The limits of the global community: The Nixon administration and global environmental politics

Abstract

This article presents the rise and decline of the Nixon administration's commitment to international environmental policies. It argues that administration officials pursued environmental issues to garner domestic political support and to revive interest in institutions in the wake of 1968.Though common interests among Western industrialised nations helped to promote cooperation on new environmental programmes, serious divisions arose between the industrialised North and the developing South. These divisions were most evident at the 1972 United Nations Conference on the Human Environment, where issues of wealth distribution, power in the international system, and ideology suffused environmental politics. In the end, Nixon and Kissinger's waning commitment to environmental protection coupled with their repudiation of the global South's concern for increasing developmental aid ultimately limited the breadth and scope of the United States' role in attempting to reconcile the tensions between desires for continued economic growth and the imperatives of environmental protection.

Acknowledgements

The author wishes to thank Melvyn Leffler, Kelly Peterman, Harold Mock, Victor Nemchenok, Barin Kayaoglu, James Graham Wilson, and Brent Cebul for their insightful comments and criticism.

Notes

Stephen Macekura is a PhD candidate in American history at the University of Virginia. He has a forthcoming article in Political Science Quarterly on the Point IV program and in the future plans to explore the relationship between environmentalism and international development. His scholarly work focuses on twentieth century American foreign relations and environmental history.

  [1] On the relationship between détente, multipolarity, and international stability, see Gaddis, Strategies of Containment, 274–81 and Suri, Power and Protest, introduction. For a discussion of ‘trilateralism’ and the search of stable global capitalist order, see Gill, American Hegemony and the Trilateral Commission.

  [2] Iriye, The Global Community, 6–8. Iriye discusses global environmentalism in chapter 6. He also reiterated many of these themes in a brief overview of new essays in the September 2008 edition of Diplomatic History: Iriye, ‘Environmental History and International History’.

  [3] For the purposes of this paper I borrow the term ‘world society’ from Buzan, From International to World Society.

  [4] Krasner, International Regimes; Hasenclever et al., Theories of International Regimes; Rittberger and Mayer, Regime Theory and International Relations; List and Rittberger, ‘Regime Theory and International Environmental Management’. On the construction of international orders around certain issues such as health and acid rain, see the essays in Henrikson, Negotiating World Order.

  [5] I derive this two-sentence description of regime theory from Krasner, ‘Structural Causes and Regime Consequences’; and List and Rittberger, ‘Regime Theory and International Environmental Management’, 85–8. Jacob Darwin Hamblin has recently written about ocean dumping regimes circa 1972 in Hamblin, ‘Gods and Devils in the Details’, 560.

  [6] For more on the rise of ecology as a critical component of environmentalism, see Worster, Nature's Economy, part four.

  [7] For arguments about Nixon's desire to earn political support for such initiatives, see Flippen, Nixon and the Environment and Hopgood, American Foreign Environmental Policy and the Power of the State.

  [8] My understanding of the structural conflict between the industrialised Northern core states and the developing global South derives from Krasner, Structural Conflict.

  [9] Richard Nixon, ‘Address at the Commemorative Session of the North Atlantic Council, April 10, 1969’. Available from http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid = 1992 (accessed 10 February 2009).

 [10] Suri, Power and Protest, chapter 5.

 [11] Flippen, Nixon and the Environment, 5–9.

 [12] Whitaker, Striking a Balance, 8. For more on environmentalism and the politics of the environmental movement, see Andrews, Managing the Environment, Managing Ourselves; Flippen, Nixon and the Environment; Hays, Beauty, Health, and Permanence; Rome, The Bulldozer in the Countryside; and Worster, Nature's Economy, chapter 16.

 [13] ‘Report of the Task Force on Resources and Environment (Train), December 5, 1968’, Box 305, Daniel Patrick Moynihan Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress. Hereinafter cited as Moynihan Papers.

 [14] For Flippen's view, see Flippen, ‘Richard Nixon, Russell Train, and the Birth of Modern Environmental Diplomacy’.

