Introduction: Theoretical Framework and Research Design

1 Introduction: theoretical framework and

research design

Duncan Liefferink, Helge Jorgens and Andrea Lenschow

1.1 Introduction

Are environmental policies in European countries growing more and

more similar? In this era of globalisation it seems likely, but if so, at

what level do national environmental policies converge? Are countries

generally reaching out to the most stringent and most effective models

available, or does increased international competition rather force them

to adopt less demanding levels of regulation?

And perhaps even more important: how do processes of environmen-

tal policy convergence come about? Some argue that cross-national pol-

icy convergence is mainly fuelled by the international trade interests of

individual states. Others emphasise formal policy coordination by, for

instance, European Union law or international environmental treaties

as the predominant convergence mechanism. Yet others argue that the

impact of legal harmonisation is overestimated and that much of the

mutual adjustment of domestic policies, institutions, and instruments

can be explained by increasing information flows and cross-national pol-

icy learning. Finally, one always has to keep in mind the possibility that

there are no international mechanisms at work at all. In this case pol-

icy convergence would simply be a matter of similar, but independent

responses to similar problems occurring in different countries.

As will be set out in considerable detail in Section 1.2, existing schol-

arly literature provides partial, tentative, sometimes even fairly powerful

clues to this major puzzle. It has been shown that convergence does take

place at a surprisingly high pace and in fact also at surprisingly high levels

of regulation. Generally speaking, environmental policies do not system-

atically fall victim to international economic competition as ‘race to the

bottom’ theories would predict. Instead, there is increasing evidence that

legal harmonisation as well as various types of transnational communi-

cation lead countries to mutually adjust their policy goals, policy instru-

ments and even their levels of ambition. Moreover, this convergence is

not restricted to groups of countries with similar political systems or

1

2 Duncan Liefferink, Helge Jorgens and Andrea Lenschow

similar policy styles, or which stand at similar stages of economic devel-

opment. It can be observed on a European and in many instances even

global scale. Less is known, however, about the precise ways in which the

prevailing mechanisms work and interact in practice.

This book seeks to find answers to these questions by way of a highly

systematic set of cases studies, covering seven environmental policy issues

in four countries: France, Hungary, Mexico and the Netherlands. This

introductory chapter sets out the analytical framework applied in the case

studies. It specifies the research questions and the central theoretical con-

cepts, explains the selection of the four countries and the seven cases, and

develops expectations as to which mechanisms of convergence may apply

under which circumstances. In Section 1.2 we fix the point of departure

for the present study by briefly reviewing the scholarly state-of-the-art in

the field of environmental policy convergence. Section 1.3 then defines

and discusses the basic terminology used in the book, notably the concept

of policy convergence and the main mechanisms behind it. In Section

1.4 we describe how our empirical case studies build upon the findings

of a large-scale quantitative study of environmental policy convergence

carried out earlier.1 The careful and systematic selection of both policy

issues and countries makes it possible to investigate in an unusually thor-

ough and comprehensive fashion how the various mechanisms of policy

convergence work in practice, how they reinforce or hinder each other,

and how effective they are in making domestic policies more similar over

time. Finally in this chapter, Section 1.5 sketches the outline of the rest

of the book.

1.2 Environmental policy convergence: the state of

the art and further

Over the last decades, the study of processes of cross-national policy

convergence has become a major concern for political scientists. In a

globalising world, increased economic, political and cultural interdepen-

dence is assumed to make national policies grow more alike over time

(Drezner 2001). This convergence of policies and programmes has been

observed in virtually all areas of public policy making (for a compre-

hensive overview see Heichel, Pape and Sommerer 2005; see also the

contributions in Holzinger, Jorgens and Knill 2007). In this section we

1 Both the quantitative study and this book form part of the research project ‘Environmen-

tal governance in Europe: the impact of international institutions and trade on policy

convergence’ (ENVIPOLCON). For further details, see Section 1.4 and Chapter 2.

Introduction: theoretical framework and research design 3

will give an overview of the literature on policy convergence in the field

of environmental policy.

