Challenges of a Transboundary World

Arnold and Mabel Beckman Center, Irvine
28–30 October 2004

The Challenges of a Transboundary World Conference was held at the Beckman Center of the National Academy of Sciences adjacent to the campus of the University of California, Irvine from October 28 through October 30, 2004. The conference had broad sponsorship within the University of California from the following organizations:

The UC Institute on Global Conflict and Cooperation
The Newkirk Center for Science and Society
Program in Industrial Ecology
Focused Research Group in International Environmental Cooperation
School of Social Sciences
School of Social Ecology
Center for the Study of Democracy
Center for the Global Peace and Conflict Studies
Urban Water Research Center

Program

Trade and . . . Beyond Ideology
Transnational Social Movements in a Transboundary World
International Governance and Transboundary Resource Problems
Democracy and Environment
Address by Rita Colwell, immediate past director, National Science Foundation
Case Studies on Reflections on Water in a Transboundary World

Thursday, 28 October 2004
2:00 p.m.–6:00 p.m.
Trade and … Beyond Ideology
Sponsors: The Newkirk Center for Science and Society, IGCC, The Canadian Consulate of Los Angeles

Link to more information about this portion of the program.

The goal of the Newkirk Center is to go beyond ideology and theory to communicate the best science and to address not only what we know but also how we know about trade and its effects and the methods used to determine that information. This conference will include the best scientific information on the impacts of free trade in North America, Europe, and other regions, using various indicators of environmental quality, labor, and other conditions. It will also include a comparative assessment of North America and Europe that will allow participants to learn from each other about the nature of the impacts within differing institutional formats.

Some of the impact analyses will be more general because of the interconnectedness of the impact categories: for example, effects on agriculture are profoundly important for environmental quality and influence labor standards and migration.

Public Policy Significance
The conference comes at a significant time in light of the 2004 elections, when trade impacts are again being debated. A WTO round of negotiations is ongoing. NAFTA is over a decade old and a free trade agreement for the Americas is being pursued. However, the debate is centuries old and will continue well beyond 2004 as nation-states consider new regional trade agreements, as the world trade community expands the scope of liberalization attempts to open markets in all areas, and as scholars further refine the work on analysis of impacts.

Program Planners
Joseph DiMento, Ph.D., J.D., Professor at the University of California Irvine
Geert van Claster, LLM Professor at K.U. Leuven
Southern California business leaders associated with the Newkirk Center for Science and Society’s Strategic Planning Group
The Canadian Consulate of Los Angeles

Panel: Social Movements and Transboundary Interactions

Chair
David Meyer, University of California, Irvine

Panelists
Alison Brysk, UC Irvine: Mapping Transnationalism
Margaret Keck, Johns Hopkins University
Paul Wapner, American University: Global Civil Society?

This panel focuses on international (including regional) regimes, organizations, conventions, and norms designed to manage trans-national resource problems. The panelists think of “resource problems” broadly, to include, for example, rivers and waterways, habitats and biodiversity, the atmosphere, and the oceans. Transboundary problems can include scarcity, depletion, pollution, access, and allocation. What insights can current research give us into how countries respond to shared natural resource challenges?

Chair
Wayne Sandholtz, UC Irvine
Panelists
Raul Lejano, UC Irvine
Karen Litfin, University of Washington
Oran Young, UC Santa Barbara
Discussant
Joseph DiMento, UC Irvine

Democracy, Liberalization, and Environment in Latin America
Kathryn Hochstetler and Stephen P. Mumme, Colorado State University

The Contested Nature of NAFTA’s Chapter 11: Investment, Environment, and Trade
Pamela Doughman, UC Irvine

Consuming Democracy: Transnationalizing the Conflicts Over the Environmental Impacts of Industrialized Salmon Farming
Kathleen Sullivan, UC Santa Barbara

Friday, 29 October 2004
4:00 p.m.–5:30 p.m.
Featured Speaker Rita Colwell
Reception to follow

Global Environmental Change and Human Health
Rita Colwell, Immediate Past Director, National Science Foundation

Dr. Rita Colwell is the world leader on understanding the ecology of the disease-causing bacterium, Vibrio cholerae, and the spread of pandemic disease cholera. Cholera is a disease caused by drinking water contaminated with Vibrio cholerae. The symptoms of the disease are severe diarrhea and dehydration, leading to death if not properly treated. Once the source of major epidemics in European and American cities, cholera remains a serious problem in developing countries lacking clean water sources.

Over 30 years ago, Dr. Colwell discovered that the cholera-causing bacteria is indigenous to brackish water. It only becomes a human pathogen when drinking water and food are contaminated with this bacterium. In the recent years, she has explored the link between global climate change patterns and outbreaks of cholera in the India subcontinent. Her results clearly demonstrate that there is a close link between rises in sea surface temperature, elevated rainfall, and the increase of frequency and severity of cholera outbreaks. She also showed that Vibrio cholerae is closely associated with zooplankton species in the water. By using a simple cloth filtration method, the majority of the disease-causing bacteria can be removed from drinking water. The incidence of disease has been dramatically reduced after introducing this method in the villages of Bangladesh.

Alternative Approaches to Stormwater Quality Control in Los Angeles County
Sheldon Kamieniecki, University of Southern California

Recent and Complex Water Politics of the San Luis Valley, Colorado
T. Clay Arnold, Emporia State

Interstate Water Accords: A Quantitative and Qualitative Exploration into Reducing Regional Water Scarcity
Frederick D. Gordon, University of Southern California

Water Management and Techno-Scientific Knowledge: Innovation, Flexibility, and Accountability in a Comparative Perspective
Maria Carmen Lemos, University of Michigan

Stakeholder Struggles Over Conflicting Claims When There is No Longer Enough Water to Go Around: The Unfolding Tragedies of the Klamath Basin
Julie H. Gonzalez, California State University, San Luis Obispo

Institutions as Phenomena: The Evolution and Denouement of Transboundary Cooperation on the Turtle Islands
Raul Lejano, John Whiteley, UC Irvine, and Dan, Torres, Pawikan Conservation Project, Philippines

Internal Boundaries: Political-Economic Transformations and Huai River Conservancy in Twentieth-Century China
David Pietz, Washington State University

Binational Water Conservation Planning: Assessment from the Lower Colorado River and Delta
Margaret Wilder, University of Arizona

Graduate Student Panel: The Conflicted Boundaries of Sovereignty: Expansions, Fragmentations, and Alternatives

Buoyant Sovereignties: Global Climate Change and Tuvaluan Sovereignty
Heather Lazrus, University of Washington

Science as Sovereign: Fact and Value U.S. Fisheries Management
Courtney Carothers, University of Washington

Where “The People” Are Sovereign: Public Land and the American Political Imagination
Julie Brugger, University of Washington

Modernizing Mountain Water: State, Industry, and Territory
Ismael Vaccaro, University of Washington