North-South equity in the Montreal Protocol: Lessons from a feminist legal analysis.

Abstract

This paper is an analysis of North-South equity in an international environmental agreement, The Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer, in force Sept. 16, 1987 (26 I.L.M. 1541). The author creates a model which applies selected feminist equality principles to evaluate North-South relations in the Montreal Protocol. The model applies the principles to four key aspects of international environmental agreements and thereby draws out lessons for North-South relations in future multilateral agreements. The four feminist legal principles applied here are: (1) "cooperative inclusiveness," (2) "contextual analysis," (3) "results-orientation" and (4) "amelioration of disadvantage". These principles are applied to four key aspects of the Montreal Protocol: (1) the roles and responsibilities of the parties; (2) the standards used for evaluation; (3) the strengthening and extension of the law and (4) dispute resolution. These four aspects were identified by the Legal Experts Group of the World Commission on Environment and Development as requiring change in the interests of sustainable development. (Abstract shortened by UMI.)