New book "The Ecolaboratory: Environmental Governance and Economic Development in Costa Rica" co-edited by Guntra Aistara

The Ecolaboratory: Environmental Governance and Economic Development in Costa Rica (University of Arizona Press, 2020) explores how Costa Rica, renowned for its exceptionalism within Central America, has balanced the contradictory demands of conservation and development, and what this reveals about current and future trends for environmental governance and sustainable development.

Despite its tiny size and seeming marginality to world affairs, Costa Rica has long been considered an important site for experimentation in cutting-edge environmental policy. By framing Costa Rica as an “ecolaboratory,” the contributors in this volume examine the lessons learned and offer a path for the future of sustainable development research and policy in Central America and beyond. It provides the first comprehensive assessment of successes and challenges as they play out in a variety of sectors, including agricultural development, biodiversity conservation, water management, resource extraction, and climate change policy" 

The new book is co-edited by our Associate Professor, Guntra Aistara. She is also author of Organic Sovereignties: Struggles over Farming in an Age of Free Trade (University of Washington Press, 2018), which explores how organic agriculture movements in Latvia and Costa Rica have negotiated entry into free trade regions, such as the European Union (EU), and the Central American Free Trade Agreement (CAFTA), respectively.