-26 June, 2012 8 5 ISDRS Board Members 8 6 An Invitation to Student Researchers:

John Telesford 9 7 Articles (i) Is socially responsible public procurement going to reveal that

the emperor is naked? Jenny Ahlstrom 10 (ii) Illuminating Short Term Private Economic Benefits in Residential

Buildings’ Energy Efficiency is Vital for Society’s Energy and Greenhouse Gas Goals

Pontus Cerin 12 (iii) Foreign Direct Investment and the Environment:

FDI Halo vs Pollution Haven. Nadia Doytch and Merih Uctum 14 (iv) The Economics of Low Carbon Cities: Outcomes of a City-Scale Mini-Stern Review. Andy Gouldson 16 (v) The World’s Richest Climate Science Denier. Clive Hamilton 19

ISDRS NEWSLETTER, ISSUE 1, 2012 201120112011

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(vi) Fair Trade in Hong Kong: Why are sales so low? Sharon Poon 22

8 In the News: Conferences, Comment and Websites (i) World Congress on Water, Climate and Energy

Dublin, 13-18 May, 2012. 24 (ii) GRONEN Research Conference 2012: Corporate Sustainability –

Off to Pastures New or Back to the Roots? Marseille, 26-29 June, 2012. 24

(iii) Rethinking Climate Change, Conflict and Security.

International Conference, University of Sussex, UK. 18-19 October, 2012. 24

(iv) UNEP Climate Action Programme

Assisting business towards carbon neutrality. 24

(v) UN calls on Academia to Embrace Sustainability Curriculum. 24 (vi) OUTREACH – UNCSD ‘Informal informals’, 2011-2012.

Stakeholder Forum. 24

(vii) The 2012 Sustainability Leaders Report SustainAbility/Globescan Incorporated. 25

9 Recommended Reading (i) The New Carbon Economy: Constitution, Governance and

Contestation. Peter Newell, Max Boykoff, Emily Boyd (Editors) 25 (ii) The Roads from Rio: Lessons Learned from Twenty Years of

Multilateral Environmental Negotiations Pamela S. Chasek and Lynn M. Wagner (Editors) 25

(iii) Hunger in the Balance: The New Politics of International Food Aid Jennifer Clapp 26

(iv) Transnational Environmental Governance: The Emergence and Effects of the Certification of Forests and Fisheries

Lars H. Gulbrandsen. 26 (v) Forum 2012 Issue of ‘Development and Change’.

Ashwani Saith, Murat Arsel, et al. (Editors). 26

10 Copy for ISDRS Newsletter 2, 2012 27

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1 EDITORIAL Dr Delyse Springett Honorary Research Associate Massey University New Zealand D.V.Springett@massey.ac.nz 2012 has special implications for the work of the International Sustainable Development Research Society. Three decades after the concept of sustainable development was formally introduced in the World Conservation Strategy (WCS, 1980), a quarter of a century since the World Commission on Environment and Development established the concept as the underlying principle of its report, ‘Our Common Future’ (WCED, 1987), twenty years on from the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED, 1992), and a decade after the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD, 2002) we await the UN Conference on Sustainable Development – UNCSD/Rio+20, 20-22 June. ISDRC 18, the Society’s conference to be hosted by Hull University immediately after UNCSD, will provide a timely platform to debate the implications of the UN event and the goals it sets (or fails to set) for our own research programmes. The challenges that sustainable development presents for a capitalist paradigm of progress have long been debated and the jury is still out on whether a shift to anything like ‘sustainable capitalism’ is an achievable goal. The tension between economic growth and social and environmental responsibility calls for a major transformation of our ways of being. The financial and economic chaos of recent years, the hard-fought struggles for democracy and justice and worldwide protests against capitalist greed underline the transformational change that is needed if there is to be a stable, let alone a sustainable, future that meets social and environmental needs in an equitable way. The complexity of the implications of sustainable development for a consumerist society of ‘aspiration’ is central to the problem. The concept complicates one’s point of view. It requires profound re-assessment of the values we live by. It has implications for all sectors and policy areas - governance, business and civil society. Its political, environmental and social imperatives are to be weighed against economic growth if the Brundtland Report’s key concepts of needs and limits are to be met. The proliferation of ‘meanings’ and ‘definitions’ of sustainable development has itself become a political process, even a displacement activity. Typologies of sustainable development, notably ‘weak’ and ‘strong’ and ‘technocentrism to ecocentrism’ comparisons and continuums, attempt to clarify the ambiguity surrounding the concept but are themselves contested. It has been argued that the vagueness surrounding the concept even forms part of its ‘appeal’ (Redclift, 1991). While it can mean different things to ecologists, environmental planners, economists, business people and activists, this ‘vagueness’ may be a politically expedient aspect of the concept, not only to play down its potential power, but also to emancipate that power (Lélé, 1991; Redclift, 1991; Hajer, 1995). A more specific definition might represent a reactionary force, a means of control that restricts discourse (Ralston Saul, 2001). For, despite its ‘rather vague story-lines’ (Hajer, 1991), sustainable development calls for radical change. This has certainly resonated with industry associations and

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corporations that have, it seems, been quicker than governments to recognise the concept’s potential as an agent of change, even if that ‘agency’ represents a force to be resisted or appropriated – hence the business-friendly ‘definitions’ that obviate change. And once again, we witness the creation of a strong corporate platform in preparation for UNCSD, as we did at the WSSD and at UNCED. In this issue, ISDRS President, Richard Welford, a long-time critic of corporate business-as-usual and an active advocate of corporate social responsibility, discusses the challenges of the concept of ‘sustainable business’, including the need for new levels of governance and the support of the private sector for new global legal frameworks. Vice-President, Walter Vermeulen, provides an overview of the reach the Society is gaining amongst other researchers and activists through the conferences, the newsletter and the ISDRS site on LinkedIn. Our sincere thanks to all contributors to this issue and a warm welcome to Associate Editor for student articles, John Telesford of Robert Gordon University. 2 FROM THE PRESIDENT Dr Richard Welford President, ISDRS Chairman, CSR Asia Professor, Asian Institute of Technology rwelford@csr-asia.com Twenty years ago, one of the key outputs of UNCED was Agenda 21 – the comprehensive plan of action for a global partnership of local, national and global organizations that included governments, inter-governmental organizations, NGOs, the private sector and other groups with the aim to reduce human impacts on the environment. Yet, in that twenty year period, we have not become more sustainable – indeed we have accelerated our path in exactly the opposite direction. We are now using up resources faster than ever and having a devastating impact on species with which we share the planet. Chapter 30 of Agenda 21 focused on strengthening the role of business and industry in the major changes that sustainable development calls for. It emphasized the crucial role of business and industry in social and economic development. The policies and operations of business and industry, including transnational corporations, were seen as playing a major role in reducing impacts on resource use and the environment. The Chapter called for more efficient production processes, preventive strategies, cleaner production technologies and procedures throughout the product life cycle, and minimizing or avoiding wastes. Technological innovations, development, applications, transfer and the more comprehensive aspects of partnership and cooperation are viewed as being, to a very large extent, within the province of business and industry. The emphasis was on environmental management and product stewardship policies and programmes, calling for environmental audits and assessments of compliance along with openness and dialogue with employees and the public.

