The International Joint Commission, Water Levels, and Transboundary Governance in the Great Lakes

This article provides a historical background of the evolution of transboundary water governance and environmental diplomacy in the Great Lakes–St. Lawrence basin, with a focus on the International Joint Commission (IJC), during the twentieth century. This study focuses on water quantity issues, such as diversions, canals, hydroelectric developments, control works, and water levels, revealing the range of artificial and natural impacts on water levels in the Great Lakes–St. Lawrence basin. Doing so provides for a revealing examination of the IJC, which has traditionally been the main forum in which Canada and the United States manage their environmental relations and border water issues, which allows for an engagement with a range of North American transboundary governance theories. While the IJC is often lauded as a model of transnational environmental cooperation, this paper demonstrates that the evolution of this bilateral institution up to the 1960s is more complicated.