More Than the Sum of Their Parts

• Author: Carl Bruch/Elizabeth Maruma Mrema
• Position: Senior Attorney and Co-Director of International Programs at the Environmental Law Institute/Principal Legal Officer
• Pages: 24-31

Page 24 ❧ THE ENVIRONMENTAL FORUM Copyright © 2009, Environmental Law Institute®, Washington, D.C. www.eli.org.

Reprinted by permission from The Environmental Forum®, July/August 2009

The past few decades have seen a rapid

development of international envi-

ronmental agreements. Countries

have developed bilateral, regional,

and global instruments addressing a

panoply of environmental threats and

challenges, including biodiversity

loss, climate change, air pollution, water quantity

and quality, land degradation, and hazardous waste

and substances.

is rapid development of international envi-

ronmental law has been hampered by a lack of co-

hesion. ere are an estimated 500 (perhaps many

more) multilateral environmental agreements, or

MEAs.1 ese agreements constitute a patchwork

of international environmental law, sometimes

overlapping, sometimes leaving gaps, and poten-

tially conf‌licting. e fact that dif‌ferent countries

frequently are party to each agreement compounds

the problem of coordination.2 Attempts to clarify

the relationship among the agreements and to im-

prove their synergistic operation at the international

level — often termed international environmental

governance — has been mired in political conf‌lict

and technical problems.3

Complicating the situation is the fact that imple-

mentation has lagged behind the creation of agree-

ments for political, structural, f‌inancial, social, in-

stitutional, legal, and technical reasons.4 Together,

these factors often result in the absence of national

laws and regulations, institutional frameworks, and

practices necessary for the ef‌fective implementation

of MEAs. Moreover, for developing countries try-

ing to implement multiple MEAs — some are par-

ties to 10, 20, or more5 — it can be challenging just

deciding where to start.

Responding to this implementation gap, the

United Nations Environment Program and other

international organizations are shifting their em-

phasis from the development of international en-

vironmental law to its implementation.6 is shift

was manifested in the 2002 World Summit on Sus-

tainable Development,7 the Bali Strategic Plan on

Technology Support and Capacity Building,8 and

in numerous lower-prof‌ile initiatives over the past

few years.9

Increasingly, countries are considering approach-

es for synergistic implementation of international

environmental law. Synergies and interlinkages

of‌fer a more holistic and organic approach to ad-

dressing environmental challenges. ey also of‌fer

opportunities to more ef‌f‌iciently and ef‌fectively im-

More an

the Sum of

eir Parts

Improving compliance with and

enforcement of international

environmental agreements through

synergistic implementation

Carl Bruch

Elizabeth Maruma Mrema

re s e a rc h & Po l i c y sT u d i e s

Carl Bruch is a S enior Attorney and

Co-Di rector of Internati onal Progr ams

at the Envir onment al L aw I nstitut e.

Elizabeth Maruma Mrema is Principal

Legal Ofcer and Ofcer in Charge of the

Bio divers ity

a nd L a nd

L a w a n d

Governance Unit at the Un ited Na -

tions Enviro nment Program Divis ion of

Enviro nmental Law and Convention s

in Nairobi. The authors are grateful to

Erica Penc ak an d Ross Wolfa rth for

research assist ance.