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Of course, this is all work in process and we have certainly not made the sort of progress required to reverse ongoing, prevailing trends of unsustainable development. But this much-needed work reflects important themes in the research that members of the ISDRS have focused on since UNCED, with the results of this research published in the Journals associated with the Society, the proceedings of the conferences managed over the last eighteen years, and the content of this Newsletter. Much of my own work, previously in universities and now with CSR Asia, has been based in these areas of corporate social responsibility and accountability. However, even as business and industry groups provided the content for Chapter 30, powerful industry forces were also ensuring that proposals that would interfere with ‘business as usual’ – such as the UN’s Draft Code of Conduct on Transnational Corporations – were effectively sidelined. Consequently, regulation of corporations was not included in the UNCED outcomes or those of the WSSD in 2002. In the aftermath of the recent and current financial crises, ongoing protests against corporate greed and malfeasance, and the growing depletion of natural resources, it is clear that corporate social responsibility and accountability are central to business’s long-term survival. Yet the business community still lacks a global legal framework to enforce such responsibility. In his preface to the World Economic and Social Survey 2011, Ban Ki-Moon, Secretary-General of the United Nations, argues that humankind’s progress has come at the lasting cost of degradation of our natural environment. He emphasizes that ‘business as usual’ is no longer an option; but neither is ‘governance as usual’. As the Stakeholder Forum (earthsummit2012@stakeholderforum.org) has noted, Rio+20 provides the opportunity for different sectors to work towards a multi-stakeholder proposal for a Convention on corporate social responsibility and accountability to be included in the UNCSD negotiations. It is time, not only to shift from ‘business as usual’, but to insist that ‘governance as usual’ must give way to global legal frameworks that provide parameters for corporate behaviour. This suggests an important role for the ISDRS. The ISO 26000 standard on social responsibility would be a useful starting point for such a framework since it is in itself the result of a comprehensive stakeholder involvement process. But it currently has no teeth and the decision not to make the standard certifiable was a mistake. It does, however, provide a useful and comprehensive framework that the private sector should and must follow if we are to move towards a meaningful sustainable development agenda. The private sector must also take a role in supporting new global legal frameworks for social responsibility. It is in the long-term interests of business to do so. Only by protecting our dwindling resources, tackling climate change, restoring biodiversity and eco-systems and protecting human rights will any of us have a future – and that includes the private sector.

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3 VICE-PRESIDENT’S REPORT Dr. Walter J. V. Vermeulen Utrecht University Vice-President, ISDRS As discussed in earlier issues of the Newsletter, the International Sustainable Development Research Society is step by step growing into a more active society than in years before. The regular Newsletters and the new Statute are clear evidence of this. Some may not have noticed yet that the Society also runs an open debate platform on its LinkedIn site, with the same name: “International Sustainable Development Research Society” (just go to www.linkedin.com and search with this full name to access it). We opened this group in such a way that anybody, not just the participants of our regular conferences, can sign into this and participate in various debates. We are very pleased to see we are gathering some momentum here. If we look at the membership we see that we are the fifth largest discussion group on sustainable development research on the worldwide LinkedIn network! We have been growing towards 849 members at the end of February 2012. If we continue at this pace we will soon take over the fourth place from The Natural Step …. The first participants entered with the 2009 Utrecht Conference, and with the 2010 New York conference the membership has been growing permanently ever after (see Figure 1).

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What is the use of having this platform? That is obviously a question for those who have not yet been there. In each week of the last years, 2 or 3 discussions have been started there (see Figure 2): sometimes, for example, asking for some support around an idea; sometimes giving a position in a debate, possibly connected to the run up to the Rio+20 Summit. A fair number of these posted discussions receive responses from fellow sustainable development researchers from other parts of the world. In this way we can help each other and exchange experiences: what a wonderful world, these internet based networks ….! We even see Dr. Tariq Banuri, the Director of UN DSD, who gave his speeches at the ISDRS conferences in Utrecht and New York, participate in these discussions in his role as organizer of the Rio+20 Summit. Looking at who the members are, we do see active participants from different fields of work: those working in academia, but also a fair number of people out there in the field, working on implementing sustainability projects in a variety of settings.

We are very glad to see this develop on the discussion group. Our very mission is to create this bridge between critical research and constructive activity in society. So, we will most certainly continue these types of initiatives. One of these next steps into the innovative social media is to better integrate the Newsletter and the LinkedIn discussion group with our common ISDRS website and enable using mobile phones and tablets to be used in these connections. We will keep you informed.

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4 ISDRC18, HULL UNIVERSITY, 24-26 JUNE, 2012.

People, Progress and Environmental Protection

As world leaders mark the 20th anniversary of the historic Earth Summit of 1992 with a return visit to Rio, it is timely to take stock of the progress that has been made towards sustainability. The challenges that continue to impact both people and the environment today are highly visible leading to the following questions: is it possible to accelerate the means of sustainable development to achieve relevant solutions, or has the time come to begin to question the viability of sustainable development as a guiding principle through which to deliver solutions? Check the website: www.hull.ac.uk/isdrc18 Contact Co-Chair, Dr Pauline Deutz, and the Conference team: isdrc18@hull.ac.uk 5 BOARD MEMBERS OF THE ISDRS President - Dr Richard Welford, Chairman, CSR Asia; Professor, Asian Institute of Technology Vice-President - Associate Professor Dr Walter Vermeulen, Utrecht University Secretary - Dr Pauline Deutz, University of Hull Webmaster - Dr Pontus Cerin, Åbo Akademi University Treasurer - Professor Peter Dobers, Mälardalen University Newsletter Editor - Dr Delyse Springett, Massey University Professor Rupert Baumgartner, University of Graz Professor Andy Gouldson, University of Leeds Dr Cecilia Haskins, Norwegian University of Science and Technology Associate Professor Martina Maria Keitsch, Norwegian University of Science and Technology Emeritus Professor Shobhana Madhaven, University of Westminster Associate Professor Van Miller, Central Michigan University Professor Arun Sahay, Management Development Institute, Gurgaon, India Professor Peter Strachan, Aberdeen Business School Associate Professor Arnim Wiek, Arizona State University

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6 AN INVITATION TO STUDENT RESEARCHERS From the Desk of the Associate Editor (Student Articles): John N. Telesford Correspondence: j.n.telesford@rgu.ac.uk Dear Fellow Student Researchers: The ISDRS Newsletter has created an excellent opportunity for you to spread the word on your research. Although not an academic journal per se, the Newsletter, which is published four times a year, finds wide readership amongst academics and policy makers alike. This is a crucial benefit of contributing to the Newsletter. As young and upcoming academics, the dissemination of our research to this important target audience can go a long way. Research articles published as ‘news releases’ in this prestigious Newsletter may resonate one day with the ‘right’ reader, thus propelling your work into academic prominence. Your accepted research papers will be published alongside articles by eminent academics of international standing in the field of sustainable development. Let us join them and make our voices heard at a serious level of sustainable development research. Previous articles by student researchers that have been published in the Newsletter can be viewed on the Newsletter Archive, available on www.isdrs.org/, as can the Guidelines for Authors. Writing in the Newsletter can also bring the following benefits:

• enhancing your networking opportunities as your affiliation and contact will be made known to all readers;

• honing your writing skills; • providing the opportunity to receive feedback from a wide and diverse

audience.

