From a historical perspective, it is easy to see that the major themes of the current debate on international environmental policy - such as the reconciliation of the pillars of sustainable development or the debate on the establishment of an international organisation to manage environmental problems - are by no means new. Many issues, such as reconciling ecological sustainability and economic growth, mentioned in the previous section, were already on the environmental policy agenda 50 years ago.

Perhaps contrary to intuition, the economic pillar did not become part of sustainable development at the request of the rich Western powers, but out of a demand from poor emerging countries to be able to build a future for themselves that the rich countries had already achieved. Opening up these historical developments makes it easier for us to understand the nature of solving environmental problems: how compromises often lead to a solution that is not the best from the perspective of the various dimensions of sustainable development, but is at least possible in each historical situation.

While sustainable development is a matter of enormous fundamental issues, such as the satisfaction of basic human needs and justification for the existence of non-human nature, we should not forget that the issues of sustainable development are, by their very nature, political. At the same time, we must remember that environmental and sustainability issues are only one issue on the world political agenda, and not historically the most important one. Moreover, these issues are shaped by the world political situations and prevailing currents of thought at each historical moment.

It should also be noted that tackling global environmental problems has required thousands of people to come together and co-operate. Raising and maintaining a common “spirit” is, therefore, an important factor behind the results achieved at megaconferences. Moreover, the general descriptions of conferences and agreements, which we will discuss in more detail shortly, often overlook the fact that whether it is states, large organizations, or megaconferences, discussions and decisions are carried out by people. Thus, the personal competence and tireless work of an individual person, usually an experienced diplomat, may have played a crucial role.

The timeline below shows the main UN conferences on environment and development, climate and biodiversity, which we return to several times in this and the next section. The UNFCCC refers to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the CBD to the UN Convention on Biodiversity, both of which originated in Rio de Janeiro in 1992. To find out more about the conference, hover over the conference.

1960s and 70s - the era of environmental awakening 

While the order of importance of the three pillars of sustainability can be endlessly debated, their chronological order is clear. Sustainable development took off specifically because of developed countries' concern for increasing environmental problems.

A major step towards international environmental governance was taken in the late 1960s, when Sweden initiated the first United Nations Conference on Environment and Development. In its initiative, Sweden argued that changes in the natural environment had become an immediate problem in both developing and developed countries and that international cooperation was needed to address them.

In the late 1960s, there was a firm belief in the blessings of economic growth. In the 1960s, as before the global financial crisis of the late 2000s, there was a widespread belief that in the era of modern economics, economic downturns could be avoided altogether. In 1961, the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) was created to promote economic growth and free trade. A founding member of the Club of Rome, Alexander King (who was also Director-General for Scientific Affairs at the OECD at the time) has described the OECD as a temple of growth for industrialised countries, providing growth for growth's sake. Somewhat paradoxically, the Club of Rome, which is known precisely for bringing the impossibility of unlimited growth into the debate, was thus born in the corridors of the OECD.

Economic growth and the consequent strengthening of welfare states were believed to appease social unrest. But the 1960s is known as the decade of social movements, culminating in the protests of 1968 in many places in Europe – most famously in France. The movement opposed the war (particularly the Vietnam War), racism, nuclear power, and conservative values, but criticism of capitalism and material economic growth also had its place. As part of this movement, the environmental protest also intensified. One important source of global environmental awareness in the 1960s was Rachel Carson's 'Silent Spring’ published in 1962, which brought environmental toxins, such as DDT, and their effects into the general debate.

In Finland, too, the first wave of the environmental movement took place in the late 1960s and early 1970s, with protests focusing on environmental pollution and the forest issue.

The international political situation during the environmental awakening of the 1960s and 70s was very different from today. The era was marked by the Cold War between East and West as well as by postcolonialism, as a large number of developing countries only gained independence during the 1960s. The environment emerged on the international political agenda during the 1960s and was focused in particular on a few core issues: the ecological effects of industrialization and poverty had already become apparent.

