On the Enforcement of Cooperative Environmental Policies

This paper investigates the sustainability of Pareto optimal policies for the replenishment of renewable resources shared by two countries with asymmetrical wealth. It does so within a two-country neo-classical growth model with externality. In absence of commitment, it identifies simple self-enforcing mechanisms that implement social optima for a typical international resource (clean air) and a parameterization of the model to the United States and a country five times poorer. Such mechanisms are trigger strategies involving transfers of wealth between countries and threats of economic isolation in case of defection. Necessary transfers can represent up to 2.6% of US wealth. (Copyright: Elsevier)