2005
Chapter
A Handbook of Globalisation and Environmental Policy: National Government Interventions in a Global Arena

Environmental Federalism in the European Union and the United States

By: David Vogel, Michael W. Toffel and Diahanna Post

Format:Print

Abstract

The United States (US) and the European Union (EU) are federal systems in which the responsibility for environmental policy-making is divided or shared between the central government and the (member) states. The attribution of decision-making power has important policy implications. This chapter compares the role of central and local authorities in the US and the EU in formulating environmental regulations in three areas: automotive emissions, packaging waste, and global climate change. Automotive emissions are relatively centralised in both political systems. In the cases of packaging waste and global climate change, regulatory policy-making is shared in the EU but is primarily the responsibility of local governments in the US. Thus, in some important areas, regulatory policy-making is relatively centralised in the EU. The most important role local governments play in the regulatory process is to help diffuse stringent local standards through centralised regulation, a dynamic which has become more common in the EU than in the US.

Keywords

Governing Rules, Regulations, and Reforms; Policy; Government Legislation; Natural Environment; Pollutants; Climate Change; European Union; United States

Citation

Vogel, David, Michael W. Toffel, and Diahanna Post. "Environmental Federalism in the European Union and the United States." Chap. 9 in A Handbook of Globalisation and Environmental Policy: National Government Interventions in a Global Arena, edited by F. Wijen, K. Zoeteman, and J. Pieters, 247–276. Cheltenham, U.K.: Edward Elgar Publishing, 2005.