Discusses how the needs of the individual must be balanced with socially desirable ecological goals if the environment is to be protected.

Discusses how the needs of the individual must be balanced with socially desirable ecological goals if the environment is to be protected.

1. ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY ANALYSIS: WHAT AND WHY? Why environmental policy analysis? Environmental issues are growing in visibility in local, national, and world arenas, as a myriad of human activities leads to increased impacts on the natural world. Issues such as climate change, endangered species, wilderness protection, and energy use are regularly on the front pages of newspapers. Governments at all levels are struggling with how to address these issues. Environmental policy analysis is intended to present the environmental and social impacts of policies, in the hope that better decisions will result when people have better information on which to base those decisions. Conducting environmental policy analysis requires people who understand what it is and how to do it. Interpreting it also requires those skills. We hope that this book will increase the abilities, both of analysts and of decision-makers, to understand and interpret the impacts of environmental policies. Policy analysis books almost invariably begin by pointing out that policy analysis can take many forms. This book is no different. As you will see in Chapter 1, we consider policy analysis to be information provided for the policy process. That information can take many forms, from sophisticated empirical analysis to general theoretical results, from summary statistics to game theoretic strategies.

This text provides the means by which both students and professionals can fully and systematically understand the inherent policy arguments behind the law and the foundational normative principles that inform those arguments. Examining both economic and ecosystem values, it is meant as a supplementary text for all those applying critical reason to environmental law. This small self-study book enriches one's ability to analyze the law as it is, while providing the tools and skill set to design alternatives for change.

The book examines a new concern in water quality policy, namely aquatic micropollutants. Micropollutants are chemicals detected in small concentrations in waterbodies today, originating from pharmaceuticals, cosmetics, or detergents, among others. Since the regulation of micropollutants is a fairly new issue, it has been largely neglected in social sciences. However, the search for appropriate solutions is of high political relevance at both the national and international levels, with many open questions arising that concern the most adequate governance structures and steering mechanisms. Solutions suitable for classical, macro-pollutants, such as nutrients, do not necessarily apply to micropollutants because of the diversity of compounds and sources, and for technical, financial, and societal reasons. The book addresses this knowledge gap by investigating the steering mechanisms at hand and their prospect for problem solving. In this regard, the research provides a systematic depiction and comparison of policy designs in place for the reduction of micropollutants in the Rhine basin. Moreover, the study yields insights into the governance structures in place, into actors’ responsibilities and constellations, and policy processes regarding micropollutants. The study is furthermore embedded into broader theoretical questions of policy research. More precisely, this research is a contribution to policy analysis that aims to achieve more optimal policy results by providing for a better understanding of the nature of policy designs and the social mechanisms behind the choice of them. Despite the intrinsic aim of policy analysis at contributing to more optimal policy outcomes, there remains a lack of research regarding analytical tools that enable an ex-ante assessment of policy designs’ problem-solving abilities. To explore such a research path, this book proposes a novel index of policy comprehensiveness for quantifying the prospective performance of policy designs in alleviating an underlying policy issue, e.g. reducing pollutants in waters. Furthermore, the book uncovers the social mechanisms behind policymaking and turns to the question: In which social settings is it possible to achieve a comprehensive policy design? Compared to purely micro-level explanations, the advantage of the network approach is that it goes beyond the mere aggregation of policy actors’ attributes by taking into consideration actors’ interdependencies. In order to take the network approach seriously, the study systematically links the structure of a policy network with comprehensive policy designs. Network concepts, such as coalition structure, interconnectedness, and belief similarity, are employed from policy change research here in order to explore the link between structural network characteristics and comprehensive policy design. By studying how network structures affect policy design, the book critically examines the explanatory value of the network approach.

This comprehensive overview of US environmental regulation?from the inception of the EPA through the current Bush administration?goes beyond traditional texts to consider alternatives to the existing regulatory regime, as well as the challenges posed by the global nature of environmental issues.Thoughtful and even-handed, Governing the Environment covers the full range of topics relevant to our understanding of current environmental policy. Clear, concise chapters move from the context of environmental policy to regulatory design, reform efforts, and notable private-sector innovations.In the process, the author argues that we?ve taken conventional environmental regulation as far as we can go?that we need to look for alternative ways of governing the environment, involving corporations that have expertise in the areas of technology, products, and markets. But, he cautions, there must be a careful integration of private-sector initiatives and public regulation.A notable feature of the text is an examination of the difficulties inherent in managing global environmental problems. Exploring recent efforts toward global environmental governance in the face of competing economic demands, the final section considers the ways in which a system of governance might compensate for the lack of effective international regulatory institutions.Marc Allen Eisner is Henry Merritt Wriston Chair of Public Policy in the Government Department at Wesleyan University. His publications include Antitrust and the Triumph of Economics and Contemporary Regulatory Policy, 2nd Edition.Contents: Environmental Protection and Governance: An Introduction. Environmental Policy and Politics. A Primer on Environmental Protection. The Environmental Policy Subsystem. The Evolution of Regulatory Design and Reform. Regulatory Design and Performance. Regulatory Reform or Reversal. Reinventing Regulation: Flexibility in an Iron Cage. Voluntarism and the End of Reform. The Emerging System of Green Governance. From Greed to Green: Corporate Environmentalism and Management. Green by Association: Code- and Standards-Based Self-Regulation. Public-Private Hybrids and Environmental Governance. Regulating the Global Commons from the Bottom Up. Beyond the Tragedy of the Global Commons. From Montreal to Kyoto. Sustainable Development: Managing the Unmanageable. Conclusion. Green Governance and the Future of Environmental Protection.

The Policy Design Primer is a concise and practical introduction to the principles and elements of policy design in contemporary governance. Guiding students through the study of the instruments used by governments in carrying out their tasks, adapting to, and altering their environments, this book: Examines the range of substantive and procedural policy instruments that together comprise the toolbox from which governments select specific tools expected to resolve policy problems, Considers the principles behind the selection and use of specific types of instruments in contemporary government, Addresses the issues of instrument mixes and their (re)design in a discussion of the future research agenda of policy design and Discusses several current trends in instrument use often linked to factors such as globalization and the increasingly networked nature of modern society. This readily digestible and informative book provides a comprehensive overview of this essential component of modern governance, featuring helpful definitions of key concepts and further reading. This book is essential reading for all students of public policy, administration and management as well as more broadly for relevant courses in health, social welfare, environment, development and local government, in addition to those managers and practitioners involved in Executive Education and policy design work on the ground.

Despite decades of policy experimentation, the ultimate goal of efficient and effective environmental regulation has continued to elude policy-makers and regulatory theorists. The less than satisfactory performance of both government and market approaches to environmental protection has led tothe introduction of a broader range of policy mechanisms, such as education, information-based strategies, economic instruments and self-regulation. Yet these various policy instruments are usually treated as alternatives to one another rather than as complementary. Drawing from studies in North America, Europe and Australia, the authors show how the design of complementary combinations of policy instruments, tailored to particular environmental goals and circumstances, will produce more effective and efficient policy outcomes. They also confront the criticalproblem of how, at a time of fiscal constraint and small government, environmental policy might still be designed in ways that improve outcomes both for the environment and for business.

'Environmental Policy' clearly explains how the social sciences relate to environmental policy-making and how they can be used to achieve policies for a sustainable future.