ON ECOLOGICAL DUMPING

Ecological dumping is a catchword used in the public discussion on env ironmental policies in open economies to characterise situations in wh ich a country uses a too-lax environmental legislation as an instrumen t of achieving trade-related economic policy goals. The paper first tr ies to define ecological dumping and then looks at economic motives un derlying this kind of environmental policy. The approaches considered in this paper are the terms-of-trade argument, strategic trade policy, and a public choice model in which the government either maximises ta x revenues or supports sector-specific interest groups.