Since the late 1960s virtually all countries in the world have created

government institutions for the protection of the environment such as

environment ministries, national environmental agencies or environmen-

tal advisory councils (Jorgens 1996; Meyer et al. 1997). Basic legislation

in the areas of air pollution control, nature and water protection as well as

waste management has equally been adopted in a large number of coun-

tries (Busch and Jorgens 2005a). At the instrumental level, the more

recent shift in the prevailing policy pattern from a sectorally fragmented

and largely legally based regulatory approach to an integrated environ-

mental policy characterised by the inclusion of softer and/or more flexible

instruments such as negotiated agreements, eco-labels, emissions trading

schemes, or ecological tax reforms is also proceeding on a global scale

(De Clercq 2002; Jorgens 2003; De Bruijn and Norberg-Bohm 2005;

Daley 2007). Even concrete environmental protection standards such as

emission standards have strongly converged over time (Holzinger, Knill

and Arts 2008). Overall, a global convergence of governance patterns

in environmental policy has been observed (Janicke and Weidner 1997;

Meyer et al. 1997; Weidner and Janicke 2002; Busch and Jorgens 2005b;

Holzinger, Knill and Sommerer 2008; Knill, Holzinger and Arts 2008).

Both comparative policy analysis and the study of international rela-

tions have contributed significantly to this growing literature on envi-

ronmental policy convergence. Although the two subdisciplines differ

substantially in their theoretical expectations as well as in their method-

ological approach, their empirical findings have become increasingly

similar over time, supporting the identification of a strong and stable

convergence trend over the past four decades in the field of environmental

policy.

1.2.1 Comparative policy analysis

Scholars in the field of comparative policy analysis originally focused on

the national determinants of policy choice and policy change. Conse-

quently, their theoretical point of departure was a general assumption

of cross-national diversity of environmental policies resulting from dif-

ferent national institutional frameworks, actor constellations, regulatory

styles and problem pressures (Lundqvist 1974; Kitschelt 1983; Weale

1992; van Waarden 1995). However, in their empirical analyses, they

quickly detected that in spite of widely differing national styles of regula-

tion, advanced industrial states had been surprisingly similar in deciding

which risks required positive state action (agenda setting) and in their


successes or failures actually to reduce environmental pollution (policy

impacts) (Badaracco 1985; Brickman, Jasanoff and Ilgen 1985; Vogel

1986). While these studies did not directly pose the question of conver-

gence or divergence of national environmental policies, their common

finding of ‘different styles, similar content’ (Knoepfel et al. 1987) was a

first and important step in that direction. In a summary of the findings of

this first set of comparative environmental policy analyses Knoepfel et al.

(1987: 183) concluded that ‘the hypothesis . . . concerning the long-term

convergence of policy outputs in environmental regulation must be tested

and questioned in a more comprehensive analysis’.

Building on these early findings, a second wave of studies began to

compare systematically the development of domestic capacities for envi-

ronmental policy making throughout the group of Western industrialised

countries. These studies found not only that national environmental poli-

cies were determined only in part by domestic factors, but also that

processes of imitation and learning among geographically, culturally or

economically related countries had become important and independent

sources of any country’s capacity to address environmental problems

(Janicke 1996; Jorgens 1996). As a consequence, Western industrialised

states responded in a surprisingly homogeneous way to the environmen-

tal challenge that had been placed on domestic and international pol-

icy agendas in the late 1960s and early 1970s. A systematic in-depth

comparison by Janicke and Weidner of case studies of thirty industri-

alised and developing countries confirmed these findings and extended

them beyond the narrow group of industrialised countries. It revealed a

global convergence of governance patterns in environmental policy that

covered not only domestic institutions but also sectoral environmental

laws, specific instruments, strategies, actor constellations and even the

strengthening of societal capacities (Janicke and Weidner 1997; Weidner

and Janicke 2002).

