Innovations in International Environmental Policy: A study of international organisations and policy change

这个项目关注的是国际组织内环境政策创新的过程。尽管实施了二十多年的可持续发展政策，但大多数环境质量指标仍在继续下降。在此背景下，一些政府和国际组织最近采取了新的概念和战略，以协调经济发展和环境可持续性。“绿色经济”和“绿色增长”正成为日益突出的概念，但对环境-经济之间的关系存在许多相互矛盾的理解，如包容性财富(如联合国大学--国际高性能发展计划和环境署2012)、去增长(如研发新开发)、稳态经济(如凯斯新开发)和新经济(如2011年海因里希·伯尔基金会)。国际组织经常在推动新的可持续发展概念和战略方面发挥领导作用；因此，这些组织是本研究的重点。该项目的目标有三个方面。第一是确定和绘制关于民间社会和政策界内关于环境-经济关系的不同当代论述。辨别这些论述提供了如何理解这一联系的完整图景，使我们能够超越国际机构、政府机构和民间社会中行为者自己使用的修辞标签，并找出一致和不同之处。第二个目标是确定国际组织在制定新的可持续发展战略的过程中如何处理环境-经济关系的内部和外部的多元立场和理解。从三十年来的环境多边主义可以明显看出，多种立场和解释可能使谈判复杂化，并使制定相互战略和协定变得困难。然而，在讨论和决策中确保异质性是有重要原因的。有充分的证据表明，志同道合的个人之间的制度飞地和决策往往会阻碍理性，并产生理性较弱的决策。除非表达了反对的立场，否则个人可能会强化他们对现有信念的承诺，而不是考虑这些信念相对于其他信念的优缺点。因此，重要的是，讨论和决策要接受相互竞争的观点。通过分析国际组织制定新的可持续发展战略的同质性和异质性的普遍程度，我将能够对这些过程的质量进行评估，并提出改进过程的建议。这将建立在国际和平研究所和约翰·S·德莱泽克开展的关于在气候变化的公开讨论和多边气候变化谈判中加强话语代表性的战略的现有研究(Stevenson和Dryzek 2012a，2012b)的基础上。第三个目标是确定国际组织推动新的可持续发展概念和战略的努力是否反映了机构学习、机构适应和/或修辞创新。学习需要重新定义的目标和方法带来的行为改变；适应需要重新定义的方法带来的行为改变以实现现有的目标；修辞创新意味着使用新的语言来指代现有的或新的目标和方法。有四个国际组织被提议作为实现该项目机构目标的案例研究：全球绿色增长研究所、联合国环境规划署、联合国亚洲及太平洋经济社会委员会和经济合作与发展组织。在研究方法上，本研究采用了三种研究方法：问答法、文献法和半结构式访谈。

This project is concerned with processes of environmental policy innovation within international organisations. Despite more than two decades of sustainable development policy, most indicators of environmental quality continue to decline. Against this background, some governments and international organisations have recently adopted new concepts and strategies to reconcile economic development and environmental sustainability. 'Green economy' and 'green growth' are becoming increasingly salient ideas, but there are numerous competing understandings of the environment-economy nexus captured in such terms as inclusive wealth (e.g. UNU-IHDP and UNEP 2012), de-growth (e.g. R&D n.d.), steady-state economy (e.g. CASSE n.d.), and buen vivir (e.g. Heinrich Böll Foundation 2011). International organisations frequently take a leadership role in advancing new sustainability concepts and strategies; therefore, these organisations are the focus of this study. The aims of the project are three-fold. The first is to identify and map the different contemporary discourses about the environment-economy nexus within civil society and the policy community. Discerning these discourses provides a complete picture of how the nexus is understood which enables us to move beyond the rhetorical labels used by actors themselves within international institutions, government agencies, and civil society and to identify points of agreement and disagreement. The second aim is to determine how international organisations deal with the internal and external plurality of positions and understandings of the environment-economy nexus in the process of developing new sustainability strategies. It is evident from three decades of environmental multilateralism that a plurality of positions and interpretations can complicate negotiations and make it difficult to devise mutual strategies and agreements. Nevertheless, there are important reasons for ensuring heterogeneity in discussion and decision-making. There is ample evidence to suggest that institutional enclaves and decision-making among like-minded individuals tend to impede rationality and produce weakly-reasoned decisions. Unless opposing positions are vocally represented, there is a danger that individuals will reinforce their commitment to existing convictions rather than consider the merits and weaknesses of those convictions in relation to others. It is important, then, that discussion and decision-making are exposed to competing perspectives. By analysing the prevalence of homogeneity and heterogeneity in international organisations' efforts to develop new sustainability strategies, I will be able to make assessments of the quality of these processes, and recommendations for improved processes. This will build on existing research carried out by the PI and John S. Dryzek on strategies for enhancing discursive representation in public deliberation on climate change and in multilateral climate change negotiations (Stevenson and Dryzek 2012a, 2012b). The third aim is to determine whether international organisations' efforts to advance new sustainability concepts and strategies reflect institutional learning, institutional adaptation, and/or rhetorical innovation. Learning entails behavioural change brought about by redefined goals and means; adaptation entails behavioural change brought about by redefined means to achieve existing goals; and rhetorical innovation signifies the use of new language to refer to existing or new goals and means. Four international organisations are proposed as cases studies for pursuing the institutional aims of the project: the Global Green Growth Institute; United Nations Environment Programme; United Nations Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific; and the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development. Methodologically, this is an interpretivist study informed by three research methods: Q methodology, document analysis, and semi-structured interviews.