Tensions between developed and developing countries also required the attention of the international community. In the United States and Europe, social movements put pressure on policymakers to address environmental problems such as forest deaths and the spread of toxic chemicals. In contrast, developing countries were skeptical of international efforts by developed countries to reduce environmental damage. A large number of developing countries had only recently become independent and had greater concern about accelerating economic growth to ensure their own sovereignty. The North’s efforts to spread stricter environmental regulations and cleaner production met with resistance in developing countries, which saw their prosperity through industrialization as a historic right.

In developing countries, environmental problems were above all linked to poverty – the lack of food security, clean water, and proper sanitation. The “vicious circle” of poverty and environmental degradation is one example of the problematic relationship between poverty and the environment. In it, farmers under the pressure of population growth and poverty expand cultivation into more fragile areas, further weakening them, thus reducing yields, which in turn further impoverishes farmers who need to expand to more fragile areas, etc.

The early 1970s were thus an important time for international environmental advocacy and cooperation. One milestone in the awakening of environmental concern was the Club of Rome report 'Limits to Growth', published in 1972.

Stockholm Conference 1972

In 1972, the first international conference on the human environment, initiated by Sweden, was convened in Stockholm (United Nations Conference on Human Environment, UNCHE). This is widely regarded as the starting point for global environmental diplomacy. The conference recognised that that environment and development should be considered in relation to each other, rather than in isolation. The term ‘sustainable development’ was not yet used at the conference, but the international community that took part in it – delegations from well over a hundred countries – agreed on the principles of more sustainable development.

However, this should not lead to the conclusion that either the preparatory work leading up to the conference or the development that started from it were harmonious processes. The Stockholm Conference took several years to prepare, during which time the divergence between the interests of developing and developed countries became clear. From the perspective of the developing countries, the environmental concerns of the West were the problems of the rich industrialised countries, which would only divert attention and resources away from the main concerns of the developing countries: (under)development and poverty. The agenda for international environmental policy, therefore, had to be built from the outset not only on the environmental concerns of developed countries but also on the social concerns of developing countries. As Maurice Strong, Secretary-General of the Stockholm Conference and first Director of the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) established at the conference, writes in his memoirs:

Today, it would be said that it was a matter of reconciling the economic, social, and ecological dimensions of sustainability.

Given the political situation of the time, with tensions between East and West as well as North and South, the fact that the Stockholm Conference was held at all can be seen as its first achievement. The Soviet Union, and with it the other Warsaw Pact countries, did, however, boycott the Stockholm Conference.

The establishment of the United Nations Environmental Programme (UNEP) is generally regarded as another achievement of the Stockholm Conference. Even then, 50 years ago, the same issues were being weighed up as today: what kind of institution would be needed to be strong enough to deliver results in an international environmental policy shaped by conflicting objectives? The options were at least the creation of an independent organisation outside the UN or the creation of a new organisation within the UN, such as the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO). 

However, UNEP was set up specifically as an environmental programme. It is an independent and autonomous body within the UN Secretariat, but it does not have any autonomous powers or supranational authority on the basis of which it could, for example, legislate (let alone force) states on environmental issues. UNEP, therefore, has a mainly coordinating role. UNEP was headquartered in Nairobi, Kenya, and was the first headquarters established by the UN in developing countries.

There are mixed views in the scientific literature as to whether the creation of UNEP was a success. On the one hand, it has been argued that in the face of global political cross-pressures such as those described above, all that was achieved was a loose, poorly budgeted programme with no real influence. Moreover, the programme was deliberately buried in Nairobi, Kenya, far from the centres of power.

However, more detailed historical analysis shows that, while UNEP did not become an organisation with greater powers, it was not deliberately designed to be an ineffective programme driven by malicious and selfish national economic goals.  Instead, UNEP was created as a kind of 'anchor institution' to serve as the world's ecological conscience and source of information, to provide impartial monitoring and assessment, to work to solve urgent environmental problems and promote international agreements, to strengthen links between environmental policy actors and, above all, to provide leadership for collective efforts to solve environmental problems. 

UNEP's organisational and funding model, as well as the location of its headquarters, were the result of compromises in international politics. It is nevertheless clear that UNEP has suffered from a lack of funding and its remote location. At the same time, UNEP's location in Africa has also helped to bring environmental debates to developing countries and to put environmental problems in developing countries on the international political agenda.

