Towards greening trade? Environmental provisions in emerging markets’ preferential trade agreements

Berger, Axel / Dominique Blümer / Clara Brandi / Manjiao Chi
External Publications (2020)

in: Negi, Archna / Jorge Antonio Pérez-Pineda / Johannes Blankenbach (Eds.), Sustainability Standards and Global Governance, Singapore: Springer, 61-81

ISBN: 978-981-15-3472-0
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-981-15-3473-7
Volltext/Document

This chapter focuses on the linkage between economic and environmental governance by tracking environmental provisions in preferential trade agreements (PTAs). While the USA and the European Union are frequently seen as innovators of ‘green’ content in PTAs, systematic research on the role of emerging markets in promoting this development is scarce. For this reason, we develop an original, detailed data set mapping the environmental content in 48 PTAs signed by the emerging markets China, India, Indonesia, Brazil and Mexico. Our findings clearly indicate a trend towards more environmental content in those countries’ PTAs over time. At the same time, the data hint at patterns that suggest that these developments may at least be partly driven by Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) countries. The chapter contributes to the literature on the design of PTAs, the linkage between trade and environment, as well as the role of emerging markets in global governance.