Environmental interests in trade policy: Institutional reform and the North American free trade agreement

Abstract

National environmental organizations played two roles during negotiations of the North American Free Trade Agreement. Adversarial environmental organizations threatened to defeat NAFTA by forming coalitions with labor and other interest groups opposed to its passage. Accommodating environmental organizations used their formal and informal access to pro-trade policy elites to negotiate provisions which included environmental concerns in NAFTA without jeopardizing the overall goals to expand economic activity. Both groups explored the political sequence of events responsible for linking environmental issues to trade poicy negotiations. Despite unprecedented gains for environmentalists in NAFTA, it is not certain whether the new role of environmentalists will result in continued progress in efforts to reconcile trade and environmental policy goals.