How do domestic politics shape a state’s position on global environmental issues?

Introduction

Acknowledging that states remain the most relevant actors in the current international system, the purpose of this essay is to explain how domestic politics, and the personal decisions of heads of state and government in particular, shape a state’s position on the broad global environmental agenda, as this would allow a more holistic analysis of the influence that leaders and other domestic actors have on these issues.

Regarding its structure, this essay is divided in three main parts. First, it will discuss how some relevant domestic actors and the interactions between and among them, with specific attention to the role of political leaders, shape the global environmental position of states. Second, this essay will primarily focus on two neighbouring global leaders –one from the North and the other from the South– and their respective stand on the environmental agenda that doubtlessly shaped their nation’s position on the matter: Donald Trump, former president of the United States, and Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO), incumbent president of Mexico. Lastly, this work is going to briefly discuss how international issues can influence domestic politics, with the intention of achieving a comprehensive understanding on how states’ positions are shaped on global environmental issues.

Shaping Global Environmental Issues: Domestic Politics

Since governments have the traditional obligation to respond to their national interests and those of their diverse constituencies to remain in office, international environmental issues represent the challenge of balancing the state’s immediate needs with those of future generations. When addressing problems that transcend their territory but that indeed represent a threat to their stability, states face the dilemma of upholding their 400-year-old conception of sovereignty, or to compromise some of that authority to cooperate with the international community to tackle this common crisis. To make that decision –which is in no way static– governments must consider a broad range of domestic and international factors that are simultaneously at play. However, this work will be mostly focus on the first. From the media to civil society, to economic interests, and to individual leaders; each of them have a role to play in shaping a state’s position on global environmental issues (Dyer, 2014, pp. 85-89).

Regarding domestic sources and depending on whether it is possible to presume states to be independent to design their own policies, some scholars divide these sources into two broad areas: one that focuses specifically on the state and the actors within its structure (statist approach), and the other focusing on the influence that diverse interest groups and public opinion have on foreign environmental policy (societal approach) (Falkner, 2013, p. 254).

Respecting the societal explanations, this approach put forward the notion that environmental policies are shaped by the principles shared by the majority of a state’s society and its interests. Here, the state is just a moderator of those values and interests that are on a permanent and dynamic confrontation to influence those policies in order to have stronger –or softer– environmental regulations. E.g., it is through lobbying and socio-political mobilization, along with media coverage, that certain parties and/or specific candidates (i.e., policymakers) win or lose elections (Marchiori, Dietz, and Tavoni, 2017, pp. 116). However, this explanation leaves out the fact that actors within the state structure do have their own values and personal interests that also have massive influence over a state’s position towards the environment, even though they are indeed subject to the already mentioned strong bottom-up pressures (Falkner, 2013, pp. 255-256). Following this logic, the statist approach recognises the influence that the different domestic actors have, but places its focus instead on the central role of states and its main actors inside the traditional three branches of government, as well as the interplay among and within them (Barkdull and Harris 2002, cited in Falkner, 2013, p. 257). Furthermore, it is widely accepted that heads of state in particular play a paramount role in shaping –or hindering– the environmental agenda at both national and global levels (Falkner, 2013, p. 263).

As states are still the only actors capable of establishing effective global controls by producing international law, agreements, institutions for global cooperation, and other sorts of regulations that go from taxes to trade; for the purpose of this essay, it would be essential to focus the attention on states and their most relevant players within them, as for they are –from a domestic politics perspective– highly influential in determining a state’s preference regarding environmental issues. Apart from rational explanations like environmental vulnerability and abatement costs mentioned elsewhere in this work, the political regime and structure of a state play a paramount part in defining its position on the environment, as these characteristics impact how heads of state address the national interest. For example, it is widely accepted that, on average, autocracies are less devoted to environmental protection than democracies (Morin, Orsini and Jinnah, 2020, pp. 95-96, 100-101). However, as complex and dynamic entities, this correlation is explained by the fact that democracies are –in general– more concerned with public opinion and, due to their higher level of human and civil rights protection, more susceptive to civil mobilizations (Bättig and Bernauer, 2009, cited in Morin, Orsini and Jinnah, 2020, p. 101).

Moreover, even within democracies there are considerable diversities that also impact a state’s position on environmental issues. The attributions hold by the executive branch of government vary in relation to whether the state is constituted in a parliamentary or a presidential regime (Morin, Orsini and Jinnah, 2020, pp. 102-104). In both cases, however, democratically elected leaders are constantly the subject of electoral and economic pressures that can easily derail long-term pro-environment objectives (Hovi et al., 2009, cited in Morin, Orsini and Jinnah, 2020, p. 102).

