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Structural Power and Actors’ Agency in Assessing the Environmental Impacts of Global Value Chains: A comparative literature review of unequal ecological exchange and environmental upgrading | UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (IIPP) Working Paper (WP 2025-19)
Authors:
- Alberto Gabino Martínez-Hernández | PhD Candidate in Economics, Laboratory of Social Dynamics and Recomposition of Spaces (LADYSS), Université Paris Cité, Paris, France
- Romain Svartzman | Research Fellow, Bocconi University, Institute for European Policymaking (IEP@Bocconi) and Honorary Senior Research Fellow, UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose (IIPP)
Abstract:
Global value chains (GVCs) – the cross-border trade of goods and services as intermediate inputs – are a defining feature of international trade and they also carry significant environmental impacts. However, we are still missing a comprehensive understanding of how power relations – among states, firms and civil society organisations – shape those environmental impacts. This paper addresses this gap through a systematic literature review of two political economy frameworks that have assessed power relations and environmental impacts within GVCs from different perspectives, while largely ignoring each other: unequal ecological exchange (UEE) and environmental upgrading (EU). UEE focuses on macro-level, structural patterns of resource appropriation and environmental harm from core to peripheral countries; EU examines how firm-level governance and strategies can transform GVCs towards more sustainable practices. Drawing on three major bibliographic databases and employing the AI tool Rayyan for screening, this review analyses how each literature conceptualises power and the environment. The results highlight that UEE typically uses quantitative, structural analyses centred on environmental outcomes, whereas EU relies on qualitative case studies emphasising how environmental processes can be modified by firms’ practices. Despite these differences, both literatures are slowly converging in their understanding of power, not only as a structural form of resource appropriation from core to peripheral countries and firms (UEE), but also as the agency of actors (states, firms, civil society) to at least partially contest existing structures and seek to transform GVCs to their own advantage (EU). Better integrating UEE’s structural focus with EU’s actor-based approach would be particularly useful to understand how ongoing structural changes, most notably the technological ascent of Chinese firms in green sectors, are deeply reshaping GVCs and their environmental impacts.
Reference:
This working paper can be referenced as follows: Martínez-Hernández, A. G., & Svartzman, R. (2025). Structural power and actors’ agency in assessing the environmental impacts of global value chains: A comparative literature review of unequal ecological exchange and environmental upgrading. UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose, Working Paper Series (IIPP WP 2025-19). ISSN 2635-0122
This working paper is part of the UCL Institute for Innovation and Public Purpose’s (UCL IIPP) publication series.
Explore more working papers and policy reports here.