 [15] Interview with Patrick Mulloy, The Foreign Affairs Oral History Collection of the Association for Diplomatic Studies and Training, Library of Congress. Available from http://hdl.loc.gov/loc.mss/mfdip.2007mul01 (accessed 18 February 2009) and Flippen, ‘Richard Nixon, Russell Train, and the Birth of Modern Environmental Diplomacy’, 618–9. For two examples of Nixon's environmental speeches, see Richard Nixon, ‘Statement Announcing the Creation of the Environmental Quality Council and the Citizen's Advisory Committee on Environmental Quality, May 29, 1969’. Available from http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid = 2077 (accessed 17 April 2009) and Richard Nixon, ‘Remarks at Morristown, New Jersey, October 29, 1969’. Available from http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/?pid = 2295 (accessed 17 April 2009). See also Schoen, A Biography of Daniel Patrick Moynihan, 144–62. For a detailed description of the federal environmental institutions created by Nixon see Whitaker, Striking a Balance.

 [16] Suri, Power and Protest, chapter 5. For an excellent overview of the worldwide protests of 1968, see the essays in Fink et al., 1968: A World Transformed.

 [17] Suri, Power and Protest, 321. For a background on the connection between Lyndon Johnson's Vietnam policies and his diplomacy with Europe, see Schwartz, In the Shadow of Vietnam. See also Kaplan, NATO and the United States, chapter six.

 [18] Quoted in Hopgood, American Foreign Environmental Policy and the Power of the State, 76.

 [19] ‘NATO CCMS Position Paper, 30 June, 1969’, Box I292, Moynihan Papers.

 [20] ‘North Atlantic Assembly: Student Attitudes to Government, Democratic Institutions, and NATO’, Box 306, Moynihan Papers.

 [21] On this point, see Hopgood, American Foreign Environmental Policy and the Power of the State, 65–6.

 [22] Train, Politics, Pollution, and Pandas, 151.

 [23] ‘Committee on the Challenges of Modern Society, interview with Dr. Gunnar Randers, Assistant Secretary for Scientific Affairs Division, NATO’, NATO Letter, Vol. XVII, No. 1, (January 1970): 8–9.

 [24] ‘Statement by Secretary Dahrendorf at the first meeting of NATO CCMS, 8 December 1969’, Box I292, Moynihan Papers.

 [25] ‘Statement by Secretary Dahrendorf at the first meeting of NATO CCMS, 8 December 1969’, Box I292, Moynihan Papers

 [26] ‘Committee on the Challenges of Modern Society, interview with Dr. Gunnar Randers, Assistant Secretary for Scientific Affairs Division, NATO’, NATO Letter, Vol. XVII, No. 1, (January 1970): 11–12.

 [27] Daniel Patrick Moynihan to Henry Kissinger, ‘The NATO CCMS’, 10 February 1970, Box I292, Moynihan Papers.

 [28] ‘CCMS Chart of Proposed Projects’ Box I292, Moynihan Papers and Elise Nouel, ‘Action: Keyword of the CCMS’, NATO Letter, Vol. XVIII, No. 12 (December 1970): 9–13.

 [29] Memorandum, Henry Kissinger to Daniel Patrick Moynihan, 14 November 1969, Box I292, Moynihan Papers; Telegram 16911 from the Department of State to the Mission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, Washington, 4 February 1970, 0121Z, Foreign Relations of the United States, 1969 –1976, Volume E-1.

 [30] ‘Statement by Secretary Dahrendorf at the first meeting of NATO CCMS, 8 December 1969', Box I292, Moynihan Papers.

 [31] The major books on détente, such as Garthoff, Detente and Confrontation; Litwak, Détente and the Nixon Doctrine; and Suri, Power and Protest all offer very little, if any, discussion of the environmental diplomacy between the United States and the Soviet Union during the 1970s. One important exception is Schweitzer, ‘Environmental Protection and Soviet-American Relations’, 225–30.

 [32] McNeill, ‘The Biosphere and the Cold War’.

 [33] Flippen, ‘Richard Nixon, Russell Train, and the Birth of Modern Environmental Diplomacy’, 626; McNeill, ‘The Biosphere and the Cold War’; Weiner, Models of Nature.

 [34] Telegram 27061 From the Department of State to the Mission to North Atlantic Treaty Organization, the Mission to the United Nations European Office, and to UNESCO, Washington, February 24, 1970, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1.

 [35] ‘Statement by Secretary Dahrendorf at the first meeting of NATO CCMS, 8 December 1969’, Box I292, Moynihan Papers.

