Carrots without Sticks? New Financial Mechanisms for Global Environmental Agreements*

Abstract

Environmental law has been described as "a cutting-edge laboratory of international law" — a metaphor which somehow casts environmental lawyers in the unenviable role of the alchemist who is impatiently expected to find cheap ways of making gold. International environmental law has indeed become a favourite testing ground for innovative policy instruments, including economic incentives (for "positive measures") and financial mechanisms in particular. Some of the experiments ongoing have drawn fire, from the defenders of more traditional ways of making international law as well as from the defenders of more traditional ways of spending money. I shall begin, therefore, by placing those instruments in the general context of international development assistance, then focus on the major new financial "carrots" of global envi-