Postmaterialism and Environmental Protection Revisited: Domestic Plastic Bag Regulations, 1992–2019

Plastics are used widely in the modern economy but create air, water, and land pollution problems (E. Wang et al. 2022). Although some plastics could be recycled, sent to landfills, or even incinerated, many Global North countries find it cost efficient to ship plastic waste abroad for processing and disposal. Owing to the lack of landfill capacity and poor enforcement of law in waste-receiving Global South countries, there is widespread illegal dumping, especially into water bodies. Given the visibility of the plastic waste issue, especially in terms of the marine environment, the 2018 G7 Summit adopted the Ocean Plastics Charter to eliminate plastic pollution. At the 2022 UN Environmental Assembly, delegates agreed to work toward an international, legally binding agreement by 2024. In the fifth session of the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee held in Busan, South Korea, delegates could not agree on a new treaty to ban plastic pollution and decided to reconvene in 2025.¹

Plastic bag regulation, via bans or fees, is the most widely adopted plastic policy (Nielsen et al. 2019; UN Environment Programme [UNEP] 2018a). The reason is that plastic bags (which are predominantly single-use) are used widely across the world given their low cost, negligible weight, and convenience. American supermarkets embraced plastic shopping bags in the 1970s, followed by western Europe in the 1980s and Global South countries in the 1990s (Clapp and Swanston 2009). The Center for Biological Diversity estimates that every year, five trillion plastic shopping bags are used worldwide.²

The postmaterialism hypothesis (Gelissen 2007; Inglehart 1971, 1977) suggests that environmental protection will be demanded by the wealthy (whose material needs have been satisfied). If so, the wealthy countries of the Global North should be early adopters of formal environmental laws and regulations. Yet, regarding plastic bags, a widely prevalent pollutant, Global South countries have been the first movers. Starting in the late 1990s, plastic bag regulations first emerged in the Global South, with Rwanda and Bangladesh taking the lead. In response to the growing recognition of the plastic waste issue, Global North countries have enacted regulations in recent years (Clapp and Swanston 2009; Nielsen et al. 2019), and some only at the subnational level (such as Australia and the United Kingdom). In 2018, the EU banned throwaway plastics, such as Styrofoam and single-use straws. The United States, the largest contributor to plastic waste (National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine 2022), has not enacted any federal regulation (Q. Wang et al. 2022).

What explains this North–South divide? Previous studies have explored this question using a single case or small-n studies. This approach helps us to take a deep dive into factors that motivated plastic bag regulation in specific countries. Complementing this approach, we use the Cox proportional hazard model to study the onset of plastic bag regulations on a panel of 133 countries for the 1992–2019 period. Our multivariate analysis allows us to assess the role of multiple domestic and international factors in motivating the onset of plastic bag regulations.

Drawing on the theoretical idea of “environmentalism of the poor” (Martinez-Alier 2003), we focus on the influence of plastic waste imports on the enactment of domestic plastic bag regulations in importing countries. “Environmentalism of the poor” highlights that marginalized communities mobilize against pollution that harms their communities. This is well illustrated by the US environmental justice movement (Bullard 1990), whereby local groups protested the location of toxic dumps in their communities or, more recently, against the oil and gas industry in Louisiana’s “Cancer Alley.” Because plastic pollution imposes disproportionate costs on poor communities in developing countries, the role of developing countries in restricting imports of plastic waste illustrates the “environmentalism of the poor” in the context of global environmental politics. We find that imports of plastic waste (of which single-use plastic bags account for 15%–20% only)³ have domestic policy spillovers. Because the improper disposal of any type of plastic waste creates local pollution problems, there is domestic mobilization against the use of plastics. Plastic bags are a visible manifestation of the plastic pollution problem. Hence they have become a focal point of regulatory action.