 [36] ‘Telegram 048681 From the Department of State to the Mission to the North Atlantic Treaty Organization, April 3, 1970’, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1.

 [37] Russell E. Train to Martin J. Hillenbrand, 16 November 1971, Box 24, Russell E. Train Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress. For a thorough overview of Train's efforts in creating the Soviet treaty see Flippen, ‘Richard Nixon, Russell Train, and the Birth of Modern Environmental Diplomacy’.

 [38] Train, Politics, Pollution, and Pandas, 126–7.

 [39] Fitzhugh Green, Assistant Administrator, Office of International Affairs, EPA, to Train, 27 October 1971, ‘Visit of Air Pollution Control Delegation to USSR September 20–October 1, 1971, under United States-Russia biennial agreement for scientific exchange’, Box 24, Train Papers.

 [40] For a complete description of the Moscow trip see Train, Politics, Pollution, and Pandas, 129–32 and Flippen, ‘Richard Nixon, Russell Train, and the Birth of Modern Environmental Diplomacy’, 626–8.

 [41] ‘Remarks by Russell Train, US Delegation, First Meeting of the US-USSR Joint Committee for Cooperation in the Field of Environmental Protection, House of Unions, Moscow, September 18, 1972’, Box 23, Train Papers.

 [42] Memorandum of meeting between Train and Podgorny, 19 November 1976, Box 18, Train papers.

 [43] The human environment was a broad phrase that referred to a congeries of issues in the late 1960s and early 1970s that seemed linked together – overpopulation, hunger, famine, agricultural productivity, pollution, and environmental degradation. The Stockholm conference, born out of a Swedish proposal in 1968, incorporated discussions of these diverse topics. It was thus far broader in scope than the United States' bilateral agreements with Japan or the USSR and the more specific UN gatherings on issues such as marine protection.

 [44] Nixon before the 24th Session of the UN General Assembly at the UN, NY, 18 September, ‘Strengthening the Total Fabric of Peace’, Department of State Bulletin, 6 October 1969, 301.

 [45] ‘US Foreign Policy for the 1970’s: A New Strategy for Peace, by Richard Nixon, February 18, 1970', reprinted in Department of State Bulletin, 9 March 1970, 287–8.

 [46] Secretary of State Rogers, ‘US Foreign Policy in a Technological Age’, made before the Panel of Science and Technology of the House Committee on Science and Astronautics, Jan. 26, Department of State Bulletin, 15 February 1971, 198–202.

 [47] ‘Bush Suggests UN Program’, New York Times, 16 March 1971, 33.

 [48] ‘Industrial Nations Blamed for Pollution’, New York Times, 29 August 1971, 11.

 [49] Gaddis, Strategies of Containment, 274–81.

 [50] ‘US to Back Global Policy on Pollution’, New York Times, 12 March 1970, 16.

 [51] ‘Bush Asks World Unit Action on Problems of Environment’, Chicago Tribune, 17 March 1971, A3.

 [52] See Hopgood, American Foreign Environmental Policy and the Power of the State, 67–77 for a longer narration of the bureaucratic conflicts that pervaded the lead-up to Stockholm.

 [53] ‘UN Conference on Human Environment Scope Paper’, Box 15, Train papers.

 [54] ‘UN Conference on Human Environment Scope Paper’, Box 15, Train papers

 [55] ‘UN Conference on Human Environment Scope Paper’, Box 15, Train papers

 [56] Westad, The Global Cold War, 194–202. See also Litwak, Détente and the Nixon Doctrine; and Nelson, The Making of Détente.

 [57] ‘Letter from President Nixon to Secretary of State Rogers, April 12, 1969’, FRUS, 1969 –1972, Vol. IV.

 [58] Brands, ‘Economic Development and the Contours of U.S. Foreign Policy’.

 [59] Eckes and Zeiler, Globalization and the American Century, 181–95.

 [60] ‘Memorandum from President's Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger) to President Nixon, September 20, 1971’, FRUS, 1969 –1976, Vol. V.

 [61] William P. Rogers, ‘The U.S. Foreign Assistance Program and Current International Realities’, Department of State Bulletin, 20 August 1973, 292. AID's overall employment dropped 44% between 1968 and 1973, cited in ‘The Budget of the United States Government – Fiscal Year 1974’, Department of State Bulletin, 19 February 1973, 213–4. See Lancaster, Foreign Aid, 75–8.

