Over the last thirty years, the European Union has created a system of environmental governance in Europe. This work seeks to understand this new system of environmental governance both at the European level and at the level of member states. It argues that the system is multi-level, horizontally complex, evolving, and incomplete, and goes on to examine the extent of convergence and divergence in environmental policy among six member states: Germany, Spain, Greece, Italy, the Netherlands, and the UK.
Introduction PART 1: ENVIRONMENTAL GOVERNANCE IN THE EUROPEAN UNION Introduction to Part I Plan of Part I 1. The Single Market and the Environment: From Issue Linkage to Political Choice 2. Programmes, Principles and Policies 3. Actors and Institutions in Environmental Governance 4. Patterns of Governance in the European Union PART II: COMPARATIVE ENVIRONMENTAL GOVERNANCE IN EUROPE Introduction to Part II 5. National Policies on the Environment: Evolution, Principles and Style 6. The Institutionalisation of Environmental Policy 7. Domestic Politics and Society-Related Variables 8. National Systems and Multi-Level Governance: Convergence through Compliance? 9. Convergent and Divergent Trends in European Environmental Policy Comparative Trends PART III: CASE STUDIES IN THE POLICY PROCESS Introduction to Part III 10. Water Quality and European Environmental Governance 11. Pollution Control and Multilevel Governance 12. Packaging and Packaging Waste PART IV: MODELS OF ENVIRONMENTAL GOVERNANCE Introduction to Part IV 13. Understanding European Environmental Governance 14. North and South in the European Union: From Diffusion to Learning? 15. Competing Models of European Environmental Governance Bibliography