Post-Negotiation: Is the Implementation of Future Negotiated Environmental Agreements Threatened? A Pilot Study

Spector, B.I. (1992). Post-Negotiation: Is the Implementation of Future Negotiated Environmental Agreements Threatened? A Pilot Study. IIASA Working Paper. IIASA, Laxenburg, Austria: WP-92-022

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Abstract

This paper is a contribution to IIASA's research concerning the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED). It explores a question -- that of post-negotiation implementation of agreements -- which is often ignored by negotiation researchers because, technically, it lies outside the process. However, given the urgency and severity of many of the environmental problems being negotiated at UNCED and on the agenda for future negotiations, it is extremely important to conduct analyses and make recommendations concerning how negotiated agreements are or should be implemented at a global, regional, and local level.

While there is an emerging literature on regime building and compliance with negotiated agreements in the negotiation field, the issue of treaty ratification -- a first step in the post-negotiation process -- has received little attention. This pilot study attempts to shed some light, through a systematic analysis of historical environmental treaties, on the difficulties of ratification and their roots in treaty and issue complexity. Several policy recommendations are made, drawing upon the lessons learned from this analysis, to modify current negotiation and post-negotiation processes in such a way as to reduce treaty ratification time.

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