Date: Fri, 04 Oct 1996 13:33:02 +0100
From: 99@spies.com (Extremely Right )
Subject: ---> G7 and Global EPA Eco-Socialism <---
To: GCR@cbsnews.com, 100064.3164@compuserve.com, 100120.361@compuserve.com,

ER> How would you like a GLOBAL EPA to manage all the worlds natural
resources? Listen to the scope of the organization:

"UNEP has the additional handicap of having to try and run the world from
Nairobi." -- ER> Yes he said "RUN THE WORLD!"

"There are two other reasons to consider some form of a Global Environment
Organization (GEO) beyond the need to provide an international regulatory
structure." http://sung7.univ-lyon2.fr/toronto/rt95est.htm]

ER> The G-7 conference has illuminated the extent of treason the
eco-socialists will go through to control your stuff. The UN Agenda 21 and
the Sustainable Development plan were never ratified yet we are DOING the
treaty as I speak. Another non-ratified treaty, the "Convention on the Law
of Treaties" also unratified, says that signatories must abide by the
treaty as a good faith measure until it is ratified.. We follow unratified
treaties, through executive order and Congressional apathy. (Document
Attached)

"An ad hoc approach also creates a system that results in what some have
called "treaty congestion." This issue will become more prevalent in the
environmental realm where there are now more than 900 different bilateral
and multilateral environmental agreements in place. When the same sort of
web of overlapping, and often conflicting, treaties..."

ER> Clearly unconstitutional behavior is hidden from Americans sight as
the globalists enslave your economy and natural resources and finally your
government. With the net these people are becoming bolder to distribute
their treason knowing that the next generation is going to be dumb enough
to be lead into slavery without a protest. Save the World will replace God
bless America. It's up to us. National Sovereignty is under attack.
Listen:

"Finally, there is another political dimension that deserves quick
consideration. To address these issues of interdependence requires an
acceptance of something that, at least in the United States, there is
currently no acceptance of: that <ER-darned pesky> national sovereignty,
as the constitutional underpinning of international relations, does not
work any longer. Although we have accepted national sovereignty as the
absolute starting point since the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, that
concept is no longer appropriate in managing present and future global
interdependence. We can no longer afford to ignore or reject our
ecological interdependence. We must acknowledge this new model of the
world <ER- is this the New World Order model?> and work together toward a
more sustainable future for all countries.
"http://sung7.univ-lyon2.fr/toronto/rt95est.htm

ER> Did you hear  "national sovereignty, as the constitutional
underpinning of international relations, does not work any longer." If
this is not an indictment of treason, well, YOU are one of them. ###8up

Documentation about Global EPA from G7 debate:

9 A Global Environment Organization: The Fourth Bretton Woods Pillar? Dan
Esty addressed the G7 conference
http://sung7.univ-lyon2.fr/toronto/rt95est.htm

This year's 50th anniversary celebration for the Bretton Woods
Institutions has created a chance to reflect on the existing international
order and a window of opportunity to move our international management
system forward. In reflecting on the past 50 years, there certainly are
criticisms that can be levelled at all three of the Bretton Woods
Institutions; but one has to admit that the international system has done
a lot better after World War II than after World War I. Now, the challenge
is to look forward over the next 50 years and to determine the structure
of the international system that is needed to manage future global issues.


One of the major challenges that separates the next 50 years from the last
50 is a recognition of the world's ecological interdependence as well as
the growing economic interdependence of nations. Economic interdependence
has been around for some time. Indeed, it was the response to the
recognition of economic interdependence that led to the creation of the
Bretton Woods Institutions in the wake of World War II. In fact, it was
the crisis brought about by the Great Depression and then the War that
allowed the leaders of the world at that time to acknowledge this
interdependence and to respond to it with an international institutional
structure to manage that interdependence.

Today, a similar challenge exists in the environmental realm. But there is
no analogous crisis of sufficient proportions to create the political will
to address the challenge. Nevertheless, environmental interdependence must
be worked into the G7 agenda for Halifax. True leaders must have vision;
they must be able to see the difficult issues of tomorrow and work to
address them before crisis hits.

Ecological interdependence necessitates an improved institutional
structure for managing environmental problems on an international scale.
There are three main reason for this.

First, we now recognize the existence of global environmental issues.
Fifty years ago, there was no appreciation of the interconnectedness of
countries in an environmental or ecological sense. Today it is clear that
there is a great potential for pollution spillovers (or what economists
call "externalities") to cause market failure. Thus, ecological
interdependence is economic interdependence for all countries. Failure to
attend to the ecological links has potentially serious implications for
trade and other economic relationships.

Specifically, there is a danger of "freeriding." Some countries or
industries recognize that they can send pollution up a smokestack or out
an effluent pipeline and not bear the costs of cleaning up these emissions
because someone downwind or downstream will have to deal with the problem.
But there exists real danger in allowing every party, every corporation,
or every country to pursue its own narrow selfinterest without taking
these spillover costs into account. In a system where this is permitted,
the result will be spillovers that are not attended to, not regulated, and
which impede the ability of the global market to deliver optimal results.

