Has the Kyoto Protocol induced carbon leakage? We conduct the first empirical ex-post evaluation of the Protocol. We derive a theoretical gravity equation for the CO2 content of trade, which accounts for intermediate inputs, both domestic and imported. The structure of our new panel database of...

This report investigates the implications of regionalism for the interaction between trade and climate policy. It examines the implications of regional climate governance for international trade and conversely the implications of regional trade governance for climate change action. Regional...

With countries from around the world set to meet in Copenhagen to try to hammer out a post-2012 climate change agreement, no one would disagree that a U.S. commitment to cut greenhouse gas emissions is essential to such a global pact. However, despite U.S. president Obama’s recent announcement...

Free riding and coordination difficulties are held to be the primary causes of cooperation breakdown among nonrelatives. These thwarting effects are particularly severe in the absence of effective monitoring institutions capable of sanctioning deviant behavior. Unfortunately, solutions to global...

This paper explores the failure of countries to coordinate climate policies as an equilibrium outcome of a game where countries optimize in the face of both unprecedented economic and environmental uncertainty. Because issues associated with climate change are historically unprecedented and thus...

The Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) under the Paris Agreement fall short of the abatement needed to reach the 2°C target. Emissions trading could be a "costless" means to reduce the ambition gap if countries used their gains from trade for additional abatement. However, this requires...

We reassess the well-known "narrow-but-deep" versus "broad-but-shallow" trade-off in international environmental agreements (IEAs), taking into account the principal-agent relationship induced by the hierarchical structure of international policy. To this end, we expand the modest coalition...

Bilateral trade and capital flows have increased substantially between the United States and China yielding economic gains to both countries. However, these beneficial bilateral relations also bring about global environmental consequences including greenhouse gas emissions. The authors develop a...

Bilateral trade and capital flows have increased substantially between the United States and China yielding economic gains to both countries. However, these beneficial bilateral relations also bring about global environmental consequences including greenhouse gas emissions. We develop a...

In the basic model of international environmental agreements (IEAs) (Barrett 1994, Rubio and Ulph 2006) extended by international trade, self-enforcing - or stable - IEAs may comprise up to 60% of all countries (Eichner and Pethig 2013). But these IEAs reduce total emissions only slightly...