ABSTRACT
The United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED) will be the world’s most comprehensive organized response to international environmental degradation. UNCED delegates will seek to adopt conventions on greenhouse gases and biodiversity; to adopt a program of action, called Agenda 21, to implement the Earth Charter; and to develop a set of institutional and financial arrangements to support such measures. The establishment of truly effective international environmental institutions would improve the quality of the global environment. However, much of this activity is relatively new, and none of the studies on the seven issues has produced good direct data about changes in environmental quality as a result of international institutional action. International environmental institutions can be considered to be responses to problems caused by inadequate responses by governments, acting without institutional support, to environmental threats. Institutions can help create and nurture coalitions among like-minded governments, among action-oriented groups within other institutions and organizations, and among environmental protection ministries.
