Environmental Policy Integration in Practice

Shaping Institutions for Learning

Mans Nilsson, Katarina Eckerberg, Katarina Eckerberg, Mans Nilsson, Katarina Eckerberg, Mans Nilsson

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2013
• Print ISBN: 9781844073931
• eBook ISBN: 9781136548178
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Biological Sciences
• Subtopic: American Government
• Index: Biological Sciences

Environmental values and concerns are meant to be reflected through environmental policy, which is then integrated into mainstream economic and social policy that serves to govern society and the economy in different sectors. Yet effective environmental policy integration has proved to be very difficult in practice and it remains largely an elusive aspiration.

This groundbreaking volume presents the first ever detailed examination of EPI at the national policy level, focusing on the key sectors of energy and agriculture within Sweden, a country that is widely recognized as a front runner in environmental management. The authors deconstruct EPI, look at what it means in policy formation and examine how environmental priorities are treated in relation to other political priorities. The final section of the book lays out the major findings and presents key lessons for international application, including institutional recommendations on how to enhance the potential for EPI. Most fundamentally, the book answers the questions of what works for EPI, why it works, and how it can be achieved in practice across sectors. The result is a rich and indispensable guide for all those involved in environmental and sustainable development policy issues.

1

Introduction: EPI Agendas and Policy Responses

Måns Nilsson, Katarina Eckerberg and Åsa Persson

We know more and more about the environmental implications of human activities and what we must do to remedy them. This has fuelled remarkable advancements in environmental policy during the last three decades. However, whether these insights result in modified decisions in mainstream economic policy sectors such as agriculture, energy or transport is another matter. Indeed, sectoral policymaking, where most important public policy decisions are made, appears to remain largely business-as-usual, leaving sustainability concerns marginalized. This book tackles this critical policy problem, persistent across the world: the concern that environmental values are not sufficiently integrated into mainstream sectoral policymaking.

This concern has spread, with the result that integration of environmental sustainability considerations into social and economic policies, the so-called environmental policy integration (EPI) principle, has become widely identified as a necessary shift in policymaking. EPI is deemed an essential component of sustainable development, as we move away from end-of-pipe solutions to proactive solutions to environmental problems. Only by strategically involving all sectors can the momentum be raised to push the whole of society in a more sustainable direction. This necessity of considering economic and environmental policy together has been widely recognized in recent decades and is emphasized in several classical texts. For instance, in 1987 the World Commission on Environment and Development (the Brundtland Commission) argued that:

The integrated and interdependent nature of the new challenges and issues today contrasts sharply with the nature of the institutions that exist today. These institutions tend to be independent, fragmented, and working to relatively narrow mandates with closed decision processes. Those responsible for managing natural resources and protecting the environment are institutionally separated from those responsible for managing the economy. The real world of interlocked economic and ecological systems will not change; the policies and institutions must.

(WCED, 1987, p310)

In Europe, EPI now has a constitutional backing not only in many national jurisdictions but also in the European Treaty. The Swedish Constitution has a formulation that ‘public activity shall promote sustainable development leading to a good environment for present and future generations’ and Article 6 of the European Treaty of 1997 (‘The Amsterdam Treaty’) declares that ‘Environmental protection requirements must be integrated into the definition and implementation of the Community policies [...] in particular with a view to promoting sustainable development.’

Hence the principles, policies and declarations regarding EPI have been in place for many years. But are they followed through in practical terms? As noted above, most observers suggest that the degree of implementation of EPI has been disappointing so far and requires more attention, both in practical policymaking and in policy-oriented research (Lenschow, 2002a; EEA, 2005). Just as with sustainable development, the idea of EPI has largely remained on the rhetorical level (EC, 2004). Why, despite political and constitutional support, is EPI largely considered a failure internationally? How do we really measure success when it comes to EPI? What are the barriers and challenges and how can they be overcome? What experiences can we draw upon to enhance the potential for EPI?