Taking a Foreign Policy Analysis approach, it is relevant to closely reflect on the decision-making process of leaders that eventually transforms into policies. Both the handling of a problem as well as the person responsible of doing it (high officeholders), have direct impact over decisions and ultimately on the whole position taken by a state on global environmental issues. Furthermore, to effectively analyse leadership it would be necessary to consider the leader’s behaviour and emotions –from a psychological and even neurological perspective–, the reasons behind those attitudes, and how his close associates perceive and interpret them, as all these factors directly affect policymaking (Hill, 2011, pp. 918, 922-923).

The Role of Leaders: U.S. and Mexico

Either by voluntarily transforming our social, economic, and cultural paradigms or by its disastrous effects if unaddressed, climate change –and the broader environmental crisis– will deeply change (in fact is currently changing) the contemporary model of global societies (Hermwille and Sanderink, 2019, p. 45). Therefore, it is of the utmost importance to make serious reflections regarding the role played by two heads of state –one former and one still in office– who are leading their respective nations against decades of environmental best practices and global political efforts to achieve sustainable development: Donald Trump, 45th president of the U.S., and Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador (AMLO), incumbent president of Mexico until 2024.

As for Trump, he explicitly devoted his one term in office to enhance a narrative where fossil fuels, its workers, and industries; the ones that make possible –according to Trump– the “American Dream”, were under attack by foreign powers through the Paris Accord, and where he was their heroic saviour. A narrative where climate change is non-existent (Hermwille and Sanderink, 2019, pp. 46, 52, 56).

The role that Donald Trump played in shaping U.S. policy and discourse towards global environmental issues is undeniable. Even the official historic website of The White House for the Trump administration is full of the former president’s rhetoric against the environment. From leading “America’s energy revolution” by becoming the first oil producers of the world (among other claims) to having “resolved the OPEC oil crisis” while being, at the same time, the country with the biggest greenhouse gas emission reductions in the planet –citing a time frame that coincided more with the Bush and Obama administrations than his own–, the list of his achievements (as opposed to his government’s) focused in having done “more than” any other national or international actor in human history to address environmental protection, without recognising it –at the same time– as a major threat to the U.S. or the planet (The White House, 2020).

However, despite the official rhetoric directed (most likely) to try to alter history, it is widely accepted that Trump and his administration had an appalling environmental record. During the last months of his presidency alone, under the flag of “energy dominance” Trump advanced detrimental regulatory changes to environmental protection policies regarding wildlife, air quality, and oil and gas drilling rights, even in historically protected regions such as the Alaskan tundra and Chaco Canyon in New Mexico, where hundredths of species of protected fauna and local tribes inhabit (Milman, 2020).

Regarding AMLO, first as a prominent leader of the opposition in Mexico and now as president, his position regarding oil and the environment has remained unchanged. Guided by nationalism, he opposed and promised to cancel the 2013 energy constitutional reform that liberalized the (declining) Mexican oil industry –state managed since 1938– and that started the transition towards clean energy generation promoted by the former administration, which he accuses of rampant corruption and of following neoliberal ideology. With respect to AMLO’s energy policy, his main goal is to cease all oil exports in order to strengthen Pemex (i.e., the Mexican state-owned oil company) refining capacity and fulfil the domestic demand of fuel without depending on foreign powers (Wood, 2018, pp. 164-166).

Using a rhetoric of “energy sovereignty”, president AMLO bid to start buying coal in big quantities again to produce energy. Even though his ideology is well received by regions where digging coal is almost the only economic activity, there is great preoccupation in other sectors of Mexico not just because of the fact of going back several years of energy transition and leadership among developing countries, but because the AMLO administration (and above all him alone) are hindering the production of and foreign investments in clean energy –which he calls a “sophism”– under the excuse that renewables are not trustworthy. Furthermore, to understand AMLO, it would be important to briefly reflect on his modest roots in a particularly poor south-eastern state of Mexico (Tabasco) once rich in petroleum, where the golden age of oil exports is remembered with deep nostalgia. Hence, when AMLO says that his administration is “going to rescue Pemex…” he is also implying that he is saving Tabasco (Agren, 2021), and perhaps his own poor childhood.