Our article joins the growing international political economy literature exploring plastic governance. Plastic waste reflects the problem of resource overconsumption, fossil fuel dependence, and market and government failures on a global scale. Mah (2021) notes the plastic waste problem and how businesses have sought to greenwash it by promoting the circular economy framework as an attempt to seek public legitimacy and arguably preempt new regulation. We suggest that such corporate strategies for the circular economy do not correct the local negative environmental and health consequences of plastic waste disposal, particularly in Global South countries. We present evidence that imports of plastic waste motivate domestic mobilization in the Global South against plastics and that governments respond with formal regulations to target a subset of the broader plastic problem of single-use bags, which are a highly visible source of pollution and allow governments to signal their responsiveness to public demands.

The article is structured as follows. In the next section, we review the literature on plastic waste regulations. In the third section, we develop our argument and propose hypotheses. In the fourth section, we detail our data and method and present the results. We conclude by highlighting our theoretical contributions and drawing out policy implications.

There is well-developed literature (Convery et al. 2007; Dikgang et al. 2012; Hasson et al. 2007; Madigele et al. 2017; Poortinga et al. 2013; Thomas et al. 2016) examining plastic bag regulations in Israel (Ayalon et al. 2009); Portugal (Martinho et al. 2017); the United States (Wagner 2017); Rwanda, Kenya, and Uganda (Behuria 2021); and Chile (Cristi et al. 2020). Scholars have examined the onset of plastic regulations using structured comparative case analysis. Drawing on the case of Bangladesh and the United States, Clapp and Swanston (2009) report that the political power of the plastic industry played a prominent role in obstructing the translation of the anti–plastic bag norm into federal policy. A weak plastic industry was not able to derail the nationwide ban on plastic bags in Bangladesh. Comparing early regulators (Bangladesh and Kenya) and late regulators (Bahamas and Canada), Shipton and Dauvergne (2022) suggest that the emergence of plastic regulation reflects variations in local perceptions of plastics’ health effects.

A limited number of studies examine plastic regulation at a global level and over time. Xanthos and Walker (2017) review plastic bag and microbead policies introduced in major countries. Nielsen et al. (2019) map out the geographical distribution, types, and preliminary effects of plastic bag regulations. Similarly, Knoblauch et al. (2018) identify potential variables that explain the uneven diffusion of plastic bag policies between the Global North and South. While these studies provide excellent analyses of regulatory gaps at the country level, they do not arbitrate among competing regulation drivers by controlling for confounding factors. Using multivariate regression analysis, we seek to understand how different factors, domestic and international, might correlate with the onset of plastic bag regulations. We are most interested in the role of the plastic waste trade, which is a globally traded commodity, in driving domestic plastic bag regulation.

Martinez-Alier (2003) notes that environmentalism is of different types, reflecting the aims of its constituent groups, their tactics, and their discourse. The first and second types of environmentalism are consistent with postmaterialism. The “cult of wilderness” has been historically an elite-led movement, viewing that the wealthy seek to protect nature (from economic interests) for their recreational and spiritual needs. The “gospel of eco-efficiency” favors technological solutions (backed by market incentives) to move industrial societies toward sustainable development. The third type, which our argument draws on, is “environmentalism of the poor.” This proposes that the poor and underprivileged view environmental challenges as threatening their material well-being; their everyday lives are impacted by pollution and environmental destruction. Marginalized communities protest against toxic dumps located in their neighborhoods (as documented in the US environmental justice literature; Bullard 1990), and rural women seek to protect trees from the logging industry. This perspective challenges postmaterialism because it shows that environmental protection is not a luxury good but a necessity that poor people (with unfulfilled material needs) are willing to fight for. Moreover, grassroots movements and legal advocacy in the Global South have influenced global environmental governance of biodiversity and climate change (Peel and Lin 2019; Ridgeway and Jacques 2015).