We sincerely hope that these benefits will entice you to grasp the wonderful opportunity provided by the IDSRS Newsletter, that is, to get your work into the academic and policy worlds where it really matters. All it requires is a brief 1,000-word abstract and submission to me (Associate Editor) at j.n.telesford@rgu.ac.uk, copied to the Editor, d.v.springett@massey.ac.nz. We welcome your submissions for the remaining issues in 2012 and beyond. We hope that many of you will be attending the ISDRC18 Conference at Hull University, 24-26 June, and look forward to meeting you there. Best wishes, John. John Telesford Robert Gordon University

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7 ARTICLES (i) Is socially responsible public procurement going to reveal that the emperor is naked? Jenny Ählström Ph.D. Candidate Sustainability Research Group (SuRe) Department of Marketing and Strategy Stockholm School of Economics P.O Box 6501 SE- 113 83 Stockholm jenny.ahlstrom@difi.no While the private sector has worked with social responsibility in supply chain management since the 1990s, the public sector has been lagging behind in this area. However, some country governments within the EU – notably Sweden, Norway, Holland and the UK – have recently begun to encourage public procurement to take account of social responsibility within the supply chain when awarding public contracts. So far the development has been similar to the way private companies implement socially responsible supply chain management in terms of setting up codes of conduct for the suppliers to meet and thereafter carry out follow ups in order to evaluate if the supplier has met the requirements stipulated by the special social responsibility contracts. Suppliers are warned that if they break the code of conduct and do not show signs of progress, the contract can be cancelled. In the private sector, however, companies are vulnerable to market conditions and have therefore not explicitly acknowledged that there is a cost for the suppliers linked to improving the working conditions. Many suppliers in manufacturing in developing countries, where the cost of labour is the main competitive advantage, are caught in a downward price press. In order to make it possible for the supplier to improve working conditions and pay higher wages, they would need to be financially compensated for socially responsible production improvements. Since it is unsure if end customers will be willing to pay the premium of improved working conditions, the cost burden for a socially responsible production is transferred back to the suppliers. The supplier is obliged to follow the code of conduct without possibilities to negotiate contract prices upwards. Due to the fact that there is a monopsonistic structure of the markets of non-advanced manufacturing in low cost labour intensive countries, competition among suppliers to remain in the market or to gain market shares is fierce. Some, like Apple supplier Foxconn, have managed to gain a significant market share and, hence, could work with higher margins than smaller competitors. But it was not until Apple, being Foxconn´s largest customer, threatened to leave if salaries not were raised, that Foxconn was willing to lower its margins in order to pay workers more. Other suppliers are fighting to remain in the market and would not afford production increase costs.

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As of today, even companies generally being recognized for being front runners in terms of corporate social responsibility within the supply chain, such as Nike and H&M, do not acknowledge that improved working conditions in production factories would be an actual extra cost for the supplier to meet. Some issues related to poor working conditions seem to have improved. Ventilation, unblocked emergency exits and clean toilet facilities, are often pointed out as being better today than in the 1990s. But even though several initiatives on coaching suppliers in efficient working methods, capacity building and manager training programs have been announced, working conditions in terms of excess working hours and inadequate overtime pay are widespread, persistent problems which do not seem to go away over time. Even with a decade or more of focus on corporate social responsibility with the supply chain, this is so. The pioneering public procurement initiatives should, instead of taking a blue print of the institutionalized way of dealing with social responsibility in supply chain management seen from the private sector, benchmark with the prior attempts from business. What can be learned from the fact that companies such as Nike and H&M, having been working with corporate social responsibility in the supply chain since the 1990s, still have to admit that progress is lacking in terms of improving major aspects of the working conditions in supplier factories? What are the realistic chances of bringing about improvements in the working conditions at suppliers’ factories just by pushing the responsibility down the line without openly discussing the increased cost effect the desired improvements would have for the suppliers? Maybe Apple can do it. But what about all the others? And will Apple (even with support from inspections at Foxconn by the Fair Labour Association, stating that the working conditions at Foxconn is above average) be able show improvements in working conditions, such as reduction in excess overtime, without going into a renegotiation and being willing to increase the purchasing price to Foxconn? Everything has its costs. Better working conditions as well. But who is going to pay for this? It is time to reveal that the emperor is naked and admit that improved ethical product quality, i.e. that a product is made under working conditions in line with the international conventions on workers´ rights, will have to be an issue negotiated in price discussions between buyer and supplier. This discussion has been off the corporate social responsibility agenda until now. As for the possibility for public procurement to acknowledge that there is a price attached to demanding that suppliers be socially responsible in production, a window of opportunity for the improvement of working conditions in developing countries competing with labour intensive low paid labour has opened. With governmental support, public procurement can award public contracts not only based on lowest price but also take into consideration issues such as social criteria during the production process. Since the end customers are the taxpayers, it is basically a question of political leadership whether public procurement will use this window of opportunity or not.

