Dynamics of the Southern Collective: Developing Countries in Desertification Negotiations

Abstract

This paper seeks to understand how the collective South, as institutionally represented by the Group of 77 (G77), manages its unity as a negotiating collective despite its many internal differences and in the face of external pressures. Negotiations leading to the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification (CCD) are used as an empirical case study. This is a particularly interesting case because a) it was manifestly South-driven, b) it saw uncommonly intense South-South bargaining within the context of a global environmental negotiation, and c) it also saw intense North-South differences. In focusing on how the G77 managed its internal (South-South) as well as external (South-North) negotiations, the paper uses a negotiation analytical framework to derive generalizable lessons about the collective negotiating behavior of the developing countries' caucus in global environmental politics.