Building on national policy experiences in Sweden, this book is an attempt to unpack these questions, putting two overarching issues up front: First, how can one meaningfully interpret the principle of EPI, and what is its status and development in policy sectors? Second, what main factors affect EPI and how should institutions in the policymaking arena be shaped to advance it? The book presents a multidisciplinary study of these questions, focusing on empirical cases in the agricultural and energy policy sectors in Sweden. These sectors are interesting because they are at the heart of some of society’s major sustainability challenges, but represent very different types of issues. In addition, they have recently been subject to intense EPI efforts in many countries. The book uses sector environmental analysis, policy framing and learning, and the role of institutions to unpack the EPI puzzle and its evolution in these sectors. With a focus on institutional dimensions, we intend to provide empirical insights and recommendations to practitioners engaged in EPI efforts across Europe and elsewhere; we also hope to provide valuable theoretical insights for students of environmental policy.

Why is the EPI experience in Sweden interesting as a case study? Among both Swedish policymakers and those abroad, Sweden is perceived as a pioneer in environmental policy (Skou Andersen and Liefferink, 1997; Lafferty and Eckerberg, 1998) and has also been known to push the environmental agenda in international arenas such as the EU and the UN, including the EU’s sustainable development strategy (SDS) and the Cardiff Process. Its track record in environmental policy performance consistently comes out high in international comparisons. For instance, Time Magazine featured an article on Sweden as the main front-runner country in the world:

Sweden’s leaders have passed laws that would be unthinkable for some politicians [...] Indeed, whereas others complain about higher taxes or infringements on their rights, most Swedes seem to embrace the idea of helping save the planet.

(Time Magazine, 2006, p41)

At the World Economic Forum in 2006, Yale University presented a study assessing the environmental performance of 133 countries. According to Yale’s 2006 Environmental Performance Index, Sweden ranks second after New Zealand (and followed by Finland, the Czech Republic, the UK, Austria and Denmark) (Yale Center for Environmental Law and Policy, 2006). Because Sweden is so successful at environmental policy we expect it to be good at EPI as well, and the study of Sweden can be expected to also generate lessons for other countries.

In Sweden, as elsewhere, many actors and institutions involved in policymaking lack sustainability perspectives through tradition and mandate. Sweden has certainly experienced its share of ‘environment-bashing’ and vested interests stalling progress towards sustainability. Nevertheless, it is apparent that some things work well in Sweden when it comes to environmental policy. And as we shall see later on, it has responded actively to the challenges set by the EPI agenda and the Swedish policy system displays several features such as consultative, coordinative and fact-finding processes that appear to be beneficial for EPI. Although research has shown that there is not one governance structure or institutional set-up that works best for environmental decision making everywhere (Brewer and Stern, 2005), the principles and mechanisms behind the Swedish arrangements should be broadly interesting to learn from. However, before looking more closely at the Swedish response, we will briefly introduce the EPI concept and the key international and European processes that contributed to establishing the EPI agenda.

EPI with a View Towards Sustainable Development

What does EPI really mean? EPI can be distinguished from environmental policy and protection in general in that it is concerned with environmental policy issues becoming part of sectors rather than being a separate (albeit sometimes successful) policy field on its own. However, beyond this there is little agreement on the exact meaning of the concept, as explored in detail in Chapter 2 and also discussed in earlier literature (Lafferty, 2004; Lenschow, 2002a; Jordan and Schout, 2006). The principle, as expressed in the European Treaty and in the Brundtland Report, seems straightforward, suggesting that environmental issues need more consideration within sectors. How much consideration is, however, a point of contention, with some authors going as far as to suggest a general priority for the environment over other objectives as a general rule of EPI (Lafferty and Hovden, 2003) and others seeing it as a way of establishing a more rational policymaking process by ensuring a more comprehensive basis for decisions (Underdal, 1980) (see Chapter 2 for an in-depth discussion).