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(ii) Illuminating Short Term Private Economic Benefits in Residential Buildings’ Energy Efficiency is vital for Society’s Energy and Greenhouse Gas Goals

Pontus Cerin Guest Professor Unit of Accounting, School of Business and Economics Åbo Akademi University Finland pontus.cerin@abo.fi Associate Professor Unit of Environmental Strategies Research - FMS School of Architecture and Built Environment KTH - Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden Energy consumption and GHG emissions of the building sector According to the International Energy Agency, the building sector globally accounts for about 36 percent of the final energy use in the world while residential building alone represents a good 27 percent of global energy usage. In the OECD the building sector constitutes an even larger share of the total end energy consumptions and in the U.S., buildings account for about 40 percent of total U.S. energy consumption and greenhouse gas emissions, approximately costing USD 350 billion per year. More than half of these emissions derive from residential properties. The relative size of these U.S. energy and emissions figures compared to the country’s total economy are rather similar to those in Europe, but the sector is not as big a contributor to GDP. The building sector constitutes 9% of the European Union’s GDP which gives it a high proportion of emissions per GDP contribution. Even though the building sector has similar shares in the OECD countries’ respective energy consumption their contribution to global warming may differ considerably. Most of continental Europe, the UK and the U.S. have a high proportion of coal and oil in the energy mix for the building sector’s energy consumption, while a few other countries have rather marginal GHG contributions. So, for countries like France, Iceland, Norway, Sweden and Switzerland and the Canadian provinces, Newfoundland and Labrador, Quebec, Manitoba and British Columbia, the battle is not primarily to further diminish GHG contributions from the buildings sector, but to lower energy costs and avoiding additional expansion of electricity generation. The E.U has decided upon an energy improvement policy denominated the EU 20-20-20 Policy. The aim is to achieve a 20% greenhouse gas (GHG) emission reduction and a 20% cut in energy usage as well as expanding renewables to constitute 20% of the energy mix by the year 2020. The European Union directives on the Energy Performance of Buildings, as well as academic studies and the Stern Report, firmly recognise the potential for reaching the overall energy and GHG emissions goals partly through initiatives in the building sector. In an attempt to increase the energy efficiency in the European private housing market the European Union imposed Energy Performance Certificates (EPC) – similar to

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those required for commercial buildings – for all private homes sold as of 2009 and afterwards. The idea is, hence, that the buyers will be able to more accurately take in the energy performance of the house into their bidding considerations. During 2011 almost half of the E.U. membership states had not implemented this mandatory regulation into their own national legislations. In some member countries that had this regulation implemented, a waiver option had made most sellers and buyers on the market agree on not demanding a declaration of energy performance. For instance, in the Dutch market a mere 12 percent of the private home transactions were associated with an Energy Performance Certificate. This, however, may not be all that wise, since it is shown that the houses without an EPC have been sold at a lower price, as shown in academic studies. In other E.U. membership countries, on the contrary, like Sweden, there has been an almost 100% adoption of the EPCs at sales of private homes. Several academic studies on property markets in the developed world have investigated the relationships between energy performance, on the one hand, and economic characteristics of properties, on the other, like sale price of properties, the size of rents for commercial or apartment spaces as well as the customer loyalty of tenants, which is a really crucial indicator in times of economic recession. It has been detected that there is a positive correlation between double glazing and house prices in Canberra, Australia, while vents in ceilings and walls lowered prices. Superior energy ratings also increased house prices. In the U.S. a positive correlation between higher energy efficiency in commercial properties that is communicated through the energy star has been found to relate to the amount of rent from occupants. It was, moreover, found that during the financial recession around year 2008, commercial properties with higher energy performance had more loyal tenants which for a real estate owner is a very crucial aspect for softening the impacts of downturns in the economy. Based on EPCs, backed up by E.U. regulation, positive correlations have, moreover, also been detected in the Dutch private housing market between, on the one hand, the existence of Energy Performance Certificates as well as higher energy efficiency to, on the other, house prices. A price premium of up to 12 percent – between the highest rated energy performance homes and lowest rated was detected in the Dutch housing market. The Netherlands has a mild temperate climate, but similar positive correlations have been detected in a study on the Swedish housing market where the climate zones stretch over mild temperate to arctic climate zones. The study on the Swedish housing market, furthermore, detected a rebate demanded by the buyers of those houses that had suggestions for energy improvements stated in their Energy Performance Certificates that were larger than the estimated costs for implementing the proposed improvements. By illuminating which energy efficiency improvements may instantly pay off in the housing market through sales is a very important piece of information that has the potential to rapidly increase the transformation of society’s building stock to more energy efficient properties. The current major obstacle for investments in energy performance improvements is the long payback times, especially so if installing new operation and control technical solutions. If it takes as long as a decade to pay for the large energy improvements of thermal heating it discourages many private home

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owners from making such investments – not all home dwellers know if they will be owning a property for ten years or not. This is important since it is not enough to implement high energy efficiencies in new constructions if we are to reach the E.U. 20-20-20 policy, while the large offsets are achieved in improving the existing building stock. If there is a clear picture whether such investments will pay off immediately on the property market, investments are much more likely to occur, and if schemes like the one promoting Energy Performance Certificates (EPC) are readily displayed - e.g. at property sales for prospective buyers - there as an increased chance for well informed decisions for integrating the value of the energy efficiency into the property price and, thus, a step towards a more sustainable development. (iii) Foreign Direct Investment and the Environment: FDI Halo vs. Pollution

Haven Nadia Doytch Department of Economics and Finance University of New Haven ndoytch@newhaven.edu Merih Uctum

Brooklyn College and the Graduate Center of the City University of New York Ph.D. Program in Economics Foreign direct investment (FDI) accounts for a large part of international economic activity and is oftentimes considered a proxy for globalization. Despite the recent attention on the environment, FDI has been studied mainly as a driver for economic growth and less attention is given to it as a factor of environment. However, a common idea underlines both the productivity and the environmental spillovers: in both cases FDI generates “leakages” of knowledge in the form of technology and expertise to local societies and results in positive externalities. The environmental literature has built on the growth literature and hypothesized that the positive spillovers spread out perhaps beyond just an impact on productivity and that multinational companies (MNCs) disseminate superior knowledge that applies to environmentally friendly practices and improved environmental performance as well. This relatively new hypothesis is oftentimes called the FDI “halo effect”.

There is, however, a hypothesis contradictory to the halo hypothesis. Critics argue that globalization can have an unfavorable impact on the environment if MNCs follow a pollution haven-seeking strategy. The pollution haven, or race-to-the bottom approach, argues that in an environment of liberalized trade flows, tightening of environmental regulation in developed countries can shift polluting industries to countries where regulation is relatively lax. A critical examination of the empirical literature reveals evidence in support of both: the FDI halo and the Pollution Haven hypotheses. The possibility that MNCs encourage the dissemination of environmentally clean technologies and environmentally friendly management practices could be motivated by shareholder

