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The Role of Epistemic Community in Some Experiences of Multi-Level Governance - Two Contrasting Cases of Regional Seas Programs, NOWPAP and MAP -

Cha Jaekwon 1

1동의대학교

Accredited

ABSTRACT

This study introduces the notion of epistemic community and the concept of multi-level governance(MLG) mostly used by researchers who deal with regional integration in Western countries such as European Union(EU) which remains politically, socially and culturally less heterogeneous and in which their civil societies remain relatively mature. In particular, this paper makes an effort to combine the notion of MLG and epistemic community in a single theoretical framework in order to relevantly explain the contrasting outcomes of MAP and NOWPAP. By doing so, this study challenges to an alternative explanation of environmental cooperation in the Northeast Asian region based upon MLG and ultimately tries to find a way of promoting MLG within the Northeast Asian region. The result of a case analysis for MAP well demonstrates that the MAP concerned parties experienced more complicated historical background and remarkable diversities in politics, society, economy and culture than the NOWPAP concerned parties did. Therefore, emphasizing such solutions as overcoming cultural underdevelopment, clearing historical debts and restoring initiatives of sovereign states are all meaningless. In order to set up a right direction of environmental cooperation in the Northeast Asian region, it is primarily necessary to make a precise diagnosis of fundamental features and problems of environmental governance structure in the Northeast Asian region.

Citation status

* References for papers published after 2023 are currently being built.