The Stockholm Conference Declaration can also be seen to have had far-reaching consequences. The Declaration consists of 26 principles, which separately address the need for development in developing countries and the need for environmental protection in developed countries, but a striking number of principles also address the link between the two. 

So it was at Stockholm in 1972 that the fundamental pillars of sustainable development, which are still at the heart of sustainable development today, were established, along with the tensions between them: on the one hand, the development of environmental protection and, on the other, the right of developing countries in particular to improve their conditions through economic growth. At the same time, an "anchor" was created on which virtually all international environmental agreements were built over the next couple of decades.

The Stockholm Conference is therefore seen as an important impetus for the awakening of international awareness of environmental and development problems. The 1970s also saw the conclusion of a number of multilateral environmental agreements, including those on the protection of endangered species, wetlands and oceans mentioned in the first part of this course.

1980s - the enthusiasm wanes

As the 1980s approached, enthusiasm for sustainable development waned. After Stockholm, the next major UN conference on environment and development was held in Nairobi in 1982 and is widely regarded as a failure.  Today, it is part of the forgotten history of UN environmental diplomacy.

By the early 1980s, the environment had fallen from the core issues of international politics and national governments, or as the long-time director of UNEP, Mostafa Tolba, put it in an interview with Environmental Conservation magazine in 1982 (Tolba & Lamb 1982, 2): "What worries me most is that governments are not worried enough."

Image: Mostafa Kamal Tolba. UNEP Executive Director from 1975 to 1992. CC BY-NC-SA 2.0 (Image information: References 4.2.).

The main reasons for the decline of environmental concerns were the escalating tensions of the Cold War and, in particular, the crisis in the world economy in the 1970s and the resulting change in economic policy thinking. Environmental policy can thus be said to have been overshadowed by security and economic policy.

The post-war period up to the 1970s has been described as the golden age of economic growth and the construction and establishment of welfare states in the Western world. The golden age also describes the period in the sense of the international monetary system. In 1944 at a conference in Bretton Woods, USA, it was agreed to peg currencies to the dollar, which in turn was pegged to gold. According to the general assessment, the system worked well as a stabilizer of the world economy.

However, the world economy went into crisis in the early 1970s. No single theory can comprehensively explain the reasons for the economic stagnation that begun. However, the starting point is obvious – the first oil crisis and the US trade exacerbated by it. In 1971, Richard Nixon unilaterally removed the dollar from the gold stock, marking the end of the post-war Bretton Woods era. The end of the Bretton Woods period paved the way for new currents of economic thought, making possible the strengthening of the economic policy trend known as neoliberalism. Neoliberalism – very briefly defined – underlines that free private property rights, free markets, and free trade are the most effective drivers of growth in human well-being.

In the United States, Ronald Reagan was elected president in 1980. The Reagan administration politicized the environment, and the scale of the Reagan administration's actions in environmental deregulation was unprecedented. It also created a model for all future presidents representing the Republican Party of the United States. In addition to deregulation, Reagan's strategy included emphasizing cost-benefit analysis, appointing pro-industry leaders to environmental agencies, and rhetorically challenging environmental protection. These strategies were also heavily deployed during Donald Trump's administration.

Reagan's stance also had an impact on international development policy. The UN's attempts to influence the rules and institutions of the international economy - the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund - went against the ideology of the free market, which neither the Reagan administration nor Margaret Thatcher's administration in Britain allowed. Reagan himself did not attend the UN meeting in Nairobi. The Soviet Union did not send a representative at all.

Against this backdrop, with progress on both environment and development policies seemingly in decline, the UN sought to strengthen its own environment and development agenda by appointing the Brundtland Commission in 1983. The definition of sustainable development contained in the Commission's 1987 report, Our Common Future, was the starting point for this part of the course. The report popularised the concept of sustainable development and inextricably linked environment and development. "Our Common Future" was an important factor in putting sustainable development back at the centre of international environmental diplomacy. 

