Suchergebnisse

The production, certification, and marketing of organic agriculture developed slowly in the West as a nongovernmental, community-based response to concerns over food safety and the environmental impacts of chemical agriculture. The current emergence of organic agriculture in less-developed nations is following a very different trajectory owing to the presence of an established global market for organic products and the developmental goals of interventionist states. In this paper I examine the emergence of state-sponsored organic marketing and certification programs in the Peoples' Republic of China as an extreme case of developmental state intervention in organic agriculture. I find that the predominance of state and market instead of community and ecology in the Chinese organic 'movement' has profound implications for the ability of organics to promote environmentally sustainable agriculture in less-developed nations. Direct state intervention may overcome some of the public-goods and collective-action problems often associated with organic agriculture. However, conflicts of interest between the state as regulator and as producer erode the consumer trust upon which organic markets rely. The use of political authority to organize organic production allows state entrepreneurs to capture market premiums, reducing farmer innovation and long-term incentive, and exacerbating free-rider problems. The case of organic agriculture in China demonstrates the need for caution when applying universalistic economic theories about environmental problems to diverse political economies. This has important implications for international environmental regimes as well as the globalization of eco-consumerism or eco-labeling strategies.

With the decline of the international market under the Clean Development Mechanism, China is establishing a national Emission Trading Scheme by setting up emission cap and trade rules for high emission industries in seven pilot areas. The shift from the international to domestic market and from an offset program to a true cap and trade mechanism requires several significant changes. This paper reviews the development and evolution of China's carbon trading market policy instruments. We find that there are substantial changes in both structure and policy. First, Emission Trading Scheme is a broad cap-and-trade mechanism with many new stakeholders added to those already involved in China's Clean Development Mechanism. Second, the administrative structure is decentralized compared to that of the Clean Development Mechanism. Third, while the Emission Trading Scheme is best thought of as a new policy, China's experience with the Clean Development Mechanism influences that policy. A large number of Clean Development Mechanism projects are being converted into offsets for the national Emission Trading Scheme market, and many institutional stakeholders that emerged during the Clean Development Mechanism are now involved in the Emission Trading Scheme. The combination of new policies and stakeholders, a decentralization of structure and the conversion of Clean Development Mechanism projects raise questions regarding the integrity of the cap and the enforcement of compliance as the Emission Trading Scheme is expanded into a nationwide system.

The Portland Metropolitan region, a single economic and ecological region with a bifurcated state and local governance structure, provides an opportunity to compare governance models and state policy environments in a single region. Using stakeholder interviews and secondary sources, we examine the role of state government policy in shaping and supporting different regimes. We find that Portland exhibits a stable, "smart-growth" regime that we characterized as a metropolitan eco-regime whereas Vancouver is in a period of fragmentation without a stable metropolitan regime. This is best explained by the differing state-level regulatory contexts and the different forms of polycentricity influenced by state action. Differences in regime and governance structure result in differently drawn and expanded urban growth boundaries with subsequent differences in land-use outcomes. We conclude with observations about state-level action and subsequent forms of polycentricity to support metropolitan eco-regimes.

Bottelier, Pieter: Implications of WTO membership for China's state-owned banks and the management of public finances. Issues and strategies. - S. 397-411. Thiers, Paul: Challenges for WTO implementation. Lessons from China's deep integration into an international trade regime. - S. 413-431. Kim Icksoo: Accession into the WTO. External pressure for internal reforms in China. - S. 433-458. Blum, Susan D.: Rural China and the WTO. - S. 459-472. Yeung, Godfrey: The implications of WTO accession on the pharmaceutical industry in China. - S. 473-493