Domestic autonomy and environmental international non-governmental organizations: a cross-national analysis of forest loss

Abstract

Non-technical Summary Nations across the world are concerned with environmental issues like forest loss. The majority of nations acknowledge the importance of reducing forest loss, and make commitments to do so. However, researchers often find that despite these commitments, and the work of non-governmental organizations, in many nations, forest loss is not declining. This research argues that institutional capacity, specifically a nations domestic autonomy may help explain the ineffectiveness of environmental international non-governmental organizations (EINGOs) at reducing forest loss. Specifically, I argue that nations with stronger domestic autonomy, measured as the extent to which a nation is free of the direct control of external political actors, improves the effectiveness of EINGOs at reaching their goals of reducing forest loss due to an autonomous state's relative strength and ability to integrate their version of environmentalism or reinterpret existing norms of environmentalism into EINGO ideologies and activities. Technical Summary Previous research finds that environmental international non-governmental organizations (EINGOs) tend to have differential impacts on environmental factors cross-nationally, such as forest loss. More recent work argues that decoupling between stated environmental norms and actual environmental outcomes may be the result of a lack of institutional capacity. Using ordinary least squares regression for 91 low- and middle-income nations from 2001 to 2014, I find that EINGOs reduce forest loss more in nations with higher rather than lower levels of domestic autonomy. However, I find that EINGOs and domestic autonomy on their own do not significantly predict forest loss. Social media summary This research argues that a nations domestic autonomy may help explain the ineffectiveness EINGOs at reducing forest loss.