Climate Change Policies in the Transitional Economies of Europe and Eurasia: The Role of NGOs

This article examines ratification of the Kyoto Protocol across 26 transitional economies of Europe and Eurasia for the period
of 1998–2009; the period between the Kyoto Protocol and the 2009 Copenhagen meeting. The dependent variable measures whether
or not the country has ratified the Kyoto Protocol in a given year. The key variable of interest is the strength of domestic
non-governmental organizations (NGOs). To account for the nascent stage of the NGO sector, I measure NGO strength as a “stock”
and as a “flow” variable. Using an event-history model, I examine the impact of the NGO strength while controlling for other
domestic-based and international drivers of treaty ratification. All time-variant independent variables are lagged by a year.
My analysis suggests that the stock of domestic NGO strength is a significant predictor of the timing of ratification. Further,
EU accession pressures, ratification levels in contiguous countries, and domestic economic cycle impact the timing of ratification
of the treaty.