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This article examines under what conditions states engage in transnational public-private partnerships for the environment. While there is hardly a disagreement in the literature on the rise of transnational actors and new modes of collaborative governance, their interaction with and impact on state institutions remain debated and insufficiently illuminated by empirical research. Some scholars of globalization interpret transnational partnerships as evidence of state insufficiency and retreat, others emphasize the continued primacy of state power in manipulating old and new institutional arenas, still other scholars anticipate the 'rearticulation' of the state to partake in new governance. This study is one of the first to examine theoretically and empirically, using a sample of some 230 partnerships, how domestic capacity, the constituencies of transnational actors, as well as international donors and institutions shape the variable rearticulation of the state to partake in partnerships. A comparative case study of Brazil and Russia provides further detail on the political dynamics that enable or constrain state-society collaborations for the environment. [Reprinted by permission of Sage Publications Inc., copyright holder.]

This article examines under what conditions states engage in transnational public–private partnerships for the environment. While there is hardly a disagreement in the literature on the rise of transnational actors and new modes of collaborative governance, their interaction with and impact on state institutions remain debated and insufficiently illuminated by empirical research. Some scholars of globalization interpret transnational partnerships as evidence of state insufficiency and retreat, others emphasize the continued primacy of state power in manipulating old and new institutional arenas, still other scholars anticipate the "rearticulation" of the state to partake in new governance. This study is one of the first to examine theoretically and empirically, using a sample of some 230 partnerships, how domestic capacity, the constituencies of transnational actors, as well as international donors and institutions shape the variable rearticulation of the state to partake in partnerships. A comparative case study of Brazil and Russia provides further detail on the political dynamics that enable or constrain state-society collaborations for the environment.

The article examines the politics and patterns of public-private partnerships for the environment in the multilateral system. It argues that two kinds of dynamics have contributed to the hybridization of environmental authority at the global level. On one hand, the fragmentation of environmental regimes and the parallel growth of non-state actors have resulted in structural pressures and opportunities for public-private collaboration. More significantly, however, international organizations have responded to the pluralization of global environmental politics selectively and acted as entrepreneurs of collaborative governance. The analysis uses a principal-agent perspective of international organizations to specify the conditions for organizational entrepreneurship of public-private partnerships. The theoretical propositions inform the comparative analysis of three "meta" partnership programs in the multilateral system: the Small Grants Program, the Prototype Carbon Fund, and the environmental portfolio of the United Nations Fund for International Partnerships. The study demonstrates that public-private partnerships represent neither a radical "powershift" from established institutions, nor are partnerships a marginal governance fad. The three partnership programs examined here emerged out of the mandates and expertise of their lead organizations and partners, but established and diffused new niches of environmental governance, particularly around community-based biodiversity management and climate-change related technology diffusion.

The article uses firm-level data to test the hypothesis that the opening of central and east European economies to international trade and capital provides an impetus for environmental improvements in industrial enterprises. The analysis reveals that although export-oriented firms adopt clean technologies faster, foreign investment is not necessarily associated with higher rates of clean-technology adoption. Moreover, even the significance of trade in promoting cleaner technology can be overshadowed by domestic factors such as regulatory enforcement. Multinational enterprises introduce more readily formal environmental management practices that respond to public pressures. These findings challenge claims that international capital and trade are likely to be the leading stimulus for clean-technology diffusion in transition countries. The analysis contributes to the political economy literature by testing the linkage between openness and firm-level environmental strategies and specifying conditions for a positive relationship between markets and environmental performance.

In the Paris Agreement era of climate governance, private market-based initiatives are expected to play a catalytic role in achieving global commitments. However, the literature has been largely silent on the political causes of the variable and often limited uptake of such initiatives in the Global South. This article uses original project-level data to investigate the participation in voluntary carbon offset (VCO) programs across developing countries. We argue that, paradoxically, access to formal international institutions and linkages with domestic priorities are key factors for participation in voluntary carbon markets, reducing asymmetries in information, capacity, and interest in developing contexts. Our statistical analysis finds that institutions such as the Clean Development Mechanism and targeted foreign aid, as well as domestic concerns such as climate vulnerability and advancing renewable energy, shape in important ways the variable engagement in VCO projects. Our analysis also suggests that the design of private regulations can be fine-tuned to better capture synergies between local concerns and transnational climate action.