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pressure or because of practices established by the MNCs’ home country environmental regulations and standards (Garcia-Johnson, 2000)1. The further spreading of this environmental knowledge can occur through a movement of trained workers from foreign to domestic firms (Görg and Strobl, 2004)2 or because of a direct competition of domestic firms with the MNCs. A number of case studies find reduction of greenhouse emissions of multinationals compared to domestic firms. For example, Lagos (1999)3 who examines the mining sector of Chile finds that few foreign-owned companies implemented responsible environmental policies at a time when Chilean regulatory framework was not yet developed. Similar are the findings by Albornoz et al (2009)4, who study a sample of Argentinean firms. The authors reveal that: foreign-owned firms are more likely to implement environmental management systems compared to domestic firms; firms that supply sectors with high multinationals and regularly meet with their customers are more likely to adopt environmental management systems; and firms’ absorptive capacity, ownership and export status also influence the extent to which they benefit from environmental spillovers. However, there is plenty of evidence in support of the opposite hypothesis - the statement that as trade is liberalized, industries that pollute shift from rich countries with tight regulation to poor countries with weak regulation and conversely, clean industries migrate towards rich countries, as formulated by Copeland and Taylor (1994)5. First, since regulation increases costs, the exports of countries with more stringent regulations become relatively more expensive than those with lax regulation (Grossman and Krueger, 1993) 6. Second, the pattern of trade shifts towards pollution-intensive goods (Low and Yeats, 1992)7. And third, multinationals’ location decisions-high regulatory costs are likely to deter firms’ investment decisions (List et al., 20048; Becker and Henderson, 2000)9. In addition, there is evidence of negative technological spillovers of FDI, where foreign firms do not display better

1 Garcia-Johnson, R. 2000. Exporting Environmentalism: US Multinational chemical corporations in Brazil and Mexico, Cambridge, MA:MIT Press. 2 Görg, H., Strobl, E., 2004. Spillovers from foreign firms through worker mobility: an empirical investigation. Scandinavian Journal of Economics 107 (4), 693–709. 3 Lagos, G. a. P. V. 1999. Environmental policies and practices in Chilean mining. Mining and the Environment, Case Studies from the Americas. A. W. (ed.). Ottawa, International Development Research Centre. Chapter 3. 4 Albornoz , F., M. Cole, R. Elliot, and M. Ercolani, 2009. In Search of Environmental Spillovers” World Economy, 32(1), 2009. 5 Copeland, B. and M. Taylor, 1994. North-South trade and the environment. Quarterly Journal of Economics. 109, 3, 755-87. 6 Grossman, G. and Krueger, A.,1993. Environmental impacts of a North American free trade agreement. In The U.S.-Mexico free trade agreement. Ed. P. Garber. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 13-56. 7 Low, P. and Yeats, A., 1992. Do 'dirty' industries migrate? In International Trade and the Environment. Washington, DC: The World Bank. 8 List, J., Millimet, D. and McHone, W., 2004. The Unintended Disincentive in the Clean Air Act. Advances in Economic Analysis and Policy. 4, 2, 1-26. 9 Becker, R. and Henderson, V., 2000. Effects of air quality regulations on polluting industries Journal of Political Economy, 108, 2, 379-421

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environmental performance than the domestic firms (Hettige et al, 199610; Dasgupta et al. 199711) or they underperformed (Aden, et al., 1999)12. In summary, the evidence of FDI halo vs. the pollution havens, at least in country-level studies, is very mixed. A new approach is proposed by Doytch and Uctum (2011)13 who study the issue with a multi-country sample at the sector-level. When FDI is disaggregated by sectors (agriculture, mining, and manufacturing, total services, financial and nonfinancial services), and an Environmental Kuznets Curve is fit into the empirical model, the authors find that FDI flows into manufacturing support the pollution haven argument, while those flowing into services support the halo effect hypothesis. Additional multi-country multi-sector research may be needed to answer the question of which hypothesis holds: the FDI halo or the pollution haven. There is also a need for studies that prescribe policy recommendations for better capture of positive environmental spillovers from FDI. It is still poorly understood what kinds of government policies enhance the dissemination and the capture of positive spillovers - more stringent environmental regulation or working closely with the firms and incentivizing R&D activities, while promoting science and technology education. (iv) The Economics of Low Carbon Cities: Outcomes of a City-Scale Mini- Stern Review

Prof Andy Gouldson Director ESRC Centre for Climate Change Economics and Policy University of Leeds A.Gouldson@leeds.ac.uk Introduction What is the best way to decarbonise a city? There are plenty of reasons why we might want to do so. As cities could be particularly exposed to the impacts of climate change, we might hope that they would play a leading role in helping to avoid it. But climate change is a collective action problem on a global scale, and the case for local action on environmental grounds alone is not always strong enough. Fortunately, there are other drivers that might motivate cities to address issues of climate change – some of which appeal more to self interest than to collective concern. Incentives to invest in energy efficiency and energy security are going up as energy prices increase. In some settings at least, policy pressures are intensifying as national governments 10 Hettige, H., Mani, M., Wheeler, D., 2000. Industrial pollution in economic development: the environmental Kuznets curve revisited, Journal of Development Economics, 62, 445-76. 11 Dasgupta, S., B. Laplante, and N. Mamingi, 1997. Pollution and capital markets in developing countries, The World Bank, Development Research Group. 12 Aden, J. A. Kyu-Hong, A., and M. Rock, 1999. What is driving the pollution abatement expenditure behavior of manufacturing plants in Korea? World Development, V. 27(7):1203 1214. 13 Doytch N. and M. Uctum 2011. Globalization and the Environmental Spillovers of sectoral FDI, Unpublished manuscript.

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adopt increasingly ambitious carbon reduction targets. And economic development opportunities are becoming more prominent as the low carbon and environmental goods and services sector, which has been estimated to be worth £3.2 trillion a year and to employ 28 million people worldwide, continues to grow. These trends could have major social and economic implications for all – through their impacts on growth, competitiveness, employment, social welfare, fuel poverty and so on - but arguably their effects are likely to be felt more acutely in cities than in other contexts. In urbanised countries, around 80% of all economic output is generated in cities, and around 80% of people live in cities. Further, it has been estimated that between 40 and 70% of all anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions are produced in cities, and that at least 70% of emissions can be attributed to the consumption that takes place within cities. Cities seem to be as exposed to attempts to reduce energy use and carbon footprints as they are vulnerable to the effects of climate change itself therefore.

The Research So what do we do about this? There are thousands of low carbon options available and although they present a significant opportunity to reduce energy bills and carbon footprints there is often a lack of reliable information on their performance. The higher levels of risk and uncertainty that emerge as a result of this can be a major barrier to action, making it hard to develop a political, a business or a social case for investment in low carbon options. Research led by Andy Gouldson, Director of the ESRC Centre for Climate Change Economics at the University of Leeds, and a member of the Centre for Low Carbon Futures, has sought to address this problem. The research has reviewed the cost and carbon effectiveness of a wide range of the low carbon options that could be applied at the local level in households, industry, commerce and transport. Downscaling national level data from the UK Committee on Climate Change, it has explored the scope for the deployment of the different low carbon measures at the local level, and the associated investment needs, financial returns and carbon savings. It has also explored the wider implications of these investments for employment and the wider economy.