However, these findings did not go undisputed. In a study on the

development of environmental policies in Western Europe, Hanf and

Jansen (1998) confirmed the previous findings that countries tended to

respond to environmental phenomena ‘by legislation that was relatively

similar in formal terms’, but added that beneath the level of formal laws

and institutions, domestic environmental policies remained ‘quite dif-

ferent in terms of operational goals and instruments’ (Jansen, Osland

and Hanf 1998: 281). Like much of the Europeanisation literature, their

study found domestic actor constellations and institutional structures

to be important intervening factors which explain differences between

national environmental policies and institutions (see also Andersen and

Liefferink 1997; Liefferink and Andersen 1998; Borzel 2002; Liefferink


and Jordan 2005). While most Europeanisation studies agreed that the

powerful economic as well as political homogenising pressures within the

EU did not necessarily lead to uniform action at the level of member

states, but often produced a quite heterogeneous patchwork of institu-

tions, instruments and policy styles (see, for example, Heritier and Knill

2001), they disagreed on the concrete level of policy making where con-

vergence and/or divergence could be expected as well as on the underlying

causal mechanisms. For example, while Jansen, Osland and Hanf (1998)

had expected diversity to be strongest with regard to operational goals

and targets, Jordan and Liefferink found that it was exactly at this level of

individual environmental standards and concrete instruments that con-

vergence was most pronounced (Jordan and Liefferink 2004; Liefferink

and Jordan 2005). Regarding the mechanisms of environmental policy

change, Knill and Lenschow (2005a, 2005b), in a study of the effects

of EU policies on the organisational structure and behavioural patterns

of national administrations, found that ‘soft’ European steering modes

based on competition or communication had led to greater administra-

tive convergence than ‘hard’ steering modes based on legal obligation.

Focusing on policies and instruments rather than administrative struc-

tures, Jordan and colleagues found more convergence in areas where the

EU has the authority to adopt binding supranational regulations than in

areas where it has little or no legislative competence (Jordan, Wurzel and

Zito 2003; Jordan and Liefferink 2004).

In parallel to these studies on Europeanisation and policy convergence,

a second strand of comparative studies began to investigate systematically

processes of transfer, diffusion and convergence of environmental poli-

cies beyond the relatively small group of EU member states. Rather than

relying on small to medium-sized samples of in-depth case studies – as

had been the case with the earlier generations of European and inter-

national comparisons – these studies began to trace the global patterns

of environmental policy change and convergence across large numbers

of countries, sometimes even on a worldwide scale (Tews, Busch and

Jorgens 2003; Jorgens 2004; Busch and Jorgens 2005a, 2007a; Tews and

Janicke 2005). Looking at a wide range of policy items which included

environmental institutions, different types of environmental laws (from

constitutional articles to issue-specific ordinances), environmental pol-

icy instruments (regulatory, informational, voluntary or market-based)

and general principles and programmes, these studies provided strong

evidence of a global convergence in environmental policy making. Fur-

thermore, they showed that a wide range of causal mechanisms, includ-

ing economic coercion, legal harmonisation, and voluntary imitation and

learning, all contributed to this convergence and that the interaction of


different mechanisms – for example voluntary diffusion processes paving

the way for subsequent legal harmonisation – could significantly broaden

the scope and increase the speed of convergence (Jorgens 2004; Busch

and Jorgens 2005c, 2007b). In sum, comparative studies have shown that

national environmental policies are actually becoming more similar over

time, but that domestic idiosyncrasies constitute an important interven-

ing factor which often limits the impact of transnational and international

convergence mechanisms.

1.2.2 International relations

While scholars in the field of comparative policy analysis focused predom-

inantly on the national determinants of policy change and consequently

started out from a theoretical assumption of persisting cross-national dif-

ferences, international relations scholars focused on international dynam-

ics. Consequently, they were from the outset more open to theoretically

derived expectations of cross-national environmental policy convergence.

The most widely received of these hypotheses in the environmental field

was the prediction of a global race to the bottom regarding standards

for environmental, consumer or worker protection (Scharpf 1997a).

Although the direction of policy change that this hypothesis implied has

repeatedly been challenged on empirical grounds with numerous studies

showing that rather than racing to the bottom, domestic environmental

policies and standards tend to move steadily towards higher levels of envi-

ronmental protection (Vogel 1995, 1997; Botcheva and Martin 2001;

Bernauer and Caduff 2004; Holzinger 2007; DeSombre 2008), the basic

prediction of a cross-national convergence of environmental standards

was supported by all of these studies.