Coordination of environment and development was thus also at the heart of the planning of the next UN High-Level Conference on the Environment, to be held in Rio de Janeiro, as reflected in the name of the conference, the United Nations Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED).

1990s - A new dawn for sustainable development

By the 1990s, the environment had risen from the margins to become one of the "normal" issues on the agenda of international cooperation and the policies of nation states. In international politics, security pressures had eased with the collapse of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War, opening up new avenues for international environmental cooperation. 

Perhaps the most significant UNEP meeting to date was held from June 3rd to June 14th, 1992 in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. This conference is most often referred to as the Earth Summit. The Rio Conference is widely considered a success. The Rio Declaration contained many formulations that are still at the heart of environmental policy today. These include the “common but differentiated responsibilities” principle (principle 7), the “precautionary principle” (principle 15) and the “polluter pays principle” (principle 16).

‘Common but differentiated responsibility’ is the principle of international environmental law pertaining that all states are responsible for combating global environmental degradation, but not all states are equally responsible. The idea is that while environmental protection belongs to all, including developing countries, developed countries (which have caused more environmental degradation than developing countries) must make a greater contribution to solving environmental problems.

'Precautionary principle' states that states should not delay action to prevent serious and irreversible pollution, even if there is no full scientific certainty of the threat.

‘Polluter pays’ is the principle of environmental policy that environmental damage is primarily the responsibility of the polluter, that is, polluter bears the costs of preventing and/or compensating the damage to humans and non-human nature.

Of course, the Rio Conference on Environment and Development also received criticism, some of which focused specifically on the conference's main theme, the contradiction between economic growth and environmental protection. According to this critique, the Earth Summit – and ‘Our Common Future’ before it – rather represented the old ideology and institutions of economic growth, only wrapped in a new package.

The tense relationship between liberal democracy and environmental protection

The end of the Cold War and the consequent unveiling of the environmental devastation of the socialist bloc seemed to demonstrate the superiority of liberal democracies in environmental protection. However, the tension between environmental protection and democracy has been the subject of (at least academic) debate at least since the 1970s.

Liberal democracy emphasizes individual rights and freedoms of choice, and critics see these premises as producing precisely those things — individualism, greed, profit maximization, overconsumption — that are at odds with the core values ​​of sustainability. This debate is often conducted through the concept of ‘ecological democracy’, which criticizes capitalist markets, private property rights, and liberal democratic institutions linked to the prevailing multilateral system.

These notions that even liberal democracies cannot respond to global environmental problems began to intensify in the 1990s. This intensification can be seen as a counterweight to the strong period of liberal democracy that followed the end of the Cold War. Although a number of international environmental agreements had been reached in the field of environmental protection, the most devastating problems – climate change and biodiversity loss – had not been resolved but have continued to deteriorate to this day.

Critics argue that the worsening of environmental problems is not a question of distortions in liberal democracies, such as asymmetric power relations or corruption, but rather an inevitable by-product of the theoretical and practical tensions between liberalism and democracy. Examples of the latter are short election cycles and territorial and electoral boundaries that have no relationship to global ecological boundaries. That is, democratically elected representatives are accountable only to their electorates, even if the decisions they make cause harm without territorial and temporal boundaries.

There were also major changes in the power relations of international environmental policy in the 1990s. The EU became a leader in international environmental diplomacy, while in the 1970s and 1980s the US had a more prominent role.

In Europe, the Green parties gained significant political influence in the 1990s with the support of the Green civil movement. Similarly, the EU institutions (Commission and Parliament) sought to establish common environmental standards for Member States. In the United States, by contrast, the environmental movement tended to wane in the 1990s. 

Indeed, Europe's rise as a leader in international environmental policy is explained by the environmental policy dynamics at the national and international levels. Stricter national standards were produced under the pressure of the European green movement. Therefore, the aim of economic operators at the national level was to extend the corresponding environmental standards to competing countries in order to remain competitive.

Following the failure to meet the commitments made in Stockholm in 1972, a separate Commission on Sustainable Development was set up in Rio to monitor and report on the implementation of the action programme adopted at the meeting. It was also agreed that in five years' time the UN General Assembly would review the implementation of the commitments made at the Rio Conference. 

