Product Policy in Europe: New Environmental Perspectives presents an overview and assessment of a relatively new area of environmental policy in Europe. Whereas the more `traditional' environment policy mainly deals with individual emissions, waste and substances, product policy is a more comprehensive approach addressing the environmental impacts of products during their whole life cycle. The study reviews the current state of affairs and the prospects for product policy in the EU and Switzerland. It shows the relationship with other areas of environmental policy and the potential role of new instruments and approaches. Four case studies (on paint, batteries, public procurement and eco-labelling) illustrate the barriers and opportunities of product policy. Environmental policy makers and policy analysts will find useful information and recommendations in this book. It is also written for those who have a professional interest in reducing the environmental impact of products, including marketing managers, product developers, procurement officers and staff members of environmental and consumer organisations, standardisation and certification institutions, etc.
Product Policy in Europe: New Environmental Perspectives presents an overview and assessment of a relatively new area of environmental policy in Europe. Whereas the more `traditional' environment policy mainly deals with individual emissions, waste and substances, product policy is a more comprehensive approach addressing the environmental impacts of products during their whole life cycle. The study reviews the current state of affairs and the prospects for product policy in the EU and Switzerland. It shows the relationship with other areas of environmental policy and the potential role of new instruments and approaches. Four case studies (on paint, batteries, public procurement and eco-labelling) illustrate the barriers and opportunities of product policy. Environmental policy makers and policy analysts will find useful information and recommendations in this book. It is also written for those who have a professional interest in reducing the environmental impact of products, including marketing managers, product developers, procurement officers and staff members of environmental and consumer organisations, standardisation and certification institutions, etc.
This second and fully revised edition brings together some of the most influential work on the theory and practice of contemporary EU environmental policy. Comprising five comprehensive parts, it includes in-depth case studies of contemporary policy issues such as climate change, genetically modified organisms and trans-Atlantic relations, as well as an assessment of how well the EU is responding to new challenges such as enlargement, environmental policy integration and sustainability. The book's aim is to look forward and ask whether the EU is prepared or even able to respond to the 'new' governance challenges posed by the perceived need to use 'new' policy instruments and processes to 'mainstream' environmental thinking in all EU policy sectors.
"The Circular Economy in Europe presents an overview and a critical discussion on how circularity is conceived, imagined and enacted in current EU policy-making. In 2013, the idea of a circular economy entered the stage of European policy-making in the efforts to reconcile environmental and economic policy objectives. In 2019 the European Commission declared in a press release that the Circular Economy Action Plan has been delivered. The level of circularity in the European economy, however, has remained the same. Bringing together perspectives from social sciences, environmental economics and policy analysis, The Circular Economy in Europe provides a critical analysis of policies and promises of the next panacea for growth and sustainability. The authors provide a theoretical and empirical basis to discuss how contemporary societies conceive their need to re-organise production and consumption and explores the messy assemblage of institutions, actors, waste streams, biophysical flows, policy objectives, scientific disciplines, values, expectations, promises and aspirations involved. This book is essential reading for all those interested in understanding how ideas about the circular economy emerged historically, how they gained traction and are used in policy processes, and what the practical challenges in implementing this policy are"--
Green European addresses the quest for a better understanding of European type(s) of environmentalism. This monograph focuses on public attitudes and behaviours and the culturally rooted as well as country specific differences. The book addresses the wider issue that many European countries are rendered ‘green’ or as having an advanced environmental awareness, but the question - ‘how green are Green Europeans really’, is yet to be answered. The book covers a variety of unique data-driven comparative studies and is divided into three parts: the first addresses perceptions of environmental and technological threats and risks, the second part deals with environmental activism in Europe, the third discusses environmental attitudes, environmental concerns and their imminent link to personal pro-environmental behaviour. The empirical comparative nature of the contributions is enabled by data from the International Social Survey Programme (ISSP).
How to tackle environmental damage from the throwaway society is one of the defining questions of the twenty-first century. By establishing a circular economy, we can encourage and support sustainable production and consumption. These essays by an international group of leading scholars from a range of disciplines analyse policies and legal instruments and challenge mainstream assumptions, from the choice of a policy mix to the actual effect of imposing standards on the market, and from corporate objectives and priorities to the use of precaution in assessing particularly harmful substances. Each chapter contributes to a better understanding of the current policy and regulatory framework in Europe and identifies the challenges and opportunities ahead. The book breaks new ground by examining how product policies can contribute to important objectives and visions, such as the aims of the circular economy. It is a must-read for researchers as well as for policymakers and practitioners.
