Direct Discrimination, Indirect Discrimination and Autonomy

Western liberal democracies tend to impose duties on publicand private bodies that are often formulated as an obligationnot to discriminate. For instance, the European Union prohibitsdirect and indirect discrimination on certain grounds in certaincontexts. Under this model, indirect discrimination involvesa measure that, although it does not directly (i.e. explicitly)discriminate on the basis of a proscribed ground, produces adisparate impact that correlates with such a proscribed ground.Indirect discrimination is generally viewed, both conceptuallyand politically, as subordinate to direct discrimination. ProfessorJohn Gardner has argued that anti-discrimination law is justifiedon the basis of duties to respect other people's autonomy. Onthe base of this analysis, he argues that indirect discriminationis a secondary concept to the paradigm wrong of direct discrimination.I contend in this article that, if one adopts Gardner's autonomy-basedanalysis of anti-discrimination law, indirect discriminationis not a secondary concept to direct discrimination. Further,I argue that autonomy does not provide a convincing justificationfor the prohibition of either direct or indirect discrimination.I tentatively suggest, however, that the widespread impact ofcertain types of discrimination (alluded to by Gardner) maysupport an equality-based justification for the prohibitionof both direct and indirect discrimination.     

The politics of multilateral environmental agreements lessons from 20 years of INEA

International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics - This review article addresses the question: What lessons can we learn from work published in International Environmental...     

Why is it hard to solve environmental problems? The perils of institutional reductionism and institutional overload

International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics - Many efforts to solve environmental problems arising at the international or transnational level meet with limited success or...     

Environmental Governance: The Role of Institutions in Causing and Confronting Environmental Problems

This article describes and explains in accessible terms major findings arising from the work of the long-term international research project on the Institutional Dimensions of Global Environmental Change (IDGEC). In analyzing the roles institutions play in both causing and confronting environmental problems, the project directs attention to three analytic themes – known as the problems of fit, interplay, and scale – and seeks to illuminate these concerns through empirical studies of marine, terrestrial, and atmospheric systems. IDGEC science has highlighted the pervasiveness of institutional misfits and begun to identify the reasons why misfits often prove difficult to eliminate, even when their existence becomes widely known. Research conducted under the auspices of the project demonstrates the growing impact of national and even international institutions on the effectiveness of local resource regimes. Similarly, IDGEC research has identified reasons why policy instruments that work well at the national level (e.g., tradable permits) are frequently difficult or impossible to transfer to the international level. To make the discussion of these findings concrete, the project has explored the problem of fit with particular reference to the performance of Exclusive Economic Zones, the problem of interplay through an analysis of the fate of tropical forests, and the problem of scale through an account of the limits of emissions trading as a policy instrument in the climate change regime.     

Sugaring off: enduring insights from long-term research on environmental governance

This article presents the results of an effort to identify the most important contributions I have been able to make in the course of a lifetime of thinking about the roles that social institutions play in governing human–environment relations. Some of the resultant propositions are general in the sense that they apply to environmental governance at all levels of social organization. Others are specific to the international level or to what we generally think of as international environmental governance. The basic message is that institutions are important determinants of human–environment relations but that they typically operate in conjunction with a variety of other drivers in a pattern best described as complex causation. As we move deeper into the Anthropocene, an era characterized by human domination of biophysical systems, the need to improve our understanding of environmental governance has become increasingly urgent.     

Institutions and the Growth of Knowledge: Evidence from International Environmental Regimes

This article argues that institutions not only reflect ideas prevalent at the time of their creation, but also play vital roles in driving the growth and dissemination of knowledge. Because institutions are not actors in their own right, however, it is essential to identify the mechanisms through which they influence the behavior of those who are producers and consumers of knowledge. The central section of the article explores three distinct mechanisms or families of mechanisms that come into play in this context:(1) framing the research agenda, (2) privileging certain types of knowledge claims, and (3) guiding the application of knowledge to specific policy concerns. The article's concluding section examines the policy implications flowing from the proposition that institutions play significant roles in creating knowledge regarding the issues they address. Throughout, observations relating to international environmental or resources regimes provide a source of illustrations.     

The Behavioral Effects of Environmental Regimes: Collective-Action vs. Social-Practice Models

International Environmental Agreements: Politics, Law and Economics - Most observers agree that institutions play significant roles both in causing and in confronting large scale environmental...