 [62] In a special message to Congress Nixon spoke about the need to emphasise humanitarian motives in foreign aid, Richard Nixon, ‘Special Message to the Congress on Foreign Aid’, 28 May 1969, Public Papers of the President. Available from http://www.presidency.ucsb.edu/ws/index.php?pid = 2073 (accessed 22 April 2009). For a critique of Nixon's development policy and the limits of his humanitarian overtures, see Brands, ‘Economic Development and the Contours of U.S. Foreign Policy’.

 [63] ‘Bush Asks World Unit Action on Problems of Environment’, Chicago Tribune, 17 March 1971, A3.

 [64] ‘Memorandum from the Executive Secretary of the Department of State (Eliot) to the President's Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger), Washington, August 5, 1971’, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1.

 [65] Memorandum From Chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality (Train) to the President's Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger), Washington, January 4, 1972, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1 and ‘Memorandum From the President's Assistant for National Security Affairs (Kissinger) to the Chairman of the Council on Environmental Quality (Train), Washington, January 14, 1972’, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1.

 [66] ‘Research Study From the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Washington, May 20, 1971’, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1.

 [67] ‘Research Study From the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Washington, May 20, 1971’, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1

 [68] ‘Research Study RSG-1 Prepared by the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Washington, January 14, 1972’, FRUS, 1969–1976.

 [69] ‘Compromise on East Germany Reported to End Boycott Threat Talks on the Environment’, New York Times, 13 February 1972, 13.

 [70] ‘Memorandum to the President, UN Conf on Human Environment, June 19, 1972’, Box 17, Train Papers.

 [71] Krasner, Structural Conflict.

 [72] See Rist, The History of Development, chapters 9 and 10.

 [73] ‘Letter From the Scientific Attache (Hudson) at the Embassy in Brazil to the Director of the Office of Environmental Affairs (Herter), February 12, 1971’, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1.

 [74] ‘Intelligence Note RARN-7 Prepared by the Bureau of Intelligence and Research, Washington, March 2, 1972’, FRUS, 1969–1976, Vol. E-1.

 [75] For more on the ‘group of 77’ and Third World economic solidarity, see Rist, The History of Development, chapters 8 and 9.

 [76] US Department of State telegram Lima 6774, 11/15/71, Box 324, Moynihan Papers; ‘Environmental Issues in the General Assembly, 1971’, Box 324, Moynihan Papers.

 [77] George Bush, US Rep. to UN, ‘Environment and Development: The Interlocking Problems’, Department of State Bulletin, 5 July 1971, 21–22.

 [78] ‘Development and Environment: Founex, Switzerland, June 4–12, 1971’ (Mouton, France: École Pratique des Hautes Études, 1971), 6–7.

 [79] Department of State, ‘Documents for the UN Conference on the Human Environment’ (Springfield, VA: National Technical Information Service, 1972), 297–8.

 [80] ‘Environment and Development Committee Established by AID’, Department of State Bulletin, 9 August 1971, 158.

 [81] ‘Senator Baker Studies Environment Attitudes of Developing Countries’, Department of State Bulletin, 6 September 1971, 260.

 [82] Daniel Patrick Moynihan statement, ‘US Representative to Stockholm Committee II, November 29, 1971’, Box 324, Moynihan Papers.

 [83] Claire Sterling, ‘Rich and Poor Nations Collide: World Politics and Pollution Control’, The Washington Post, 26 May 1972, A24.

 [84] Claire Sterling, ‘Rich and Poor Nations Collide: World Politics and Pollution Control’, The Washington Post, 26 May 1972, A24

 [85] Commoner, ‘Motherhood in Stockholm’.

 [86] Faramelli, ‘Toying with the Environment and the Poor’ and Morphet, ‘NGOs and the Environment’.

 [87] Claire Sterling, ‘Chinese Attack on US Endangers Declaration on Environment’, The Washington Post, 11 June 1972.

 [88] ‘Prophets of Doom Come on Strong but Ecology Talks Sideline Them’, Los Angeles Times, 15 June 1972, A16.