However, the results presented by the Commission and the General Assembly in terms of progress in implementation were rather dismal: some progress had been made, but as a whole, progress was not encouraging – the state of the environment had only deteriorated since the Rio Conference.

2000s - A change in attitudes towards the pillars

The situation did not improve after the turn of the 21st century. The turn of the millennium was a symbolically important time for planning the future of environmental protection. However, the environment was left behind in the agenda of the major environmental and development conferences of the 21st century. At the UN Millennium Summit in New York in 2000, the environment was still one of the most important goals of the 21st century for world leaders. After that, the role of the environment in world politics diminished at a rapid pace. The most visible achievement of the early 2000s was the setting of the Millennium Development Goals (see box below).

When the next major UN International conference on the environment (WSSD, World Summit on Sustainable Development) was held in Johannesburg in 2002, world politics had changed again. The 9/11 terrorist attacks in the United States in 2001 had put security policy back at the forefront of international politics. As mentioned above, in the United States, environmental protection had lost its place in national politics, and U.S. interest in international environmental policy declined. At the time of the Johannesburg conference, environmental obligations were seen as conflicting with U.S. national goals. President George W. Bush did not attend the Johannesburg meeting, unlike more than a hundred other heads of state.

The situation before the Johannesburg meeting in 2002 was reminiscent of the situation 20 years earlier, in the run-up to the Nairobi meeting. The hopes raised in Rio in 1992 had not been fulfilled and the commitments not implemented. Perhaps the most important purpose of Johannesburg was to breathe new life into a fading sustainable development. As in Nairobi in 1982, expectations were not high for the success of Johannesburg 2002. But in terms of size and attendance, the conference was unprecedented. It was not only the largest UN Conference on Sustainable Development to date, but possibly the largest ever held.

There is a broad consensus in the assessments of the Johannesburg meeting that the environment was left behind economic and social sustainability. The final documents produced by the meeting mainly refer to the environment as a means of achieving economic and social development. In part, this was due to a shift in the North-South positions that had already lasted for 30 years at the time. Thus far, the North had been emphasizing the environment, and the South emphasizing the development. This set-up had survived despite the enormous effort that had been put into building a common agenda.

The work of the Brundtland Commission to launch sustainable development in the 1980s was largely aimed to reconcile these ingrained positions. Similarly, at the 1992 Rio Conference on Environment and Development, it was said that the Northern developed countries went to an environmental conference and the Southern developing countries to a development conference. Although the set-up still existed in Johannesburg, it is considered in the scientific literature to have subsided by the early 2000s. While in the past the attitude of developing countries towards the ecological pillar of sustainable development was described as a luxury that the poor cannot afford, in Johannesburg many developing countries considered the environment to be a necessary basis for social and economic development. 

At the same time, however, the perspective of the North had also changed. Where previously the focus of the North had been on the environment, it had now become an emphasis on economic development. Economic globalization – open market, privatization, etc. – was North’s remedy to improve also the conditions of the poor and the environment.*

*In this context, one of the problems of the Johannesburg meeting was that trade policy was not addressed. In 2001, the World Trade Organization (WTO) formally opened multilateral negotiations regarding the organization of world trade in Doha, Qatar, making this multi-year process known as the Doha Round or the Doha Development Agenda. According to critics, with this, sustainable development became only a minor part of the world trade negotiations. Negotiations on the Doha Development Agenda stalled in 2008.

In Johannesburg, the Northern Bloc made sure that nothing was agreed in Johannesburg that would jeopardize or weaken the existing trading systems or future trade agreements. In general, trade issues have played a much greater role in international politics than environmental questions, as reflected in the limited funding of international environmental institutions such as UNEP. 

2010s - From disappointment towards new sustainable development goals

The next UN mega-conference on Environment and Development was held in 2012 again in Rio de Janeiro, 20 years after the previous Rio meeting. Therefore it is commonly referred to as the Rio+20 meeting. The proportions were again huge. 44,000 people arrived in Rio to attend the preparatory events and the conference itself. Of the UN members, 191 countries sent representatives, 79 of whom were heads of state.