Despite reality, as with Trump, the Mexican government website contains nationalistic claims of fighting for energy sovereignty by using fossil fuels –“as other countries do”–, creating jobs and public investments while respecting the international environmental commitments made by Mexico not without, however, officially casting doubts over the reliability of renewables (The Secretariat of Energy, 2020). “We are going to keep protecting Pemex…(Mexico) will only extract the oil needed to meet the domestic demand…this way we are acting with responsibility and the inheritance of future generations is not going to be affected”, expressed president AMLO during the celebration of his first 100 days of his third year of government (The Secretariat of Energy, 2021).

Arguably, there are some interesting parallelisms between AMLO and Donald Trump. However, unlike Trump, AMLO (yet not his government) remains highly popular among voters with a 65% of approval. Nevertheless, this enthusiasm for AMLO is not shared by all the foreign and national investors that his energy policies are affecting, so it is reasonable to expect many legal challenges through the dispute-settlement mechanisms of the vast network of preferential trade agreements Mexico has signed, especially the new NAFTA (The Economist, 2021a).

Furthermore, when analysing the fundamental role of leaders in presidential regimes, it is essential to consider three important factors that are well positioned to determine the level of autocracy with which these political leaders can act within their countries, namely: the vitality of their democracy, the strength of their rule of law, and their freedom status in relation to political and social issues. Therefore, regarding the two cases of study used in this work, both the United States and Mexico are classified in the broad category of “flawed democracies”, however, the U.S. ranks 25 while Mexico ranks 72 out of 167 analysed countries in 2020 (The Economist, 2021b). In terms of rule of law strength, the U.S. ranks 21 while Mexico ranks 104 out of 128 countries (World Justice Project, 2020). Respecting their freedom status, the United States is considered to be a “free” country while Mexico is graded as a “partly free” country (Freedom House, 2021).

As a free liberal democracy with a strong rule of law, the United States have the necessary institutional and societal framework to ameliorate the impact of an unstable, ill-informed leader. In an interesting analysis of the first 100 days of Trump’s presidency, Dr. Elizabeth Bomberg raised the importance that relevant domestic and global actors could have in countering the erratic behaviour of the 45th president of the U.S. Better put, “Trump’s impact…depend less on what he does, and more on what others do” (Bomberg, 2017, p. 956).

Focusing on some of these alternative domestic actors, from a legislative perspective, to get approval for his most important actions (e.g., passing the federal budget) Trump had to negotiate with the diverse congressional distribution of members with respect to party ideologies, states and constituencies’ interests, and personal beliefs –to mention a few–. Furthermore, from a legal view, the Trump administration had to fight their entire term with court litigations promoted by NGOs, states, and cities (both Republican and Democrat) against many of his environment-damaging policies and executive orders. In fact, as a federal republic, much of the efforts to keep tackling climate change and other environmental issues continued within states and cities despite Trump’s presidency. Moreover, Donald Trump was (indirectly) effective on uniting different civil society movements against him and his policies on environmental, religious, health, minority rights, and scientific grounds. Lastly, over the last decade the U.S. economy has been rapidly shifting from coal to renewable energies. Therefore, even markets were against Trump (Bomberg, 2017, pp. 958-961).

Even though Donald Trump was able to stablish major policy setbacks to the environment domestic agenda of the U.S., it would also be important to question ourselves about all the things he would have wanted to do that were blocked by effective checks and balances, as well as by other domestic politics actors of the American democracy. Furthermore, the newly inaugurated Biden administration has demonstrated a strong commitment to global environmental issues, especially regarding the efforts to tackle climate change “at home and abroad…with evidence-based policymaking” (The White House, 2021), and it is well positioned to undo Trump’s harms and advance the environmental agenda within the US, as well as to reclaim –to some extent– their global leadership on the issue.

As for Mexico, the future of public environmental advocacy looks rather gloomy. With three more years to go, the AMLO administration is likely to keep their legislative majorities in the upcoming midterm elections. Therefore, without proper check and balances and an organized civil and political opposition to his power, president AMLO will continue to institutionalize his environmental-damaging energy policy at constitutional and budget levels. How will the Biden administration will react to his highly dependable neighbour’s carbon-led stubbornness remains an interesting question. Fortunately, the Paris Accord has proved to be resilient to the frontal attacks of one of its more relevant members (Bomberg, 2017, p. 962), and together with other international politics actors –especially those related to economic factors– will continue to put pressure on individual, more vulnerable countries to pursue a greener future.

International Relations as Source of Domestic Politics

In order to fully understand how domestic politics shape a state’s position on global environmental issues, it would be essential to analyse how international politics could potentially influence those national decisions, especially in countries where democracy and the rule of law are weak. Under those conditions, the presence of a wilful leader could render other domestic actors unable to effectively take part on public decisions. Therefore, close attention should be paid as well to the role played by international sources in moulding domestic politics regarding the environment, particularly in autocratic regimes (Falkner, 2013, p. 263).

