Chapter VIII.3: Public and private interactions in global environmental governance

Over the past two centuries, global environmental governance has been a field in continuous shift. Private transnational schemes have assumed an increasingly important role in the regulation of global environmental challenges. The flourishing of private transnational regulation (PTR) regimes has not occurred in isolation from public environmental regulation (PER). This chapter develops a detailed taxonomy of the forms of interaction between PTR and PER, which includes, it is argued, five key forms: incorporation, facilitation, abstention, substitution, and suppression. The chapter further discusses the optimal distribution of authority between the PTR and PER in view of the foregoing taxonomy. It identifies several variables which are central to answering this question and applies them to several case studies.