Environmental Policy Integration in Times of Transition

The concept of EPI refers to the process of integrating environmental objectives into non-environmental policy areas, such as energy, agriculture and transport, rather than leaving them to be pursued solely through purely environmental policy practices. EPI is widely recognised as one of the key elements to institutionalise the pursuit of sustainable development. More recently, the notion of ‘climate policy integration’, also denoted as ‘mainstreaming’, has been applied to indicate the integration of climate considerations (both mitigation and adaptation) into the normal (often economically focused) activity of government. The concept of EPI has evolved recursively over four decades at the interface between policy, politics, and science (including political and social science) at national, supranational (e.g. EU) and international/ global levels (e.g. UN, World Bank). Several researchers (Brown, 2013; Collier, 1994; Liberatore, 1997; Weale & Williams, 1993; Weale et al. 2000) have traced its mandated evolution (Kent, 2014; Lafferty & Hovden, 2003; Lafferty, 2002) through international treaties and high level agreements at EU and UN level and it has come to prominence once again in academic discussions on global environmental governance (Biermann, Davies, & van der Grijp, 2009) and more recently in discussions of post-2015 ‘Sustainable Development Goals’ (Biermann et al. 2014). Discussions of EPI are present in evaluative and analytical programmes and policies of the World Bank, EU and UN and is also used by organisations like the European Environment Agency and the European Environment Bureau as a comparative metric, or at least a useful heuristic of sustainability in cross-national comparisons. Increasingly, EPI is also appearing in national and regional studies outside of the EU e.g. China, Japan and East Asia. The pre-eminence and popularity of EPI in diverse policy sectors and communities has waxed and waned, but just as it appears to go into abeyance in one policy domain, in any given policy cycle, it appears resurgent in another. This makes the concept continuously relevant for analysts of (public) policy whether from a public administration, political science or governance perspective. The aim of this Section is to explore: the conceptual foundations of this concept; how the initial ideas behind the concept have evolved and differ in time, in place, and between policy sectors; its adoption, diffusion, and influence on policy output and impact in terms of raising environmental awareness; and its contribution to environmental protection. We are particularly interested in pushing our knowledge about the impacts of EPI further – the literature does not provide an adequate answer to the question of what EPI strategies work, where and why but also how the concept fares in new contexts. Further, we are interested in the viability and role of this concept in considering recent discourses on, e.g., green economy, resilience, and transformation. Panel 1: Environmental Policy Integration – Conceptual Foundations and Performance Evaluations. Chair: Professor Hens Runhaar, University of Utrecht and University of Wageningen. Co-chair: Chair: Dr. Ger Mullaly, Environmental sociology and research associate with the Cleaner Production Promotion Unit, Environmental Research Institute and Institute for Social Science in the 21st Century at University College, Cork. This panel explores the evolution of the concept of EPI since its emergence in policy communities in the 1980s, in theory and as applied in various policy areas, geographical contexts and levels of governance. It invites analysis of how conceptual foundations may have stayed intact or changed, in light of emerging discourses such as green economy, resilience, transformation, etc. The panel also invites analysis and review of what we know about the performance of EPI and what are key barriers and success factors. It also explores methodologies and criteria for evaluating EPI in process and in policy outcome. Panel 2: Environmental Policy Integration Beyond Public Policy – Governance Contexts and Their Implications Chair: Mr. Marcel Kok, Programme-leader Environment and Development and senior researcher, PBL Netherlands Environment Assessment Agency Traditionally, the principle of EPI addressed public policy, as developed and implemented largely by state bureaucracies. This Panel explores how EPI has been conceptualised and pursued in a changing governance context, where policy is co-developed and –implemented with non-state actors or where such actors self-regulate. Panel 3: Climate Policy Integration: Conceptual Foundations and Practice Chair: Dr. Alexander Widmer, Eawag - Swiss Federal Institute of Aquatic Science and Technology, Department of Environmental Social Sciences. This Panel explores integration dilemmas and opportunities in climate policy development and implementation, by considering if, how and when climate policy objectives conflict with other environmental and non-environmental objectives and how to understand efforts to resolve them. Bio Section Chairs: Chair: Sylvia Karlsson-Vinkhuyzen is Assistant Professor with the Public Administration and Policy Group of Wageningen University, the Netherlands and Adjunct Professor in global environmental governance at Helsinki University, Finland. Sylvia’s research covers global and multilevel environmental governance and has over 30 scientific publications including in journals such as Global Environmental Politics, Regulation & Governance and Ecological Economics. She is a senior research fellow of the international Earth System Governance Project and a member of the editorial board of the journal International Environmental Agreements. Co-chair: Åsa Persson is Senior Research Fellow at Stockholm Environment Institute, where she leads the research theme Transforming Governance. Åsa specialises in global and national-level environmental governance, and currently focuses on climate adaptation, the notion of planetary boundaries, sustainable consumption and environmental policy integration. Her research has been published in journals such as Nature, Nature Climate Change, Ecological Economics, Environment & Planning C. She is affiliated with the Earth System Governance project.