From a structural (realist) perspective, hegemonic states –considered to be so by military, economic and political reasons– play a decisive role in moving forward the global environmental agenda through legitimacy and leadership (Clark, 2011, cited in Falkner, 2013, p. 258). This power-based logic, however, relies on the wide existing inequalities between countries and the power imbalances these provoke. Nevertheless, the rapid rise of new powers (namely, the BRICS) has changed the geopolitical dynamics of international negotiations, on which the global North was more used to dictate than to debate (Falkner, 2013, p. 259). On the other hand, more social (e.g., constructivist and English School) angles establish that global environmental issues –whether because of moral, rational, communitarian, or self-interest reasons– are in position to incentivise cooperation in the anarchic international system, by redefining the identities and interests of states (Falkner, 2012, cited in Falkner, 2013, p. 260).

Furthermore, sovereignty and self-interest have always been an important factor that states consider when embarking on international negotiations. However, specifically regarding environmental issues it would be important to consider additional factors such as the state’s high vulnerability to the existing environmental crises, and the cost it would represent to them addressing those issues. Jan Karlas put forward a relevant criteria to explain why states take the positions they do regarding climate change, namely: states without a privileged position within the international system that are also exceptionally vulnerable to climate are likely to vow for a strong international regime to address the crisis. Similarly, states with a modest international position that are less responsible for the crisis, in terms of emissions, will presumably support hard international laws on climate protection if they share the principles of global cooperation (Karlas, 2017, pp. 825-827).

From a theoretical perspective, Karla’s criteria take a combination of neorealism, constructivism, and a rationalist institutionalism approach to support his logic. In other words, cooperation on climate issues depends on states’ calculation between the benefits and the costs that cooperation would represent to them, as well as on the level of socialization (i.e., the extent to which a principle is shared collectively and therefore legitimate) that environmental norms have within their government structures, political leaders, and/or societies, while considering their place in the international system in terms of whether they are looking to enhance their influence through international institutions, or to defend their sovereignty from external threats (Karlas, 2017, pp. 830-832).

Therefore, going back to the case study of Mexico, the relatively low immediate vulnerability to the environmental crises, the unclear gains from international cooperation, and the very low level of socialisation of environmental norms –especially applicable to president AMLO–, together with the mentioned weaknesses of other domestic actors, are factors well positioned to explain the incumbent administration position on global environmental issues. However, due to Mexico´s modest place in the international system, it is likely that the deeply environment-committed president Biden will use the hegemonic position of the U.S. –both directly (through bilateral diplomacy) and indirectly (through international institutions)– either to pressure or to help socialise his southern neighbour into more climate-sensible policies.

Conclusion

In conclusion, to understand the position that a certain state takes on the international environmental agenda, it would be essential to analyse the effect that the dynamic and contrasting interests of businessmen, citizens, scientists, the media, high public officials, and bureaucrats have over domestic politics, in terms of pressuring their governments to take a certain approach towards the environment. Furthermore, the effectiveness of those pressures and actors depends, in turn, on the type of regime a state has. For example, derived from their developed levels of overall freedoms and the dynamics of electoral considerations, democracies are particularly vulnerable to lobbying, party interests, civil protests, and public opinion in general, as well as other external pressures such as international cooperation or top-down approaches from hegemonic powers.

However, even within liberal democracies the level of influence of these domestic actors –both from a statist and a societal perspective– varies depending on the different attributions of their state’s structure. Nations with solid check and balances are less exposed to extremist views in terms of policymaking than countries with weak institutions and rule of law. Nevertheless, as this essay efforts to argue, due to their popularity, legitimacy, constitutional capacities, as well as the shortcomings of other domestic actors, it is political leaders and their preconceived values, ideologies, emotions and interests the ones more able to influence their nation´s position on global environmental issues.

Bibliography

Agren, D. (2021) ‘Mexico was once a climate leader – now it’s betting big on coal’, The Guardian, 15 February. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/feb/15/mexico-coal-fossil-fuels-climate-crisis-amlo#:~:text=President%20Andr%C3%A9s%20Manuel%20L%C3%B3pez%20Obrador,from%20small%20producers%20like%20Rivera (Accessed 12 April 2021).

Bomberg, E. (2017) ‘Environmental Politics in the Trump era: an early assessment’, Environmental Politics, 26(5), 956-963. DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/09644016.2017.1332543

Dyer, H.C. (2014) ‘States. Nations, Sovereignty and the International System’, in Harris, P.G. (ed.) Routledge Handbook of Global Environmental Politics. London and New York: Routledge Taylor & Francis Group, pp. 85–96.

