Orchestration within plastics governance – From global to Arctic

Abstract

The lack of coordinated global regulation of plastics with drivers such as increasing production and poor waste management continue to bring vast amounts of plastic pollution into our environments. Plastics are transboundary with often a complex value chain in production, use and waste handling and, until now, a fragmented regulatory response on how to solve this crisis. We utilize Abbott and Bernstein theory of orchestration to understand the actors at play attempting to regulate the life cycle of plastics within the ongoing treaty negotiations. When properly orchestrated, transnational governance can overcome the ineffective and fragmented mechanisms currently in use, thereby improving plastics regulatory performance. We utilize orchestration theory and participate observation at the ongoing treaty negotiations and explore to what degree the challenge of plastic pollution uses state orchestration to speed up the governance process.