As an initial case study, the research has focused on the Leeds City Region. This is the second largest city region in the UK, with a population of 3 million and an economy worth £52 billion. The research finds that if nothing else changes projected levels of economic growth, combined with a continuation of gradual improvements in the energy and carbon intensity of GDP, will lead to a small increase in carbon emissions in the city region between 1990 and 2022. However, this prospect is mitigated – in almost equal proportion – by the effects of three other trends. The first is that the substantial increases in energy prices that are predicted through to 2022 will have major impacts on levels of energy demand. The second is that the investments in new energy infrastructure at the national level will lead to significant drops in carbon emissions. And the third is that exploiting all of the realistic potential for energy savings measures and low carbon options at the local level would lead to a further significant drop in carbon emissions. It is this third aspect that we focus on in the research.

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The Findings The research ranks all of the options available to households, industry, commerce and transport at the local level in terms of both their cost and carbon effectiveness. This analysis is done at the interest rates and energy prices available to households and businesses to provide a realistic ‘business case’ for investment. If nothing else, this provides a useful guide for decision makers who are able to prioritise and focus their resources on the most cost or carbon effective options. But it also enables us to predict the impact of different carbon reduction strategies. The research finds that, when combined with the impacts of price increases and the decarbonisation of the grid, the exploitation of the cost effective low carbon measures would lead to around a 36% carbon cut in the city region between 1990 and 2022. This would require several billion pounds of investment, but these investments would pay for themselves on commercial terms in around 4 years. The energy bill would be cut by £1.2bn a year and 4,500 jobs would be created in the low carbon sector within the city region. If the savings from these cost effective measures were captured and reinvested in further low carbon measures, then these figures increase substantially. Of course, the fact that these opportunities exist on this scale is obviously not enough to ensure that they are actually exploited. Incentives – no matter how strong they are – have to be matched with appropriate capacities if progress is to be made. These relate both to the capacity to supply appropriate levels of investment, and to the capacity to stimulate and sustain demand for such investments. To stimulate the supply of the very significant levels of investment that are needed, we need to think about innovative financing mechanisms, based on new forms of cost recovery and benefit sharing and new ways of managing risk. And we need to develop new delivery vehicles that can stimulate and sustain demand for investment in low carbon options by overcoming the many potential barriers to change. The Impacts We hope that by presenting a realistic but compelling case for investments in numerous low carbon options, the research will have a major impact on transitions to a low carbon economy and society at the local level, not only in the Leeds City Region but also in other contexts. Indeed, we are currently working with several other cities in the UK and internationally to replicate the study and would welcome ideas on partnerships to develop and apply the work more broadly. And of course we recognise that economics is not the only discipline that has something useful to say on the transition to a low carbon economy/society. Wider analysis is also considering the social and political acceptability of the different options, as well as issues relating to the social equity and broader sustainability of the different pathways towards a low carbon economy and society.

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(v) The World’s Richest Climate Science Denier

Clive Hamilton Professor of Public Ethics Centre for Applied Philosophy and Public Ethics, Canberra mail@clivehamilton.net.au

The role of conservative billionaires in sabotaging action on climate change is now well-documented. The Koch brothers’ funding of climate denial, along with a range of right-wing causes, was exposed in the New Yorker last year following a detailed report by Greenpeace. Foundations controlled by the Scaife family14 have also been funding the work of a range of denialist think tanks.

Now a new billionaire, hostile to environmentalism, is emerging. Gina Rinehart is a mining magnate from Western Australia who has built a vast fortune by exporting iron ore to China. Her assets are valued at $20 billion, making her Australia’s richest person. Citigroup estimates she is on track to overtake Bill Gates and Carlos Slim as the richest person in the world in the next few years.

Although she is famously shy of publicity, enough has emerged to make it clear that Rinehart has political views on the far right of the spectrum. Those close to her have reported that she would like to use her wealth to gain political influence and over the last year she has begun buying up important media assets.

Rinehart inherited Hancock Resources from her father Lang Hancock, a legendary mining magnate with a take-no-prisoners style. He was described by one journalist as “a swashbuckling right-winger who believed people and governments should bow to his will”. As a child and young woman, Gina was close to her father and absorbed his brand of right-wing politics. On workers’ rights, West Australian secession and special deals for mining, her views are indistinguishable. Advertising executive John Singleton, who has been close to both father and daughter, recently said: “a conversation with Gina was a conversation with Lang. They both had the same fanaticism.”

Hancock was a confidant of the notoriously authoritarian Queensland premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen, whom even Liberal Party MPs accused of running a police state. In 1975, Hancock launched John Singleton’s Workers Party, the forerunner of the new right in Australia. Gina was in attendance, soon after she had dropped out of the University of Sydney claiming the lecturers were communists.

Like her father, Gina Rinehart once advocated opening up new mines in Australia by using nuclear explosions. Hancock got the idea of using nukes to excavate harbours from Edward Teller, the fiercely anti-communist “father of the H-bomb”, once described as “a major architect of the Cold War”. Hancock invited him to Australia in the mid-1970s.

14 http://thinkprogress.org/romm/2011/10/03/335022/organized-climate-change-denial/

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Singleton, who owns the Sydney radio station that broadcasts right-wing shock-jocks, Alan Jones and Ray Hadley, has known Rinehart most of her life and is still close to her. Earlier this year Singleton bragged about their combined influence:

“We have been able to overtly and covertly attack governments … Because we have people employed by us like Andrew Bolt and Alan Jones and Ray Hadley who agree with her thinking about the deployment of our resources, we act in concert in this way.”

Rinehart complains bitterly about “red and green tape” and has created a lobby group called Australians for Northern Development and Economic Vision (ANDEV). Her economic vision includes turning the northern half of the Australian continent into a special economic zone, a place where mining companies would enjoy tax breaks and be able to bring in guest workers from poor countries to work in the mines.

According to the business press, ANDEV is “like a who's who of ultra-conservative Australian business”. Hugh Morgan, a prominent member, used to run Western Mining Corporation (swallowed up by BHP Billiton in 2005), but his enduring legacy is a series of right-wing groups he established or supported, including the H.R. Nicholls Society, dedicated to attacking trade unionism and expanding the power of employers.

Morgan has been close to the conservative Melbourne think tank, the Institute of Public Affairs, which has a long association with the mining industry and actively promotes climate science denial. The IPA is secretive about its funding but it would be a reasonable suspicion that its rapid expansion during the past two years has been financed by Gina Rinehart.

Morgan was the force behind the foundation of Australia’s leading climate science denial organisation, the Lavoisier Group, which has close links to anti-climate science think tanks in the United States, including the Heartland Institute.

Hatred of environmentalism runs deep in the culture of the Australian mining industry, and Rinehart channels her father on that score. She is now putting her wealth into the climate change denial movement. She is enamoured of Ian Plimer, the geologist whose anti-climate science tracts have been systematically debunked by leading scientists.

