
J.-E. LANE
damental types of collective action difficulties: on the one hand
the depletion of ecological capital (tragedy of the commons)
and on the other hand the unanimity-stalemate typical of state
coordination. The UN framework of UNEP with all its meet-
ings and consultations lack enforcement capacity and resources
to take action. The voting regime of the WB and the IMF shows
that global coordination can be done effectively. Weighted vot-
ing is a proper institution for global coordination, but the allo-
cation of voting rights must not be too skewed. By reforming
the scheme in the WB and the IMF, simply taking the square
root or the cube root of the present allocation, a viable format
for global coordination can be constructed, allowing for certain
but not excessive differences in state voting power as well as
overcoming the veto-transaction cost problematic. Global en-
vironmental coordination can only work if these is a strong
agency devoted to these tasks permanently, operating on the ba-
sis of quantitative voting.
The inexorable degradation of the global environment in-
volves yearly losses of ecologica l capital. The international and
regional environmental coordination has not been effective in
halting this dismal process for planet Earth (Rosendal, 1995;
Meyer et al., 1997; Raustiala, 1997), despite the increase in the
recognition of environmental values (Regan, 1983; Taylor,
1986; Attfield, 1999; Singer, 2002). Only a powerful global
environmental agency constructed on the model of global eco-
nomic coordination and entrusted with proper resurces—econo-
mic and legal ones—can stem the global tragedy of the Com-
mons: the final elimination of endangered species, the pollution
of water and sea assets, the poisoning of the atmosphere and the
cutting down of rain forests and spreading of deserts.
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