This book contains six studies on various national environmental policies and environment -oriented technology policy systems in Austria, Denmark, Germany, the Netherlands, Spain, and the United Kingdom, sandwiched between this introductory and a concluding chapter. These studies were conducted as part of the ENVINNO research project, "Towards an Integration of Environmental and Ecology-Oriented Technology Policy: Stimulus and Response in Environment Related Innovation Networks", which formed part of the Targeted Social and Economic Research (TSER) Programme of Directorate-General XII of the European Commission, now 1 Directorate-General for Research. We like to thank Mrs. Genevieve Zdrojewski of GD Directorate-General Research for her kind support of our research project. The project was carried out between 1998 and 2001 by research teams from the six countries. The co-ordinating institute was the Department of Environmental Economics and Management at the Vienna University of 2 Economics and Business Administration. At this place we want to mention all researchers involved in the ENVINNO project and we want to thank them all for their contributions to this book and the project and for the good time we have had performing the project and meeting each other at regular intervals in Vienna (A), Enschede (NL), Berlin (D), and Sevilla (E). Department of Environmental Economics and Management at the Vienna University of Economics and Business Administration in Austria: • Univ. Prof. Dr. Uwe Schubert, • Mag. Judith Kock, • Mag. Jiirgen Mellitzer, 1 Under contract-number SOEI-CT98-110S. 2 The project website is http://www.wu-wien.ac.atiwwwu/institute/iuwIENVINNO.
European policy patterns are in a state of transformation. New governance models are shifting power away from states and toward the involvement of all stakeholders and the idea of shared responsibility. It's a move from command and control to push and pull. What's in this new approach for the environment? This book provides a detailed analysis of the example of integrated product policy (IPP) which aims to improve the environmental performance of products and services through their life-cycle. All products cause environmental degradation in some way, whether from their manufacturing, use or disposal. The life-cycle of a product is often long and complicated. It covers all the areas from the extraction of natural resources, through their design, manufacture, assembly, marketing, distribution, sale and use to their eventual disposal as waste. At the same time it also involves many different actors such as designers, manufacturers, marketers, retailers and consumers. IPP attempts to systematically stimulate each phase of this complicated chain to improve its environmental performance. With the involvement of so many different products and actors there cannot be one simple policy measure for everything. Instead, IPP employs a whole variety of tools – both voluntary and mandatory – which are used to achieve identified objectives. These include economic instruments, the phase-out of dangerous materials, voluntary agreements, eco-labelling and product design guidelines. IPP is still in relative infancy and can be seen as an ongoing process hugely dependent on effective governance measures to ensure its continued success. This book presents a plethora of perspectives from policy-makers, researchers and consultancies, representatives from business, environmental and consumer associations on how to effectively conceptualise, institutionalise and implement IPP. The book is divided into four parts. First, the approach to the governance of IPP is examined in relation to other approaches to sustainable production and consumption. Second, the widely differing approaches to environmental product policy in practice at national, supranational and global level are analysed. Third, the book explores the challenge of designing a coherent policy mix to support the integration of sustainable consumption and production patterns by sector and theme. Finally, the book concentrates on the key issue of how to involve stakeholders in IPP in order to encourage continuous innovations for sustainability throughout the value chain. Governance of Integrated Product Policy aims to fill a clear gap in work to date on sustainable production and consumption by providing researchers and practitioners from politics, business and civil society new insights into modern environmental governance in practice.
A theoretical and empirical contribution to the quest for sustainability and environmental quality. The book examines the physical and economic aspects of flows of materials and products, as well as the policies and strategies designed to reduce the related resource depletion and environmental pollution. The `material-product chain' concept forms a general framework, defined as a system of linked flows of materials and products that support the provision of a certain service. Various economic models of material-product chains are studied, both theoretical and applied, such as static optimisation, dynamic simulation and general equilibrium models. Applications to metals, rain gutters and window frames are described. Audience: Readers in universities, research organizations and policy institutes interested in the environment, economics and government policy.
Provides insight into recycling legislation and its relationship with trade law, explaining numerous environmental policy tools, such as producer responsibility. Examines the relationship between international trade and environmental protection. Uses a case study of electronic recycling and a comparative law approach to clarify the evolving law of the European Community and the United States.