In recent years, scholars have applied the perspective of “environmentalism of the poor” to plastic pollution. Dauvergne (2023b) calls for a new international agreement on plastics to incorporate distributional justice given that plastic pollution disproportionately harms vulnerable populations, especially in the Global South. He finds that the activities of transnational oil and gas, petrochemical, and plastics companies are creating serious local pollution problems in these countries (Dauvergne 2023a). Aligning with this literature on plastic governance, we argue that the international plastic waste trade flowing into the Global South from the North can motivate domestic mobilization in the Global South against plastic waste. A plausible causal mechanism is that improper waste disposal creates local problems of plastic pollution, which triggers social activism for enacting formal antipollution laws. Because plastic bags are a visible source of pollution, governments have incentives to enact formal regulations targeting such bags.

Managing plastic waste is a serious policy challenge as landfills become scarce. While some plastics can be recycled, this requires a sophisticated infrastructure to collect, sort, and process different types of plastics. Since 2010, there has been a push toward a circular economy by recovering value from waste for reuse and recycling (Gregson et al. 2010; OECD 2018; Pacini et al. 2021; UN Trade and Development 2018). While Global North countries probably have the technologies and the infrastructure to collect and process waste, waste-management firms find it less expensive to ship waste abroad to countries with lower labor costs and laxer regulations governing waste-processing facilities (Ragaert et al. 2017; Schroeder et al. 2019). In Table A.1 of the Supplementary Appendix, we present the list of top importers and exporters of plastic waste.

While processing such waste brings in valuable foreign exchange to Global South countries, it creates significant local environmental and health risks, accentuated by the lax and poorly enforced laws regulating processing facilities. In many cases, the waste-processing industry is located in the informal economy. Dumping of plastic waste without properly preparing the landfills leads to groundwater pollution. What is worse, recycling or environmentally sound management of plastic waste is partial at best, as imported plastic waste consists of a substantial portion of unrecyclable, dirty plastic waste (Dauvergne and Islam 2023). For example, in Malaysia, illegal dump sites expanded quickly after a large volume of plastic waste began to enter the country (Wong 2024). Dumping or open burning of plastic waste is highly hazardous for workers and surrounding communities (Campanale et al. 2020; North and Halden 2013; Wang et al. 2020; Wong 2024). In light of this, some scholars regard the waste trade as “toxic colonialism,” whereby the Global North externalizes environmental and health costs by dumping its waste on the Global South (E. Wang et al. 2022). This is why concerns about the environmental and human risks of importing plastic waste have grown in importing countries despite the relatively small volume of imported plastic waste compared to the total volume of produced plastic waste. Internationally, the mounting global concerns led to an amendment to the Basel Convention, limiting waste exports from OECD to non-OECD countries (Pacini et al. 2021).

How does international trade in plastic waste bear upon domestic policies on plastic bags? After all, plastic bags account for only 15–20 percent of imported waste, which also includes plastic bottles, containers, toys, and consumer products (OECD 2023). Waste imports can motivate antiplastic social activism. As concerns about health and environmental risks rise, NGOs, citizen action groups, and grassroots movements demand that governments shut down illegal recycling facilities and limit plastic waste imports. For example, in Malaysia, local communities urged the government to close illegal recycling facilities (Dauvergne 2023a). They established an environmental action association to increase the pressure on government officials to shut down these facilities.

Antiplastic social movements also lobby politicians and public officials to restrict and ban single-use plastics (Dauvergne and Islam 2023). Therefore it is likely that social activism, triggered by plastic waste imports, played a role in advancing plastic regulations, of which plastic bag regulation is an important manifestation. Even beyond plastic bags, Global South countries have been keen to regulate other types of single-use plastics, although such regulations are less common than for plastic bags (UNEP 2018a).⁴ Nonetheless, analytically focusing on the plastic bag regulations, which have been widely adopted in both the Global South and North, provides leverage to identify why the Global South was an early mover in this regard. Hence we hypothesize the following:

Might global plastic trade provoke the same backlash in exporting countries? Probably not, because they have offloaded their waste disposal problems elsewhere, out of sight and out of mind. Hence we hypothesize the following:

