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European Affairs
Letters to the Editor
Johannesburg Issues May Outlast Us All
Thank you for assembling an impressive collection of viewpoints prior to the Johannesburg Summit in your special report on the "Rocky Road to Johannesburg." The authors accurately foreshadowed some of the outcomes and make very interesting reading in the light of the actual results. Although expectations for Johannesburg were lower than for its predecessor, the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992, the Johannesburg Summit will probably make some important contributions to global welfare in specific areas.
Johannesburg has also raised a couple of important and perhaps lingering questions. In particular, is the United States capable of making a strong and sustained commitment to any multilateral process to implement sustainable development, and is Europe capable of comprehending how exporting its regulatory posture on biotechnology adversely affects the developing world?
Perhaps the article by Paula Dobriansky most accurately foreshadowed the answer to the question about the United States. Her commitment is not to "sustainable" development, but rather to "sustained" development. And the clear message is that it must begin and also perhaps end at home by implementing trade and financial policies, but not environmental policies, that embody the results of multilateral consensus.
Hers was a message that stopped far short of working toward global environmental policies based on consensus, and instead reflected the very cautious and limited role that the United States did in fact play in Johannesburg.
On the European question, Margot Wallström's explanation of the precautionary principle as a bedrock of the European regulatory posture on environmental regulation and biotechnology accurately foreshadowed the inevitable consequences of exporting the same principles to the developing world.
As events unfolded during the Johannesburg Summit that inspired Southern African countries to refuse food aid just days later, it became apparent that precaution is an expensive commodity and that a regulatory regime built around consumer fears is meaningless in the context of food scarcity. It remains to be seen whether Southern Africans will be able, like Europeans, to be "sensitive about their food," or whether they will instead opt for the food, and some of the other benefits, that biotechnology can deliver.
I believe Maurice Strong's pre-Johannesburg articulate and measured call for a more sustainable civilization may be the best message in retrospect. His observation that the roots of our present environmental problems lie in how we are affecting the marginal conditions that have made the good life on Earth feasible justifies any amount of bilateral cooperation. His qualified endorsement of the market system as one, but not the only, provider of positive incentives justifies any amount of tinkering with the existing system to produce positive growth.
Finally, Kaj-Ole Johannes Bärlund and Wayne Balta offer some really pragmatic perspectives. It is not yet clear whether a real consensus on what are public goods will be achieved only to prevent a massive influx of immigrants, or whether e-business can really be good for the environment. These propositions will be tested by time, but we have been warned. These are interesting issues that have outlasted Johannesburg, and may outlast us. Thank you for airing them.
Jane Earley
Earley Initiatives
Consultant on international agricultural, biotechnology, trade and environmental policy Washington, DC