UNCLOS would bolster U.S. efforts at international environmental protection

Leadership in Environmental Concerns. A fourth reason for the change in the American attitude toward the Convention was a new global attitude toward management of the environment. Part XII of the Convention deals extensively with the protection and preservation of the marine environment, covering a wide array of issues, from general principles to global and regional cooperation, technical assistance, monitoring and environmental assessment, and responsibility and liability.³¹ The inclusion of strong environmental protection measures in the Convention was an earlier and enduring goal of the United States. In the decade following its completion, the U.S., along with many other nations, became even more interested in preserving the environment, to the point that such concerns in many cases supplanted economic considerations.³² Given that Part XII creates an effective, if diffuse, international mechanism for controlling marine pollution and establishes a symbiotic relationship between the Convention and other issue-specific agreements, the Clinton administration decided that agreeing to the Convention would ensure a stable regime for environmental protection.³³