The Global South’s early adoption of plastic bag regulations could result from several additional factors. An established literature has examined the role of isomorphic pressures (DiMaggio and Powell 1983) in policy diffusion. The intuition is that countries seldom make policy decisions in isolation; their decisions are often informed by the policies of countries in their “neighborhoods” (Bernauer et al. 2010; Neumayer et al. 2014; Simmons and Elkins 2004). In this article, we focus on the role of regional peers because governments often look to their neighbors for policy guidance. Moreover, once a country enacts plastic bag regulations, neighboring countries may feel the normative pressure to do so as well. For example, scholars suggest that Rwanda’s plastic bag regulation inspired Malawi to follow suit (Nielsen et al. 2019). Thus we propose the following:

Finnemore and Sikkink (1998) suggest that norm adoption gets traction when the causal chain between cause and effect is short and clear. Another explanation is that plastic issues are more visible in Global South countries because these countries lack waste-management capacity. Waste importers indulge in improper disposal, illegal dumping, burning, and other practices that pollute local air and water (Clapp and Swanston 2009; Knoblauch et al. 2018).

Regulations are often motivated by problem visibility (Mani and Mukand 2007; Prakash and Potoski 2014). Politicians recognize that they will be rewarded for solving visible problems of today, as opposed to preempting nonvisible, future problems. This is why voters reward political parties for disaster relief as opposed to disaster preparedness (Healy and Malhotra 2009). Arguably, plastic bag regulations are enacted earlier in countries lacking waste-management facilities because the bags make plastic pollution more visible. Hence we propose the following:

Discarded plastic bags in water streams and along coasts are visible issues. The Irish government’s view is that coastal areas polluted mainly by plastic bags impede the country’s green image and scenic beauty. In Australia, concern about the plastic issue has centered on litter along coastlines and its hazardous effects on marine animals (Clapp and Swanston 2009). Moreover, marine plastic pollution can have negative economic consequences for the fishing industry. Thus we propose the following:

While citizens and environmental groups might demand new regulations, governments could be reluctant to supply them if they confront opposition from powerful interest groups (Clapp and Swanston 2009; Houreld and Ndiso 2017; Nhamo 2008). The domestic plastic and petrochemical industry, in particular, has strong incentives to oppose domestic plastic bag regulations (Clapp and Swanston 2009; Dauvergne 2018; Knoblauch et al. 2018). For example, the US petrochemical industry has been able to stall nationwide plastic bag regulations (Romer and Foley 2012). Importantly, plastic manufacturer associations, together with plastic trade associations and trade unions, have resisted plastic bag regulations (Clapp and Swanston 2009; Houreld and Ndiso 2017; Nhamo 2008). Thus we propose the following:

Worried about both pollution and climate issues, environmental NGOs have come out strongly against plastics. For example, in Bangladesh, early campaigns against plastic shopping bags were led by local environmental NGOs (Clapp and Swanston 2009). The efforts of NGOs are facilitated when they have the political space and opportunity to advocate (Knoblauch et al. 2018). Antiplastic advocacy will be less effective in countries that restrict political voices. Therefore we propose the following:

We drew on multiple sources to construct our data set. We referred to the work on global plastic pollution legislation by the Plastic Pollution Coalition (PPC).⁵ Because the PPC did not include the year in which a policy was enacted, we drew on the UNEP (2018b) publication Legal Limits on Single-Use Plastics and Microplastics. We also cross-checked our data against the recent work of Nielsen et al. (2019) and Knoblauch et al. (2018). Thus data availability issues led us to limit the data set on plastic bag regulations to 2019.⁶

Plastic bag regulations take two forms. Some countries have banned plastic bags. Only a few countries impose total bans, that is, bans on the introduction of any type of plastic bag. Most countries have enacted bans based on bag thickness, size of retail operation, or purpose of use. In many countries, the use of plastic bags for primary packaging (fresh, perishable, or other loose foods; pharmaceutical products) is allowed (UNEP 2018a). Other countries have enacted taxes or fees on manufacturers and consumers. In our data, until 2019, eighty-five countries had enacted bans, while thirty-five had enacted taxes/fees.