Falkner, R. (2013) ‘The Nation-State, International Society, and the Global Environment’, in Falkner, R. (ed.) The Handbook of Global Climate and Environment Policy. Hoboken, NJ: Wiley-Blackwell, pp. 251-267.

Freedom House (2021) Countries and Territories. Available at: https://freedomhouse.org/countries/freedom-world/scores (Accessed 16 April 2021).

Hermwille, L. and Sanderink, L. (2019) ‘Make Fossil Fuels Great Again? The Paris Agreement, Trump, and the US Fossil Fuel Industry’, Global Environmental Politics, 19(4), pp. 45-62. DOI: 10.1162/glep_a_00526

Hill, C. (2011) ‘Foreign Policy Analysis’, in Badie, B., Berg-Schlosser, D. and Morlino, L. (eds.) International Encyclopedia of Political Science. Thousand Oaks: Sage Publications, pp. 917-928.

Karlas, J. (2017) ‘States, coalitions, and the legalization of the global climate regime: negotiations on the post-2020 architecture’, Environmental Politics, 26(5), pp.825–846. DOI: 10.1080/09644016.2017.1324754

Marchiori, C., Dietz, S. and Tavoni, A. (2017) ‘Domestic politics and the formation of international environmental agreements’, Journal of Environmental Economics and Management, 81, pp.115–131. DOI: 10.1016/j.jeem.2016.09.009

Milman, O. (2020) ‘A destructive legacy: Trump bids for final hack at environmental protections’, The Guardian, 21 November. Available at: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/nov/21/trump-environmental-protections-rollback-climate-crisis (Accessed 11 April 2021).

Morin, J.F., Orsini, A. and Jinnah, S. (2020) Global Environmental Politics. Oxford and New York: Oxford University Press.

The Economist (2021a) ‘A bad energy law says much about Mexico’s president’, 13 March. Available at: https://www.economist.com/the-americas/2021/03/11/a-bad-energy-law-says-much-about-mexicos-president (Accessed 12 April 2021).

The Economist (2021b) ‘Global democracy has a very bad year’, 2 February. Available at: https://www-economist-com.ezproxy.is.ed.ac.uk/graphic-detail/2021/02/02/global-democracy-has-a-very-bad-year (Accessed 16 April 2021).

The Secretariat of Energy (2020) The Government of Mexico goes forward with the implementation of the Energy Policy to guarantee its population the access to the basic public services related to energy. Translated from the Spanish by B168331. Mexico City: The Government of Mexico. Available at: https://www.gob.mx/sener/articulos/el-gobierno-de-mexico-avanza-en-la-politica-energetica-para-garantizar-a-la-poblacion-el-acceso-a-los-servicios-basicos-de-energia (Accessed: 9 April 2021).

The Secretariat of Energy (2021) Message of the President of Mexico regarding the first 100 days of his third year in office. Translated from the Spanish by B168331. Mexico City: The Government of Mexico. Available at: https://www.gob.mx/sener/es/articulos/mensaje-del-presidente-de-mexico-de-los-primeros-100-dias-del-tercer-ano-de-gobierno?idiom=es (Accessed 9 April 2021).

The White House (2020) Energy & Environment: Administration Achievements. Washington, D.C.: The White House. Available at: https://trumpwhitehouse.archives.gov/issues/energy-environment/ (Accessed 9 April 2021).

The White House (2021) Fact Sheet: President Biden Takes Executive Actions to Tackle Climate Crisis at Home and Abroad, Create Jobs, and Restore Scientific Integrity Across Federal Government. Washington, D.C.: The White House. Available at: https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/statements-releases/2021/01/27/fact-sheet-president-biden-takes-executive-actions-to-tackle-the-climate-crisis-at-home-and-abroad-create-jobs-and-restore-scientific-integrity-across-federal-government/ (Accessed 10 April 2021).

Wood, D. (2018) ‘An Uncertain Future: The Energy Sector Under AMLO’, in Wood, D. (ed.) Mexico’s New Energy Reform. Washington, D.C.: Mexico Institute, Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, pp. 164-168. Available at: https://www.wilsoncenter.org/publication/mexicos-new-energy-reform (Accessed: 11 April 2021).

World Justice Project (2020) WJP Rule of Law Index. Available at: https://www.worldjusticeproject.org/rule-of-law-index/global/2020 (Accessed: 16 April 2021).