The Europeanization of British environmental policy. A departmental perspective

Book abstract:

This book represents an innovative approach towards a greater understanding of the Europeanisation of British policy making by examining the issue on a departmental basis. The author offers a fresh insight into the role of Whitehall and Ministerial Departments in that process. The first chapter sets the scene, giving background to the 'Think European' philosophy urged upon Government departments as long ago as 1972, and explains why the DoE (Department of the Environment - now DEFRA) has played such a pivotal role. Chapter two amplifies that position with an outline of the machinery of government in Whitehall and the DoE's response to Europeanisation of policy-making since 1970. A more detailed exposition of the two theoretical positions is given in chapter three. The following chapters four to ten present different empirical cases of European environmental policy-making. The first three are 'major' - Single European Act, Maastricht Treaty, and the Amsterdam Treaty - and the remainder more specific but perhaps mundane - water policy, biodiversity, air policy and land-use planning. The final chapter reviews the case studies and assesses the extent to which the DoE shaped, guided and steered the Europeanisation of British environmental policy to suit its own (or the British Government's) purposes. The author comments on the ironic outcome of the DoE involvement in shaping European environmental policy having started on the road with a clear objective to thwart the Europeanisation of British environmental policy.

The book will interest scholars of British and EU politics and policy-researchers.

Andrew Jordan is Lecturer in Environmental Politics at the University of East Anglia and a Programme Manager of the UK ESRC's Centre for Social and Economic Research on the Global Environment (CSERGE) in Norwich.