Countries have also enacted regulations at different levels, from municipalities and provinces to the country level (Clapp and Swanston 2009). In this article, we focus on national plastic bag regulations only. We also limit our focus to legally binding plastic bag regulations, excluding voluntary measures (Nielsen et al. 2019). We recognize that our data do not reflect the redirection of trade in plastic waste to Southeast Asian countries (such as Malaysia) after China enacted a ban on plastic waste imports in 2018 (Staub 2020). With the rise of such imports, INTERPOL (2020) notes the proliferation of illegal waste-processing sites and the increased number of “accidental fires” in plastic waste dumps. We also recognize the distinction between de jure and de facto regulations; that is, regulations are sometimes not enforced. Hence our findings should be interpreted with these data limitations in mind.

To test our hypotheses about variation in the onset of plastic bag regulations, we employ the Cox proportional hazard model, which is suitable for analyzing the effect of covariates on hazard rates, especially when covariates are continuous variables. In the survival analysis, the dependent variable represents the time until the event happens (the adoption of plastic bag regulation, in our case), while covariates represent factors that influence duration times. Our unit of analysis is country-year.

We examined two types of regulation: bans and fees on plastic bags (Figure 1). Ban and Fee are coded as 0 before the enactment of the plastic ban/fee and 1 upon its enactment and are removed from the data set for subsequent years to match the hazard data (Andersen and Gill 1982). While fees are less stringent than bans, fees, which may require a web of institutional arrangements, may incur more administrative costs. Analyzing two different models of Ban and Fee enables us to assess how different political considerations impact policy instrument choice. For example, governments facing strong industry opposition to bans might introduce fees. As a supplementary analysis, in Table A.4 in the Supplementary Appendix, we also examine Fee and Ban altogether as one dependent variable, Fee or Ban. Some countries introduced fees first and moved on to the ban later. In this case, while Ban and Fee respectively represent the year of enactment of the ban and the fee, the Ban or Fee variable reflects the timing of the first regulation (the year of enforcement of the fee, in this case).

Our main explanatory variables are plastic waste imports and exports (H_1a, H_1b). To capture the effect of plastic waste imports and exports on plastic bag regulation, we include the total volume of plastic waste (measured in net weight) imports and exports in a given year (Import; Export). For the supplemental analysis, in Table A.5 in the Supplementary Appendix, we include plastic waste imports and exports measured in value (Pacini et al. 2021; E. Wang et al. 2022). The data are from the UN Comtrade Database.

Following E. Wang et al. (2022), we focused on the harmonized system code 3915 (waste, parings, and scrap, or polymers of ethylene), which reflects the trade in various polymer categories and major product categories containing plastic. For example, the 3915 category consists of subcategories including 391,510 (polyethylene waste or scrap), 391,520 (polystyrene waste or scrap), 391,530 (polyvinyl chloride waste or scrap), and 391,590 (plastics waste or scrap of other plastics).

Our model controls for alternative factors that may independently drive plastic bag regulations. To capture the effect of regional peer pressure (H₂), we control the share of countries in the region that have already enacted a ban or fee (Region). To specify a region, we use the World Bank’s regional classification (Latin America & Caribbean, South Asia, sub-Saharan Africa, Europe and central Asia, Middle East and North Africa, East Asia and Pacific, and North America).

To capture the effect of issue visibility (H_3a, H_3b, and H_3c), we control for waste management, coastline, and fishery. Waste Management represents the proportion of household and commercial waste generated in a country that is collected and treated in a manner that controls environmental risks. The data are from the Environmental Indicators Dataset.⁷Coastline represents coastline length measured in kilometers as reported in the CIA World Factbook.⁸Fishery, drawn from the FAO,⁹ is measured by the value of aquaculture and the farming of aquatic organisms, including fish, mollusks, crustaceans, and aquatic plants (% of GDP).

