Insights from Global Environmental Governance

Abstract

The field of international relations (IR) is fragmented along several lines, some stirring more debate than others: theoretical divides have been discussed ad nauseam in the so-called “great debates”; the split between qualitative and quantitative methods remains a recurring theme of discussion; disciplinary walls continue to structure academia; and the differences between European and North American traditions have flowed into recent fashionable exchanges. Countless conferences and publications have documented these divides, often calling for new bridges across those lines (Hellmann 2003). Answering these calls, an increasing number of books and articles in IR develop middle-range theories, rely on mixed methods, borrow from several disciplines, and are coauthored by researchers from different countries. Yet, fewer studies have addressed the mutual ignorance of the different thematic areas of IR—supposedly united by a joint interest in international affairs—and explored potential avenues for bridging them. Global environmental governance (GEG) is one of these thematic islands of the IR archipelago. It has its own key journals (such as Global Environmental Politics), its inescapable classical references (such as Garrett Hardin's Tragedy of the Common), and its own research program (such as a persistent interest in regime theory). GEG scholars read, cite, criticize, and build on each other. However, they remain relatively insulated from the rest of the archipelago, and reciprocally, other subfields in IR pay relatively little attention to GEG (Dyer 2010).