There is a long history in economics of developing responses to these
market failures. In fact, it is a history that is hundreds of years old.
The basic thinking is this: where the problem is limited to a small number
of people, one can negotiate a solution. And it does not really matter who
is assigned the initial property rights, either the polluter or the
victim. If the numbers are small, it is still possible to negotiate to
optimal resource use.

However, where "transaction costs" are high (that is, where the ability to
respond to the problem is made more costly because the numbers are large),
an optimal solution is not likely to be achieved through negotiation, and
some kind of regulatory structure is required to avoid market failures and
inefficient outcomes. For most global environmental problems, where a
large number of actors are involved, the best response is, following
economic theory, some form of overarching regulatory structure.

Another fundamental lesson from economics is that the best way to regulate
spillover problems is to set out structures commensurate with the scale of
the environmental harm. Where the problem is local, a local response is
appropriate. Where the problem is provincial, a provincial response is
appropriate. Where the problem is national, a national response is needed.
When it is international, one needs to have an international structure.
Most developed countries have created effective local and national
regulatory systems ² what is lacking is an international system.

There are two other reasons to consider some form of a Global Environment
Organization (GEO) beyond the need to provide an international regulatory
structure. Specifically, one could envision a GEO that has a somewhat
softer character and a somewhat more muted initial mandate. For example,
providing an intersection point for countries thinking about "common
problems" ² that is, problems that all countries or many countries face.
There is a great deal to be gained by sharing information about how to
respond to common problems, getting data and the best science to
understand them, providing the best risk analysis to figure out what the
impacts are on public health or ecological resources, developing a common
understanding of possible policy responses, and comparing notes on what
works and what does not work. This kind of organization already exists.
Indeed, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD)
provides an excellent model for intergovernmental cooperation of this
sort. There is an enormous benefit to having representatives of the 25
different countries come together, share information, talk through
problems, and take home the best thinking about how to respond to the
issues that they all face.

There is a third set of issues that also argues for some international
coordination and perhaps some kind of GEO. This set derives from the link
between economic policy and environmental policy ² competitiveness. In an
interdependent economic structure, a global marketplace, how countries
handle their local environmental problems takes on an international
dimension. Companies are always asking the question: "Are environmental
regulations making me bear costs that my competitors abroad do not have to
bear?" That concern is politically very vibrant, even if economists have
been hardpressed to identify it as empirically significant. Even more
important is the impact of fears of competitive disadvantage on
environmental policy debates. In the North American Free Trade Agreement
(NAFTA) debate, for example, Ross Perot made a big splash with his
arguments about the giant sucking sound of jobs flowing south and fanned
the fear that US companies would be disadvantaged competing against
Mexican companies that might face lower environmental standards or less
stringent enforcement.

These competitiveness fears are also illustrated by the collapse of
several recent efforts to advance creative and more optimal environmental
policies. This "political drag" was clear in the European Union's ability,
or lack thereof, to put an energy tax in place. It is also apparent in the
United States on the same issue, where the Clinton Administration's Btu
tax collapsed in the face of competitiveness concerns.

So there is a real need for cooperation and coordination to ensure that
these environment competitiveness issues do not overwhelm economic
interdependence and countries' ability to push toward freer trade. Because
the real fear here is not only that environmental policy will be
negatively affected by competitiveness, but also that there will be a
counterattack or backlash against free trade as an avenue for sustainable
development.

But we have seen this issue before in the trade realm. The major powers
recognized the "beggarthyneighbour" policies of the 1920s and '30s that
led to the Great Depression as the result of successive rounds of
retaliatory tariff increases. That beggarthyneighbour risk forced
countries to surrender some of their traditional national sovereignty in
order to work together in a cooperative international structure, the GATT.
The same risk is at play in the environmental realm with a
"litterthyneighbour" problem. And there is the same need to have some
recognition of interdependence and subsequent surrender of sovereignty to
an overarching system that allows all parties to prosper.

One can respond quite properly by saying, "well, we can agree with all of
these diagnoses of the problem and not agree with the proposed solution."
However, there are a number of alternatives to setting up a Global
Environment Organization.

The first alternative is to do nothing and let the problem lie. That
appears to be what is indeed happening. And this is all right as long as
the environmental spillovers and the costs they impose are not great. But
there is increasing recognition that the costs are significant. In China,
for example, there are enormous spillovers from its development path,
particularly spillovers from its energy policy, which is heavily dependent
on coal. Initial analysis suggests that Japan and Korea are bearing
hundreds of millions of dollars of pollution burden from China's
coalburning emissions. And if one puts even a small price on CO2
emissions, the world is threatened with billions of dollars of additional
spillovers due to China's rapidly expanding economic activities. It is
important to point out that these spillovers from China are of special
note only because of the phenomenal Chinese growth. Countries all over the
world are bearing spillovers from each other as well. So the suggestion
that pollution spillovers are too small a problem to worry about is
inaccurate ² and increasingly problematic. Thus, even if "do nothing"
seemed like the best policy in the past, prospectively "benign neglect" of
international environmental problems is clearly inappropriate.