 [89] ‘United Nations Conference on the Human Environment: Report to the Senate’ (Washington, DC: GPO, 1972), 57–8. See also the ‘Development and the Environment’ section of the ‘Proceedings of the Conference’, Report of the United Nations Conference of the Human Environment, Stockholm, 1972. Available from http://www.unep.org/Documents.Multilingual/Default.asp?DocumentID = 97&ArticleID = 1497&l = en (accessed 22 April 2009).

 [90] ‘Rich Nations Urged to Bear Cost for Clean Environment’, Chicago Tribune, 8 June 1972, A2.

 [91] Indira Gandhi speech reprinted in India News, clipping from Box 15, Train Papers.

 [92] ‘UN Conference on Human Environment Scope Paper’, Box 15, Train Papers.

 [93] ‘United Nations Conference on the Human Environment: Report to the Senate’, 8-10.

 [94] ‘A Summary of UNEP Activities, Report No. 8’ (New York: UNIPUB, 1980), 4–5.

 [95] ‘Memorandum to the President, UN Conf on Human Environment, June 19, 1972’, Box 17, Train Papers.

 [96] ‘The United Nations Environment Program Participation Act of 1973’, Report No. 93-196. Congressional Record (Washington, DC: GPO, 1973). See also ‘Foreign Assistance and Related Agencies Appropriations for 1974’, Hearings before a Subcommittee of the Committee of Appropriations, House of Representatives, 93rd Congress, First Session (Washington, DC: GPO, 1973), 1310–2.

 [97] ‘Developing Nations Stage Power Play at UN’, Los Angeles Times, 11 November 1972, 5.

 [98] ‘Etude Annuelle 1977–1978 par le Directeur Executif’, Programme des Nations Unies pour L'Environnement (Nairobi: Printing and Packaging Corporation, Ltd., 1981).

 [99] See Hopgood, American Foreign Environmental Policy and the Power of the State, 116–40; Guha, Environmentalism; Keck and Sikkink, Activists Beyond Borders; McCormick, The Global Environmental Movement; Wapner, Environmental Activism and World Civic Politics. Exactly how influential these actors have been is a matter of ongoing debate. In particular and comparison to most of these works, see Hopgood, American Foreign Environmental Policy and the Power of the State for an argument that NGOs have not had a major impact on the foreign policy of the United States.

[100] Holdgate et al., The World Environment, 1972–1982, 629–30; Escobar, Encountering Development, 194–200; McCormick, The Global Environmental Movement, 120.

[101] ‘Prepared remarks of the Honorable Russell E. Train Administrator, US EPA, For CCMS Round Table, Fall Plenary, October 22, 1974’, Box 43, Train papers.

[102] Schweitzer, ‘Environmental Protection and Soviet-American Relations’, 225–38.

[103] Hamblin, ‘Gods and Devils in the Details’, 560.

[104] Hays, Beauty, Health, and Permanence, 57–8; Flippen, Nixon and the Environment, 188–9.

[105] Flippen, Nixon and the Environment, 188–91.

[106] Andrews, Managing the Environment, Managing Ourselves, chapter 15; Flippen, Nixon and the Environment, chapter 6; ‘Agriculture, Environmental, and Consumer Protection Appropriations for 1974’, Hearings before a Subcommittee of the Committee of Appropriations, House of Representatives, 93rd Congress, First Session (Washington: GPO, 1973), 8; Flippen, Nixon and the Environment, 204–5; Rothman, Greening of a Nation?, chapter 5.

[107] List and Rittberger, ‘Regime Theory and International Environmental Management’, 91–7.

[108] Gill, American Hegemony and the Trilateral Commission, introduction.

[109] Rist, The History of Development, chapter 9.

[110] Rist, The History of Development, 178–83; Tolba and Rummel-Bulska, Global Environmental Diplomacy, 6–10. On the institutional development of international and transnational environmental NGOs after Stockholm, see, for instance, McCormick, The Global Environmental Movement, 128–9; Morphet, ‘NGOs and the Environment’, 126–7; and Wapner, Environmental Activism and World Civic Politics.

[111] Stephen Hopgood, for instance, notes the staggering growth of environmental NGOs during the 1970s and 1980s, but argues that their influence on foreign policy remained weak. Hopgood, American Foreign Environmental Policy and the Power of the State, 137–8.