The conference agreed on the preparation of new Sustainable Development Goals, which can be considered perhaps the most significant achievement of the conference. This topic will be further explored later in the course in section 4.4.

Image: World leaders at the Rio + 20 conferece. (Blog do Planalto, CC BY-SA 2.0 Image information: References 4.2.) 

Despite the great setting and high expectations, the conference is generally described as a disappointment. Many expected a clear roadmap for institutional changes and future governance of sustainable development as a result of the conference. After all, the main themes of the conference were “green economy” and the institutional framework for sustainable development.

The latter referred to a 40-year-old debate – that is, should the ecological pillar of sustainable development be strengthened by setting up a stronger unit than UNEP, such as an international environmental organization. The conference resulted in a vague statement, maintaining the existing institutional framework. This was particularly affected by strong opposition from the US, Japan, Russia, and Brazil.

Another issue concerning the reforming of the institutional framework in the Rio+20 meeting was an attempt to strengthen the integration of the three pillars of sustainable development. One of the problems in sustainable development over the decades has been the poor integration of the environmental and economic pillars. Over time, the UN has tried to influence the institutions and rules of the international economy, but with little success. The success in Rio was estimated modest, although one new high-level forum was set up. This forum holds an annual meeting at the ministerial level and a meeting of the Heads of State and Government every four years. The Forum replaced the Commission on Sustainable Development, set up 20 years earlier at the Rio Summit.

Rio also called for a new kind of attention to future generations by addressing the then relatively new concept of ‘planetary boundaries’. ‘Planetary boundaries’ is a framework presented by Johan Rockström et al. in the 2009 issue of Nature. The authors identified nine processes that regulate the stability of the world’s natural system. Within the boundaries set for these processes, humanity and its future generations can evolve, but crossing the boundaries is likely to lead to dangerous environmental changes. In their article, the researchers considered that three such limits – in terms of climate change, biodiversity loss, and the nitrogen cycle – had already been exceeded. However, planetary boundaries are not mentioned in the conference's final document, “The Future We Want”, mainly due to opposition from the US and developing countries. Developing countries feared that attention to future generations would put a strain on the development potential of present generations. (See more about planetary boundaries here: https://www.stockholmresilience.org/research/planetary-boundaries.html )

The poor success of Rio+20 again sparked criticism of the usefulness of UN mega-conferences as a whole. According to the critics, these conferences waste a disproportionate amount of money (and fossil fuels) in relation to their results. From the beginning, the conferences have been criticized as ineffective. Proponents of these UN forums believe. however, that they should not be expected to have immediate direct effect. Instead, UN conferences can at their best help set and coordinate international economic, social and environmental themes on the international policy agenda and can also provide a backbone for national efforts to build sustainable development policies and institutions. For example, the 1972 Stockholm Conference is considered to be one of the key factors in setting up national environmental administrations.

The most recent major UN conference on environment and development (Stockholm+50) was held in Stockholm in 2022, 50 years after the first meeting there. Little has been written about the Stockholm 2022 meeting in the scientific literature, at least so far. But even on the basis of these few reviews, the overall assessment of Stockholm seems clear: Stockholm+50 will go down in history as one of the great failed UN meetings.

Before the meeting, the scientific community had high expectations for Stockholm. For example, Johan Rockström, known for his work on planetary boundaries, and his partners (2021) called for clear goals, as "Stockholm+50 should be the next big watershed moment for action toward a desirable future for the planet and people, going well beyond climate only, to integrate all global commons, the stability of Earth, and a just distribution of the remaining ecological space on Earth to all citizens."

It is obvious that the Stockholm meeting did not become any watershed moment. In Stockholm, sustainable development seems once again to have been overshadowed by the world's most acute problems - this time the war of aggression by Russia and the COVID-19 pandemic.

For reflection: what do you think are the main obstacles to international cooperation on environmental and development issues, and how could they be overcome?  You can share your reflections and discuss with other course participants on the page linked below.

Would you like to comment something on this section? Voluntary.