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A Network-Based Approach to Understanding International Cooperation in Environmental Protection

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Social Media Analysis for Event Detection

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Social Networks ((LNSN))

Abstract

Environmental international treaties and multilateral agreements are complex arenas for cooperation between parties with the overarching goal of promoting our society’s environmental sustainability. International environmental protocols or treaties can be seen as communities that work together to achieve common environmental goals. To analyze the dynamic landscape of international cooperation in environmental protection in the last decades, we compared the cooperation established between the international parties that ratified the most important environmental treaties by continent and assessed the implications for transboundary environmental issues. Network analyses uncover clusters of the most popular and important international environmental treaties and the most influential brokers at the continental level in promoting environmental sustainability across borders. We further analyzed the structural patterns in international environmental protection to identify key promoters of cooperation, most collaborative countries, and most important environmental issues tackled by international agreements by considering the party’s continent as an attribute. Given the growing environmental issues over the past few decades—including the effects of climate change, future strategies must consider missing elements leading to improper environmental agreements implementation and the emergence of cross-border issues. Our results illustrate current networks’ structure at the international level and at the same time at the continental level, suggesting the prospects of improving strategic partnerships for achieving sustainable development goals. Further research should explore exponential random graph models (ERGMs) by considering different specific attributes (i.e., GDP, country density, country population, types of landscapes) along with a detailed analysis, targeting how the principles of these multilateral agreements are implemented in practice at national level after ratification.

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Acknowledgements

This research was supported by a grant of the Romanian National Authority for Scientific Research (https://uefiscdi-direct.ro), PN-III-P1-1.1-TE-2019-1039.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. University of Bucharest, Center for Environmental Research, Bucharest, Romania

    Andreea Nita & Laurentiu Rozylowicz

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  1. Andreea Nita
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  2. Laurentiu Rozylowicz
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Correspondence to Andreea Nita .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Computer Engineering, Ankara Medipol University, Ankara, Turkey

    Tansel Özyer

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Nita, A., Rozylowicz, L. (2022). A Network-Based Approach to Understanding International Cooperation in Environmental Protection. In: Özyer, T. (eds) Social Media Analysis for Event Detection. Lecture Notes in Social Networks. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-08242-9_1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-08242-9_1

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