The NAFTA Environmental Dispute Settlement System as Prototype for Regional Integration Arrangements

This article addresses NAFTA's environment-related dispute settlement mechanisms and how these might serve as a prototype for other regional integration efforts. The article focuses on a few critical issues with respect to NAFTA's environment-related dispute mechanisms. These are: (1) whether NAFTA's dispute settlement mechanisms are adequate for their purpose and therefore suitable for extension to the contemplated expansion of NAFTA throughout the Western Hemisphere; (2) how NAFTA's separate regional dispute settlement system will interface with the new World Trade Organization (WTO) multilateral dispute settlement mechanism as both relate to environmental issues, and; (3) how the NAFTA and European Union dispute resolution models may be comparatively evaluated for application to other regional arrangements