Ambient air pollution represents a global health crisis, leading to 7 million annual deaths worldwide. The rise of a “global environmental regime” manifests in the widespread adoption of environmental policies and laws to reduce ambient air pollution, but debate remains whether they have any effect. Scholars argue that the relationship between the global environmental regime and air pollution depends on the penetration of the global environmental regime. In this analysis, I argue that the relationship between the global environmental regime and air pollution levels is contingent on a country’s position in the world-system. Using fixed effects panel analyses of 144 countries from 1990 to 2010, I find embeddedness in the global environmental regime does predict lower national air pollution levels. This effect, however, is smaller in semi-peripheral and peripheral countries. These findings contribute to an emerging body of scholarship integrating world society and world systems approaches in the study of the environment.

Scholars have long investigated the factors that affect health outcomes in less-developed countries. One debate that has increasingly intensified in recent years is the democracy and health relationship in comparative international context. Scholars argue that democracy does affect country-level health outcomes in less-developed countries, while others argue democracy does not affect country-level health outcomes. I estimate the effect of numerous democracy indexes on child mortality and infant mortality in developing countries using fixed effects regression models with heteroskedasticity-robust standard errors clustered by country. I find that multiple aspects of democracy exert significant beneficial effects on child mortality and infant mortality in less-developed countries.

Objective: I estimate the effect of foreign investment dependence on carbon dioxide emissions in developing countries with methods and data that address the numerous limitations of previous research on the same topic. Methods: I use fixed effects panel regression models that account for first-order autocorrelation with a sample of 109 developing countries from 1980-2014.Results: I find that foreign capital dependence is positively associated with carbon dioxide emissions. I also find economic development, total population, urbanization, and export intensity are positively associated with carbon dioxide emissions, while domestic investment is inversely associated with carbon dioxide emissions. Conclusion:This analysis provides even stronger empirical support for the ecostructural theory of foreign capital dependence than previous research on the same topic. KEYWORDS foreign investment, global political-economy, greenhouse gas emissionsSocialscientists have long investigated the environmental impacts of foreign investment for developing countries. Numerous studies find a significant positive association between foreign investment dependence and carbon dioxide emissions in less-developed countries 1 (Grimes and Jorgenson, 2007a; Jorgenson, 2007b;Jorgenson, Dick, and Shandra, 2011;Kentor and Grimes, 2006). However, there are numerous limitations to some of the aforementioned analyses that investigate the effect of foreign investment dependence on carbon dioxide emissions in developing countries. One limitation of some of the existing literature on the relationship between foreign investment dependence and carbon dioxide emissions in less-developed countries is that they utilize cross-sectional models, which are unable to account for unobserved heterogeneity (Wooldridge, 2010). 2 Another limitation of existing research on the relationship between foreign capital dependence and carbon dioxide emissions is that the number of countries and observations in the reported panel regression models is quite small (Jorgenson, 2007b;1 Please note that I refer to developing countries and less-developed countries interchangeably throughout the article.2 Please note that I refer to foreign capital penetration and foreign capital dependence interchangeably throughout the article.

Scholars have long inquired the anthropogenic causes of greenhouse gas emissions. The majority of empirical work focuses on carbon dioxide and methane emissions, but limited attention is paid to nitrous oxide emissions. This is a crucial omission as nitrous oxide emissions are an extremely potent greenhouse gas and trigger ozone-depleting reactions upon reaching the atmosphere. Using a fixed effects panel regression of 106 developing countries, I estimate the effect of foreign direct investment dependence on nitrous oxide emissions. I find foreign capital dependency is positively associated with nitrous oxide emissions, supporting a refined ecostructural theory of foreign direct investment dependence. This analysis highlights the need for social scientists to consider the environmental impacts of the transnational organization of production beyond carbon dioxide emissions and methane emissions.

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