A second response might be ad hoc international environmental agreements.
Where a problem is identified, a convention, then a protocol, and then a
structure are put together. This pattern seems to have worked, for
example, in the case of the Montreal Protocol. Maybe it is working in the
case of biodiversity and maybe it is working in climate change. Probably
not. These treaties seem to be doing very little. Moreover, enormous
opportunities are being lost to address these issues in ways that
recognize their interconnectedness. For example, the loss of forest cover
is an issue for biodiversity and also for climate change. Managing CFCs is
an issue for ozone depletion and for climate change. There are
considerable synergies to be obtained by addressing these problems as
linked.

An ad hoc approach also creates a system that results in what some have
called "treaty congestion." This issue will become more prevalent in the
environmental realm where there are now more than 900 different bilateral
and multilateral environmental agreements in place. When the same sort of
web of overlapping, and often conflicting, treaties began to be recognized
in the intellectual property area, there was an effort to unite that
system into a World Intellectual Property Organization. This structure is
now in place and has the unfortunate acronym of WIPO. At any rate, the
need to unify a disconnected series of international environmental
agreements that is becoming increasingly complex and potentially
inefficient and ineffective makes the ad hoc response to environmental
problems less than sufficient.

The third possible alternative might be to fix the existing structures in
institutions such as the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) or
the United Nations Commission for Sustainable Development (CSD). These
institutions are, however, beyond repair. The CSD, in particular, has an
almost impossible mandate of trying to follow up on Agenda 21 with little
political backing and very little budget. UNEP has the additional handicap
of having to try and run the world from Nairobi. Although it is
politically incorrect to say, trying to do that is very difficult both
because of the lack of infrastructure and, more importantly, because of
the difficulty of attracting and retaining firstrate people to spend their
careers and lives in Nairobi. The contrast with the OECD, which can get
good people to go to Paris, or the GATT and the World Trade Organization,
which can get good people to go to Geneva, is stark. It is time for
international environmental management to stop being held hostage to a
political gesture to the developing world. That gesture is important, but
there must be other ways to respond. The international management of
environmental problems is too important to be sacrificed.

Finally, the question must be asked: Doesn't the prospect of a GEO run
hard in the face of prevailing wisdom that says, first of all,
"international organizations are something we do not like;" secondly, "we
do not want to give them money;" and thirdly, "the system is so confused,
why add to it?" The answer has to be "Yes, there are problems. But when
there are problems, one should not stick with the status quo." If there
are problems, why not address them and take on the challenge of undoing
existing systems, abolishing organizations that are not fulfilling their
needs, refining those that are performing, and compressing and
consolidating these into a new and better functioning structure? Isn't it
right to clean house and consolidate the existing international
environmental institutions with new, streamlined, efficient lean
operations that can respond to today's problems?

Clearly there are enormous complexities and difficulties, but looking with
the kind of vision that includes a 50year time horizon it becomes clear
that these problems are not going away. And the institutional response and
how one manages that is quite critical.

Finally, there is another political dimension that deserves quick
consideration. To address these issues of interdependence requires an
acceptance of something that, at least in the United States, there is
currently no acceptance of: that <ER-darned pesky> national sovereignty,
as the constitutional underpinning of international relations, does not
work any longer. Although we have accepted national sovereignty as the
absolute starting point since the Peace of Westphalia in 1648, that
concept is no longer appropriate in managing present and future global
interdependence. We can no longer afford to ignore or reject our
ecological interdependence. We must acknowledge this new model of the
world and work together toward a more sustainable future for all
countries.

Dan Esty is a professor of environmental law and policy at the Yale School
Forestry, a professor of environmental studies at the Yale Law School and
Director of the Yale Center for Environmental Law.

             VIENNA CONVENTION ON THE LAW OF TREATIES

The States Parties to the present Convention

Considering the fundamental role of treaties in the history of
international relations,

Recognizing the ever-increasing importance of treaties as a source of
international law and as a means of developing peaceful co-operation among
nations, whatever their constitutional and social systems,

Noting that the principles of free consent and of good faith and the pacta
sunt servanda rule are universally recognized,

Article 18       Obligation not to defeat the object and purpose of a
treaty prior to its entry into force

A State is obliged to refrain from acts which would defeat the object and
purpose of a treaty when:

 (a) it has signed the treaty or has exchanged instruments constituting
      the treaty subject to ratification, acceptance or approval, until it
      shall have made its intention clear not to become a party to the
      treaty; or
(b) it has expressed its consent to be bound by the treaty, pending the
     entry into force of the treaty and provided that such entry into
      force is not unduly delayed.

This is UNRATIFIED by the US Senate and they can't ratify this since it
contradicts the constitutional powers of the Senate to ratify treaties.
That would require a constitutional amendment!



