Advancing Marginalized Actors and Regulatory Quality in Transnational Governance

With Professor Stepan Wood, Peter A. Allard School of Law, Canada

Thursday, 23 May
1pm - 2pm
Room 223, Level 2,
Melbourne Law School, 185 Pelham Street, Carlton

From agriculture to sport and from climate change to indigenous rights, transnational regulatory regimes and actors are multiplying and interacting, with a range of beneficial and detrimental effects. This talk presented the results of an interdisciplinary research project that investigates whether, how and by whom “transnational business governance interactions” (TBGIs) can be harnessed to improve the quality of transnational regulation and advance the interests of marginalized actors. Drawing on a forthcoming edited book, the talk integrates concepts of interaction, marginalization, regulatory quality and regulatory capacity into a framework for studying transnational governance, explores selected examples of productive and unproductive TBGIs, and identifies opportunities for—and obstacles to—mobilizing TBGIs to enhance regulatory quality and empower marginalized actors in transnational business governance. The topic may interest scholars of law, regulation, business, politics, governance and society, as well as policymakers, civil society actors and professionals.

Presenter

Professor Stepan Wood holds the Canada Research Chair in Law, Society and Sustainability at the Peter A. Allard School of Law, University of British Columbia, in Vancouver. He directs the Centre for Law and the Environment and coordinates the Specialization in Environmental and Natural Resource Law. He studies corporate social responsibility, sustainability, globalization, transnational governance, voluntary standards, climate change and environmental law. He leads the interdisciplinary Transnational Business Governance Interactions (TBGI) research network, which examines competition, cooperation, coordination, and conflict in transnational business governance. He is lead editor of Transnational Business Governance Interactions: Advancing Marginalized Actors and Enhancing Regulatory Quality (Edward Elgar, forthcoming). His coauthored book, A Perilous Imbalance: The Globalization of Canadian Law and Governance (UBC Press, 2010), was shortlisted for the Donald Smiley award for best book on Canadian politics. Professor Wood is the founding cochair of Canada’s Willms & Shier Environmental Law Moot, ViceChair of the Canadian national committee on environmental management systems standards, and a lead Canadian negotiator of the ISO 14001 and 14004 standards. He holds an LLB from Osgoode Hall Law School, York University (Toronto) and an SJD from Harvard. He was a law clerk to the Supreme Court of Canada and practised law with White & Case in New York. Prior to joining the Allard School of Law in 2017, he was Professor and York Research Chair in Environmental Law and Justice at Osgoode, where he was also EditorinChief of the Osgoode Hall Law Journal, Coordinator of the JD/Master in Environmental Studies joint program, and founding codirector of Osgoode’s Environmental Justice and Sustainability Clinical Program. He has held visiting appointments around the world, including at the University of Verona, BarIlan University, the European University Institute, University of Melbourne, Monash University and Northwestern University.