CENTER FOR U.S.-MEXICAN STUDIES
UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO
9500 GILMAN DRIVE, 0510
LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA 92093-0510, U.S.A.
(619) 534-4503 FAX (619) 534-6447
ANNOUNCING SPECIAL FELLOWSHIPS*
FOR STUDIES OF ECONOMIC INTEGRATION AND THE U.S.-MEXICO BORDER ENVIRONMENT
The Center for U.S.-Mexican Studies at the University of California, San
Diego is pleased to announce a new, interdisciplinary research project
focused on economic integration and the environment along the U.S.-Mexican
border. The project, "Economic Integration and the Environment: Promoting
Sustainable Development Along the U.S.-Mexican Border," will support as many
as six residential fellowships of up to six months each for project-related
research and writing beginning January 1998. Fellowships will be divided
equally between two topic areas: (1) population growth, immigration, and the
border environment; and (2) governance, sustainable development, and public
policy in the U.S.-Mexico border region. The project is funded primarily by
the Tinker Foundation.
Applications should include: research project statement (3-4 double-spaced
pages), curriculum vitae, and a minimum of two letters of recommendation.
Deadline for receipt of applications is September 15, 1997. Applications and
inquiries should be addressed to C.R. Hibbs, Program Officer, Center for
U.S.-Mexican Studies (0510), University of California, San Diego, 9500
Gilman Dr., La Jolla, CA 92093-0510. Tel. (619) 534-4503; FAX (619)
534-6447; e-mail: chibbs@weber.ucsd.edu
* This call for proposals is in addition to the Center's regular
Researcher-In-Residence program. Applications for the regular fellowship
competition are due January 9, 1998.
Project Abstract
ECONOMIC INTEGRATION AND THE ENVIRONMENT:
PROMOTING SUSTAINABLE DEVELOPMENT ALONG THE U.S.-MEXICAN BORDER
Citizens and policymakers alike are grappling with the increasingly complex
environmental challenges posed by economic integration between Mexico and
the United States. A dramatic increase in population and rapid
industrialization along the binational border, especially in major urban
areas such as metropolitan San Diego-Tijuana, have already overburdened
infrastructure and significantly degraded natural habitats and the
biodiversity they support. And because a significant portion of the
economic growth spurred by the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA)
will occur in the U.S.-Mexican border region, the environmental problems
associated with increased economic integration between Mexico and the United
States are likely to worsen in the future.
Yet at the same time, the debate spurred by the NAFTA about the
environmental implications of rapid economic development in the binational
border region has focused greater public attention on these problems,
mobilized substantial public and private resources to address them, and
created new institutional arrangements for redressing the environmental
costs of North American economic integration. Some of the new institutions
created in association with the NAFTA explicitly encourage nongovernmental
organizations, municipal and state government agencies, and ordinary
citizens to become more fully involved in the definition of environmental
priorities and the design of appropriate public policies. As a result,
approval of the NAFTA opened a new era in policy debate concerning trade and
the environment in general and the border environment in particular.
With the support of the Tinker Foundation, the Center for U.S.-Mexican
Studies is implementing an eighteen-month research and public education
program to promote sustainable development policies along the U.S.-Mexican
border. The program focuses on three substantive issues: (1) the definition
of a common, binational minimum working agenda for promoting sustainable
development, with particular reference to the San Diego-Tijuana metropolitan
area; (2) the implications of population growth and especially immigration
for the border environment; and (3) the capacity of existing institutions
(especially those created in association with the NAFTA) to develop and
implement environmental policies that are responsive to community needs.
Project fellows examining the nexus between population growth, immigration,
economic integration, and the environment, will examine such questions as:
What is the current population situation in the transborder region, and what
are its projected tendencies for the future? How much population growth can
the region sustain? What are the competing claims of increasing the scope
and depth of regional markets and labor forces, while husbanding the area's
resources? What economic sectors could be developed in the region that would
be ecologically sustainable? How do immigration and immigration policy
affect the processes of economic integration? Conversely, how has economic
integration affected migration to the region? What are the environmental
implications? How has immigration policy in the context of economic
integration affected the border environment?
Questions to be addressed by project research fellows focused on governance
issues include: Do the present structures of governance facilitate or
shackle innovative initiatives to resolve border environmental problems? How
effective is binational environmental cooperation in the region? What has
been the extent of public participation in NAFTA-created environmental
institutions, and what is their broader sociopolitical impact on both sides
of the border? Have new opportunities for cross-border collaboration created
new U.S.-Mexican citizen coalitions? What lessons can be learned from
comparing developments in the San Diego-Tijuana area to the experiences of
other binational communities along the U.S.-Mexican border?
The research and public education activities of the project include two
public policy forums on sustainable development issues, field research by
two interdisciplinary teams (a total of six project researchers) based at
the Center, the broad public dissemination of a consensus minimum working
agenda on sustainable development in San Diego and Tijuana, and the
publication of an edited book of research papers. These activities will
take place between August 1997 and December 1998.
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