To assess the role of the petrochemical industry (H₄), given the lack of time series cross-sectional data on the size of the petrochemical industry, we include the size of the chemical industry (value added % of GDP) as a proxy, retrieved from the World Development Indicators (Chemical Industry).¹⁰ Separately, we control for the size of the manufacturing sector (% of GDP) in an alternative specification in Table A.6 in the Supplementary Appendix. Last, we control for democracy to assess the political space available to citizens and NGOs to campaign against plastic bags (H₅; Democracy). This variable reflects liberal democracy in the V-Dem Democracy Indices.

In addition to variables for which we offer hypotheses, we control for factors that could independently influence the government’s decision to enact plastic bag regulations. Plastics contribute to climate change because they are made from petroleum products. Thus strong climate performers with low CO₂ emissions may seek to regulate plastic bags earlier for regulatory cobenefits. Climate represents CO₂ emissions per GDP, drawn from the Environmental Indicators Dataset.

We also consider the level of a country’s environmental regulatory orientation. Countries that have dealt with various environmental issues in the past through regulatory arrangements should rely on regulations also for plastic bags. Because direct measurement of environmental regulatory orientation is not available, we use the ratification of multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) as a proxy, given that MEAs obligate countries to enact regulatory measures to tackle targeted environmental issues. Drawing on the IEA Database Project,¹¹MEAs represents the cumulative number of ratified MEAs by a country in a given year.

Last, we control for a variety of socioeconomic variables. We control for GDP per capita and its squared term (GDP Per Capita; GDP Per Capita²) to account for the effect of the Environmental Kuznets Curve (e.g., Grossman and Krueger 1995). Consistent with the postmaterialism hypothesis, it suggests that while local pollution (typically, air pollution) will increase with economic growth, as countries move beyond a certain per capita income threshold, they will start enacting stricter regulations.

Plastic bag use and waste might reflect economic growth, population growth, and levels of urbanization. These might create a public demand for regulation. Therefore we control for GDP Growth (annual %), Population, Population Density, and Urban Ratio (% of urban population). All these data are from the World Development Indicators. Descriptive statistics for all variables are available in Table A.2 in the Supplementary Appendix.

Table 1 presents the results based on the Cox proportional hazard model.

We find that Import is statistically significant (p < 0.001): higher imports increase the likelihood of the onset of plastic bag fees earlier. It is also weakly significant (p < 0.1) for bans. In contrast, Export is negatively associated with Ban (p < 0.1), while this negative association is not statistically significant for Fee. These results hold across all alternative specifications presented in Tables A.3–A.8 in the Supplementary Appendix.¹² Thus H_1a is strongly supported, and H_1b is weakly supported.

We find that regional peers’ adoption of a ban or fee increases the likelihood of the adoption of bans only, which partially supports H₂. Concerning problem visibility, Coastline or Waste Management does not have a statistically significant effect on either Ban or Fee. Against our expectations, countries characterized by a higher share of fisheries are less likely to adopt plastic fees (p < 0.1). These results are robust even when we add a dummy variable Landlocked Countries (see Table A.7 in the Supplementary Appendix). Overall, H_3a, H_3b, and H_3c are not supported.

Regarding industry pressure, which is a powerful competing hypothesis in the literature, contrary to our expectations, countries with higher salience of the chemical industry are more likely to adopt plastic fees only and not bans (H₄ is partially supported). This result is also puzzling given the role of industry opposition reported in the literature. One plausible interpretation is that the industry supports a fee (which is often set at a low level) as opposed to an outright ban, which can disrupt business. The chemical industry recognizes the antiplastic sentiment and favors the least disruptive regulation aimed at plastic bags, which are often a small revenue item for major firms. When we replace the chemical industry with the manufacturing industry in an alternative specification in Table A.6 in the Supplementary Appendix, it has a weak negative association with Ban or Fee at p < 0.1. Last, the level of democracy, whether a country has enough room for political advocacy, is not statistically significant for either Fee or Ban (H₅ is not supported).

