Trade and Environment Negotiations: A South American Perspective

Abstract

During the 1990s, few topics provoked as much controversy in the area of trade negotiations as the convenience, or inconvenience, of expanding the multilateral agenda to include the relationship between international trade, on the one hand, and environmental and labor norms, on the other. This controversy took the form of a strong North-South polarization that placed in opposition the governments of developed and developing countries and also has heavily involved civil society in both the North and the South.