Ultimately, the process of integration is a context-specific interpretation process which is likely to involve many different actors and evolve over time as problems and understandings are continually reframed. This means that for the purposes of this book, specific operational definitions of sustainability cannot be theoretically deduced and used as benchmarks. In our research we will refrain from viewing certain measures, technologies or policy agendas as inherently sustainable. Viewing sustainability as a matter of context-specificity and interpretation is consistent with the policy-learning approach to EPI that we apply in this book. The policy-learning approach to EPI tries to bridge the rational and normative perspectives and situate itself somewhere in the middle. We recognize that EPI is something more than rational decision making and entails a normative orientation. Still, since environmental concerns in sectoral policymaking are systematically undervalued, despite democratically established policy goals about environmental protection and sustainable development, a more rational pursuit of our common goals requires enhanced attention to environmental knowledge, at least in the major economic sectors. Thus a policy-learning process drives a normative reorientation in the sectors as well as rendering it more rational and effective vis-à-vis established policy objectives. The learning concept applied in this book does not, however, entail any general priority of environmental objectives over other policy objectives (see Chapters 2 and 3). At some point there will be ‘enough’ EPI. However, taking a (learning) process view of EPI, we refrain from defining such an end state. The learning conceptualization will be further discussed in Chapter 3 and then applied in the empirical Chapters 5 and 6.

This book is primarily concerned with the environmental objectives of EPI. However, since EPI as a policy principle both in Sweden and internationally is explicitly concerned with integration of the environment into decision making with a view to promoting sustainable development, it must be recognized that EPI in a sustainable development context entails more than protecting the environment in a narrow sense. From an empirical point of view, it is difficult to work with the sustainability concept entailing the environmental, economic and social dimensions that were outlined in the Brundtland process. These three cover virtually all public policy areas and objectives, including employment, work safety, health and industrial competitiveness. Integrating sustainable development would then be a matter of ‘integrating everything into everything’. How, then, can ‘in the context of sustainable development’ be interpreted? The Brundtland definition – ‘sustainable development is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’ – gives three useful leads. First, being concerned with future generations means that we are concerned about effects far into the future. This means that policy must take a long-term view and potentially trade off goals over time. Second, meeting the needs of the present stipulates efficiency in the use of resources. This means that environmental policy must be efficient in terms of how much resources we spend, or opportunities we give up, to protect the environment. And third, being concerned with the needs of the present also means that policy must take an international perspective and see national policy in a global and equity context.

International Policy Background

The recent impetus to pursue EPI more actively in many countries and international organizations builds on a policy debate with a long history. We have already quoted the Brundtland Commission, which also stated that the consideration of ecological dimensions at the same time as other dimensions is the ‘chief institutional challenge of the 1990s’ (WCED, 1987, p313). As a result, a number of proposals for institutional change were made. At the national level, it was proposed that:

Sustainable development objectives should be incorporated in the terms of reference of those cabinet and legislative committees dealing with national economic policy and planning as well as those dealing with key sectoral and international policies. As an extension of this, the major central economic and sectoral agencies of governments should now be made directly responsible and fully accountable for ensuring that their policies, programmes and budgets support development that is ecologically as well as economically sustainable.

(WCED, 1987, p314)

In 1992 the UN Conference on Environment and Development (UNCED), held in Rio de Janeiro, picked up the views expressed by the Brundtland Commission, devoting Chapter Eight of Agenda 21 to the integration of environment and development in decision making (UNCED, 1992). It identified four programme areas: integrating environment and development at the policy, planning and management levels; providing an effective legal and regulatory framework; making effective use of economic instruments and market and other incentives; and establishing systems for integrated environmental and economic accounting. Similar to other political declarations and strategies at the global level, Agenda 21 lac...

Table of contents

• Front Cover
• Half Title
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Contents
• List of Figures and Tables
• List of Contributors
• Acknowledgements
• List of Acronyms and Abbreviations
• Forewords by Roger Kasperson and Susan Owens
• 1 Introduction: EPI Agendas and Policy Responses
• 2 Different Perspectives on EPI
• 3 Theory and Methodology for EPI Analysis
• 4 Sector Environmental Analysis of Energy and Agriculture
• 5 Policy Framing and EPI in Energy and Agriculture
• 6 Institutional Analysis of Energy and Agriculture
• 7 Discussion: What Enabled EPI in Practice?
• 8 Shaping Institutions for Learning
• Index