Global South countries are early adopters of plastic bag regulations, which suggests that wealth may not drive the onset of all types of domestic environmental regulation. Drawing on the “environmentalism of the poor” approach, our article challenges postmaterialism. Overall, the findings of the positive association of plastic waste imports with bans and fees support our main argument about the “environmentalism of the poor.” This effect is robust across different model specifications (although weakly significant for bans in the main model). Underprivileged communities suffer when plastic waste imported from rich countries is improperly processed, thereby causing local pollution. This could mobilize communities against plastics and direct sentiment toward a visible and feasible item for plastic regulation: plastic bags. Nonetheless, because we do not provide a direct measure of local mobilization against plastic waste and the proxy measure, such as the Democracy variable’s nonsignificance, we need to be cautious in translating the statistical association into a causal mechanism.

Competing hypotheses noted in the literature, such as issue visibility and democracy, are not supported, while regional peer pressure and the power of industry are partially supported. The lack of support for issue visibility may suggest that plastic bag regulations are triggered not by local-level pollution problems (which lead to social mobilization) but by the high salience of the plastic pollution problem at the national level. The implication is that environmental activities might be seeking longer-term solutions that go to the source of the problem (plastic waste imports). Thus their activism does not seek tactical, locally focused solutions (such as more waste treatment plants) but a structural solution by changing the composition of the national-level trading basket, which ultimately affects local-level plastic pollution problems.

Also, countries tend to follow regional peers’ policy decisions in their adoption of plastic bag bans only. Perhaps countries may be able to imitate bans more easily, which could require less administrative capacity and fewer costs than imposing fees. Interestingly, we also highlight the possibility that the chemical industry, which is negatively affected by the reduction of plastic production, is counterintuitively in favor of fees. This may be because fees are passed on to consumers or downstream industries (e.g., the packaging industry or retail establishments) and have limited impact on production, whereas bans could significantly affect plastic production. These findings perhaps point to the strategic acquiescence by the petrochemical sector to a weaker and less disruptive form of regulation.

This article has important implications for the study of global environmental politics. While there is a well-established literature on the economic benefits of free trade (or open economy), we highlight that free trade is a source of negative externalities of environmental costs and health risks (Clapp 2001; O’Neill 2019) by focusing on trade in a specific commodity: plastic waste. At the same time, our empirical analysis adds new insight by suggesting that it can also be a source of mobilization for environmental constituencies in the Global South.

Our article has several limitations. Because we have not empirically identified the causal mechanism, future work should seek direct measures of local mobilization against pollution problems and how this translates into a wide range of plastic policies beyond plastic bag regulation. This raises a question about the scope conditions of our case study. Are the mechanisms that link waste imports to domestic regulations via local harms also active in the context of other types of traded waste, such as e-waste and used clothing (O’Neill 2019)? E-waste (including mobile phones) is among the fastest-growing globally traded waste products (Forti et al. 2020; Ilankoon et al. 2018). While e-waste disposal or recycling poses local health hazards, it has economic potential for recovering valuable critical metals (Patil and Ramakrishna 2020). Another example is used or secondhand clothing (Frazer 2008; Hansen 2004), donated by affluent consumers in the Global North to charitable groups, which then sell it in the Global South. Such imports hurt the domestic textile industry, including the foreign multinationals that have established local facilities (Brooks and Simon 2012), and sometimes cause public health concerns (e.g., concerns about transmission of skin diseases). These consequences have motivated several East African countries to ban or phase out such imports.

Finally, our article raises a question about the drivers of plastic waste trade. In this article, we have presented evidence that plastic waste imports are associated with an earlier onset of plastic bag regulations. But what drives trade in plastic waste in the first place? Is this a classic case of domestic waste regulation in the Global North driving out “dirty” industries to the Global South? Or, alongside, does it pertain to the saturation of domestic landfills and local pushback against creating new landfills? We believe that these are important issues for future research.

We thank the three anonymous reviewers for their helpful comments.