Last year she helped fund the Australian tour of Lord Christopher Monckton, who argues that climate science is a communist conspiracy to establish centralized world government in Europe. Monckton is a fantasist whose repeated claim to be a member of the House of Lords prompted the sitting Lords to write a public letter demanding that he “cease and desist”. He also claims to have won the Nobel Prize. He is better known in Australia for putting a swastika next to a photo of Ross Garnaut, who led the team that wrote the equivalent of the Stern Report in Australia.

None of this dents Monckton’s credibility in Rinehart’s eyes. So she invited him to give the Lang Hancock Memorial Lecture in Perth last year. While in Perth, Monckton met with a number of anti-climate science activists linked to an obscure think tank. Astonishingly, a video recording of the meeting was posted on the

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internet. Monckton can be heard proposing a business plan “encouraging those we know who are super-rich” to invest in the news media to “keep the news free and fair and balanced, as they do on Fox”.

Rinehart has let it be known that she is worried about Australia’s future, and wants to use her wealth to change it. Last year she bought into one of Australia’s three commercial television networks, Channel Ten, enough to secure a seat on the board. She is said to have used her influence to have the channel broadcast a new program for most obsessive and vituperative climate science denier, Andrew Bolt. In recent weeks she launched a raid on Fairfax Media, publisher of the Sydney Morning Herald, the Melbourne Age and the Australian Financial Review, and the only serious newspaper rival in Australia to Rupert Murdoch. She now owns 14 per cent of Fairfax, enough to gain a seat on the board and perhaps to become its Chair. Her intervention is changing the nation’s political landscape.

Gina Rinehart has an Achilles heel, a poisonous relationship with her children, three of whom are presently pursuing legal action to take away her control of the family trust. They allege their mother has engaged in ‘serious misconduct’. Rinehart always plays hardball. In a bitter legal dispute with her father in the 1980s an exchange of letters was made public in which she accused him of “stoop[ing] to lies, blackmail and distortion against your own family” and he replied by asking what had turned her into a “slothful, vindictive and devious baby elephant”.

Rinehart has engaged the best lawyers to have the courts impose a suppression order on details of the dispute with her children, and it now rests with the High Court. Nevertheless an earlier hearing allowed publication of emails in which her children complained to Rinehart that she was not providing them with enough to pay for proper security. One lives in New York and another in Vancouver. Her daughter, Hope, emailed:

“I don't think you understand what it means now that the whole world thinks you’re going to be wealthier than Bill Gates – it means we all need bodyguards and very safe homes!!”

Rinehart then threatened to stop payments on her children’s kidnap insurance, unless they agreed to suppress details of the dispute. Her son John told the press that his mother “won’t share a penny to help protect her grandchildren from the risks she ... is creating by her own actions.”

He finished with a message to any potential kidnappers hoping to extort money from Gina Rinehart: “If you think you’re going to get anything from my mother, good luck.”

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(vi) Fair Trade in Hong Kong: Why are sales so low?

Sharon Poon Hong Kong sharonpoon1@gmail.com Who doesn’t love to shop in Hong Kong? The city has always been known as a shopping paradise and ‘shop till you drop’ seems to be the city-wide motto. Signs of Gucci, Louis Vuitton and agnès b. are ubiquitous. The sight of a toddler sporting a Burberry jacket is no longer a surprise.

Even for those of us who do not claim to be brand-conscious consumers, we must admit that shopping is a necessity. So, what does shopping mean to us? Is it a therapeutic activity? A channel to exercise our power within the marketplace? Our contribution to making a fairer economy? A way to promote a sustainable livelihood for people in developing countries?

According to the Hong Kong Ecological Footprint Report 2010, if everyone in the world lived a similar lifestyle to that of us in Hong Kong, we would need the equivalent resources of 2.2 planets. If we cannot cut down on our consumption, the very least we should do is to support our world and the environment through our consumption habits.

Supporting Fair Trade through our purchasing behaviour is a way to promote a fairer economy for people in developing countries, where shopping is probably considered a luxury. A large majority of us knows that Fair Trade means a fairer price for farmers and workers in developing countries, but it goes beyond that. When we purchase Fairtrade products, we are also supporting labour rights, a cleaner environment, stable contracts, and democracy, among other things. Our chocolate will not be coming from cocoa plantations where there is bonded or illegal child labour. Our banana will not be loaded with prohibited pesticides. Farmers will get more than HK$0.10 cents for HK$20 worth of coffee. In addition to the Fairtrade Minimum Price, there is a Premium on top that is reinvested into the local community. For example, the Fairtrade Premium may be used to build a primary school, set up medical facilities or protect natural water sources. In 2010, consumers worldwide spent EUR4.36 billion on Fairtrade products, up by 27% in 2009 (Fairtrade International, 2011). The figure for retail sales in Hong Kong is lumped into the “Rest of World” category which represents a mere 0.9%. Considering that Hong Kong has a GDP per capita of US$49,300 (Central Intelligence Agency, 2012), there is certainly room for the Fairtrade market to grow. So why are the sales of Fairtrade products so low in Hong Kong? Is it the lack of availability? Or a lack of education and awareness? About 27,000 Fairtrade products are sold in more than 70 countries around the world; these products are categorized into 20 product groups – from sports balls to rice, chocolate to tea, cotton to wine, honey to coffee. All but a few of these categories (flowers/plants, fresh fruit and fresh bananas) are sold in Hong Kong, with Fairtrade coffee, tea and chocolate forming the majority of sales. Fairtrade goods are sold or

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served at 110 outlets across town, but many consumers are only aware of the goods at chain stores, such as Marks and Spencer and Starbucks. Some may argue that convenience is ‘king’ when it comes to shopping, but we often go out of our way to hunt down the best cup of coffee or dessert in town, so why not extend the effort to Fairtrade? Perhaps if more of us buy Fairtrade products, our demand can encourage more stores, such as giant supermarket chains Park n’ Shop and Wellcome, to stock it on their shelves, at all of their locations. The relationship between a lack of availability and a lack of education and awareness is interactive. True to the rules of advertising, the less Fairtrade products we see, the less likely we are to buy it. Likewise, the less aware we are about Fair Trade, the less likely we are to demand for Fairtrade products. Public education is important in promoting Fair Trade concepts, but it will be a long time before it becomes a common household discussion. Thus public education needs to be coupled with branding initiatives. They are equally important in that they complement each other – a reputable brand, especially for food products, indicates quality and safety; conversely, education promotes understanding of the Fair Trade concept which is likely to turn some people into socially conscious consumers. Since Hong Kong consumers are relatively brand-conscious, companies selling Fairtrade products may benefit from a brand image which conveys prestige and top quality. Think of brands like La Maison du Chocolat, Starbucks, and TWG Tea. They all fall within the realm of affordable luxuries where consumers are willing to pay a premium for a taste of luxury rather than a no-name alternative. Although the long term sustainability of this marketing strategy is a concern, it will certainly help speed up the Fair Trade movement while education takes its effect in the long term. On the education front, Fairtrade snacks should be included in vending machines at schools and stocked in company pantries. Fair Trade issues should be incorporated into the teaching curricula. If all children grow up with the belief that it is ‘normal’ to buy Fairtrade products, together they can be an influential social force that rewrites the future of the Fairtrade market in Hong Kong, and ultimately those of producers in developing countries. References Central Intelligence Agency (2012) The World Factbook. [Online] Available at:

https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/hk.html Fairtrade International (2011) ‘Challenge and Opportunity’, 2010 Financials and

Global Sales Figures. pp2.

