Vanishing Borders: Protecting the Planet in the Age of Globalization

March 2000
Hilary French
ISBN: 0-393-32004-9
257 pages

Print Version

$13.95

As the twenty-first century dawns, goods, money, people, ideas, and pollution are traveling around the world with unprecedented speed and scale, producing transnational environmental problems, from climate change to the soaring trade in commodities like timber and shrimp.

In Vanishing Borders, author Hilary French provides people concerned about the future of the planet with a clear plan of action for ensuring environmental stability in the wake of globalization.

French argues for integrating ecological considerations into the still-nascent rules of global commerce by reforming international treaties and institutions. She shows that new communications technologies are making it possible for nongovernmental organizations to mobilize powerful coalitions of private citizens to force government and corporate decision-makers to take global environmental issues into account. She finds that some forward-thinking businesses have begun to support environmental codes of conduct and other international standards that international institutions, nongovernmental organizations, and the business community are forging innovative partnerships to reverse ecological decline.