Radioactive Waste Disposal at Sea: Public Ideas ... - IMO

Introduction 9
many regime analysts would concur with the view that “the politics of new
resource issues [“those resources that are of recent origin elsewhere than
on or under land: in ocean beds, outer space, climate and the geosynchronous
orbit”] is unlikely to be sustained by the hue and cry of mass publics
or burdened or facilitated by their mobilization and intervention” (Rosenau
1993, p. 81).
The inattention to public ideas and ideational factors reflects the fact that
regime analysis (including knowledge-based regime analysis to some extent)
adopts basic concepts and notions of realism, rational-choice theory, game
theory, and the study of regional integration and international organizations.
Scholars in these traditions have focused almost exclusively on
strategic action and on rationalistic elements of elite behavior within and
among states and international organizations. Although evidently important,
power understood in a materialistic sense and distributive aspects of
environmental policy within and among states have attracted inordinate
attention as a result. Scholars ignore the roles of policy entrepreneurs and
public ideas in the mobilization of political and public support, in the justification
of policy, and in the establishment of political legitimacy in
regime processes.
In contrast, a number of recent studies in comparative politics and international
relations have concluded that ideas constitute a significant independent
variable in policy processes. Supporters of the emerging ideational
approach have found evidence of causal effects of ideas across a number of
areas of foreign policy and international policy. These studies, which cover
international cooperation in public health, macroeconomic policy, monetary
policy, trade policy, development strategy, human rights, military
affairs, foreign policy, international political change, and European Union
policy making, conclude that policy choices and policy development can be
explained satisfactorily only if ideational factors are taken into account. 18
Regime analysts, however, apart from studying the role of scientists, epistemic
communities, and knowledge brokers, have considered ideational factors
to be of minor significance for environmental regimes.
In addition to presenting an empirical study of ideational factors, I empirically
document a global regime process that differs significantly from exclusively
power-based, interest-based, and knowledge-based propositions
about the dynamics of regimes. Careful empirical studies are necessary in
order to better understand the impact of ideas on international policy, in