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8 IN THE NEWS: CONFERENCES, COMMENT AND WEBSITES (i) World Congress on Water, Climate and Energy, Dublin, 13-18 May, 2012. The World Congress on Water, Climate Change and Energy is to be held in Dublin, 14-18 May, 2012. A full article written by the Congress Chair can be found on the homepage of the Congress website: Conference website: http://iwa-wcedublin.org/ Or contact: info@iwa-wcedublin.org (ii) GRONEN Research Conference 2012: Corporate Sustainability – Off to Pastures New or Back to the Roots? Marseille, 26-29 June, 2012. GRONEN 2012 will bring together a range of different formats for advancing the academic debate on corporate sustainability. See details on www.gronen2012.org/ or contact Tobias Hahn: Tobias.Hahn@euromed-management.com (iii) Rethinking Climate Change, Conflict and Security

International Conference, University of Sussex, UK, 18-19 October 2012 http://rethinkingclimateconflict.wordpress.com

(iv) UNEP Climate Action Programme

Assisting business towards carbon neutrality. www.climateactionprogramme.org/ Newsletter: www.climateactionprogramme.org/news/P10

(v) UN Calls on Academia to Embrace Sustainability Curriculum http://www.unglobalcompact.org/news/194-03-01-2012 (vi) OUTREACH – UNCSD ‘Informal informals’ A multi-stakeholder magazine on environment and sustainable development (Stakeholder Forum). Rio+20 editions, 2011/2012, and COP 17 editions, with up-to-date commentary and Rio podcasts. http://www.stakeholderforum.org/sf/outreach/index.php/cop17pdfhome

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(vii) The 2012 Sustainability Leaders Report: SustainAbility/Globescan Expert consultation on sustainability leadership: press release GreenBiz has also published an article on the results of the survey. 9 RECOMMENDED READING (i) The New Carbon Economy: Constitution, Governance and Contestation Peter Newell, Max Boykoff, Emily Boyd (Editors) ISBN: 978-1-4443-5022-7 Paperback. 208 pages February 2012, Wiley-Blackwell. The New Carbon Economy provides a critical understanding of the carbon economy and key insights into the constitution, governance and effects of the carbon economy across a variety of geographical settings, including Europe, the US and Central America. It examines different dimensions of the carbon economy from a range of disciplinary angles in a diversity of settings, provides ways for researchers to subject claims of newness and uniqueness to critical scrutiny, and historicizes claims of the 'newness' of the carbon economy. (ii) The Roads from Rio: Lessons Learned from Twenty Years of Multilateral

Environmental Negotiations Pamela S. Chasek and Lynn M. Wagner (Editors). Paperback: 978-0-415-80977-1 February, 2012, Routledge/Taylor and Francis.

This book provides a review of twenty years of multilateral environmental negotiations (1992-2012). The authors have participated in most of these negotiating processes and use their first-hand knowledge as writers for the International Institute for Sustainable Development’s Earth Negotiations Bulletin as they illustrate the changes that have taken place over the past twenty years. The chapters examine the proliferation of meetings, the changes in the actors and their roles (governments, nongovernmental organizations, secretariats), the interlinkages of issues, the impact of scientific advice, and the challenges of implementation across negotiating processes, including the Framework Convention on Climate Change, the Convention to Combat Desertification, the Convention on Biological Diversity, the Commission on Sustainable Development, the UN Forum on Forests, the chemicals conventions (Stockholm, Basel and Rotterdam), the Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, the Convention on Migratory Species and the International Treaty on Plant Genetic Resources for Food and Agriculture.

http://www.routledge.com/books/details/9780203125564/

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(iii) Hunger in the Balance: The New Politics of International Food Aid Jennifer Clapp. Cornell University Press, 2011.

Food aid has become a contentious issue in recent decades, with sharp disagreements over genetically modified crops, agricultural subsidies, and ways of guaranteeing food security in the face of successive global food crises. In Hunger in the Balance, Jennifer Clapp provides a timely and comprehensive account of the contemporary politics of food aid, explaining the origins and outcomes of recent clashes between donor nations—and between donors and recipients. She identifies fundamental disputes between donors over "tied" food aid, which requires that food be sourced in the donor country, versus “untied” aid, which provides cash to purchase food closer to the source of hunger. These debates have been especially intense between the major food aid donors, particularly the European Union and the United States. Similarly, the EU's rejection of GMO agricultural imports has raised concerns among recipients about accepting GMO foodstuffs from the United States. For the several hundred million people who at present have little choice but to rely on food aid for their daily survival, Clapp concludes, the consequences of these political differences are profound. (iv) Transnational Environmental Governance: The Emergence and Effects of the Certification of Forests and Fisheries Lars H. Gulbrandsen.

Edward Elgar, 2010. Paperback, 2012. In recent years a wide range of non-state certification programs has emerged to address environmental and social problems associated with the extraction of natural resources. This book provides a general analytical framework for assessing the emergence and effectiveness of voluntary certification programmes. It focuses on certification in the forest and fisheries sectors, as initiatives in these sectors are among the most advanced cases of non-state standard setting and governance in the environmental realm. (v) Development and Change Journal, Forum 2012 Issue, January, 2012. The Forum 2012 issue of Development and Change contains an exciting Debate section on neoliberal conservation and market-based environmental policies. Most of the papers in this section were drawn from the NatureTM Inc conference that was held at the Institute of Social Studies in June 2011. Other sections of the Forum issue also have a number of other pieces that are of direct relevance to geography, anthropology and environmental politics. For example, Jean Grugel and Pia Riggirozzi's piece in the Focus section deals with Post-neoliberalism in Latin America and Lorenzo Pellegrini has a fascinating interview with Joan Martinez Alier in the Reflections section. The 'Assessments' section includes reviews of the World Energy Outlook 2010 by Mazan Labban and UNEP's Green Economy Report by Dan Brockington. Ashwani Saith, Murat Arsel, Kees Biekart, Amrita Chhachhi, Bridget O'Laughlin and Servaas Storm (Editors). http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/dech.2012.43.issue-1/issuetoc

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10 COPY FOR ISDRS NEWSLETTER, ISSUE 2, 2012 Please visit the website, www.isdrs.org/, for information about the next Newsletter.