The second big strand of research on environmental policy conver-

gence in international relations, but also in international sociology, is

based on a constructivist epistemology. Analysing the global prolifera-

tion of characteristic elements of modern environmentalism – such as

environmental ministries, national parks, environmental NGOs or envi-

ronmental impact assessments – John Meyer and his colleagues found a

worldwide convergence of environmental policies and institutions which

they interpreted as the domestic implementation of an emerging global

norm or, in other words, a norm-based ‘world environmental regime’

(Meyer et al. 1997; see also Frank, Hironaka and Schofer 2000; Hironaka

2002).

Most studies on international environmental politics, however, do

not deal explicitly with the convergence of national environmental poli-

cies. International agreements rather than domestic policies are their


dependent variable (Harrison 2002). The most important strand of this

literature, empirical research on international environmental regimes,

is predominantly concerned with the development and implementation

of common solutions to transboundary environmental problems. Con-

vergence, in this literature, is found mainly with regard to the value

states place on environmental protection and their subsequent willingness

and ability to reach and comply with multilateral agreements. Although

regime studies implicitly assume that domestic policies will converge as

multilateral agreements are being implemented, this assumption does

not constitute a core concern of the international relations literature and

is hardly ever tested empirically. The large body of literature on the effec-

tiveness of international environmental regimes illustrates this. Focusing

on issues such as oil pollution at sea (Mitchell 1994a, 1994b), long-range

transboundary air pollution (Levy 1993), depletion of the ozone layer

(Litfin 1994), the transboundary movement of waste (O’Neill 2000) or

ocean dumping of radioactive waste (Ringius 2001), these studies are pre-

dominantly interested in the environmental effectiveness of multilateral

regimes. Although they often compare systematically how domestic poli-

cies change in response to international accords (Miles et al. 2002), their

focus is not on cross-national policy clustering or convergence, but rather

on the specific design features of international institutions that promote

or hinder domestic compliance (Haas, Keohane and Levy 1993).

Within this general regime literature, one particular research strand

pays greater attention to the diffusion and convergence of domestic envi-

ronmental policies. Applying the concept of ‘epistemic communities’,

Haas (1992) and his colleagues stress the impact of transnationally dis-

seminated scientific knowledge. They argue that ideas and causal beliefs

which have emerged and were promoted through knowledge-based net-

works of experts can shape state interests by ‘framing the issues for collec-

tive debate, proposing specific policies, and identifying salient points for

negotiation’. According to Haas, this ‘diffusion of new ideas and infor-

mation can lead to new patterns of behaviour’ (Haas 1992: 2–3). Again,

the dependent variable is international cooperation rather than domestic

policy change and convergence. However, as the epistemic community

literature explicitly points out, domestic policies may converge as ‘the

innovations of epistemic communities are diffused nationally, transna-

tionally, and internationally to become the basis of new or changed inter-

national practices and institutions and the emerging attributes of a new

world order’ (Adler and Haas 1992: 373). Other scholars have taken

up this point, arguing that epistemic communities and other transna-

tional actor networks may in fact constitute an important mechanism

for the diffusion and convergence of domestic policies (Finnemore 2003:


149–50; Orenstein 2008; Veenman 2008) although their homogenising

impact will certainly be moderated by domestic factors. Thus, in her

study on the national regulation of the pulp and paper industry in

Canada, Sweden and the United States, Harrison shows that the impact

of internationally shared scientific knowledge was ‘undermined by com-

peting domestic interests and different institutional contexts for decision-

making’ (Harrison 2002: 65).

1.2.3 Bringing the strands together

The research project ‘Environmental governance in Europe: the impact of

international institutions and trade on policy convergence’ (ENVIPOL-

CON) was developed against the background of the literature reviewed

here.2 Our primary aim for this project was to bring together the differ-

ent research strands dealing with environmental policy convergence, to

overcome their individual shortcomings, to integrate their findings, and

thus to ‘advance our theoretical and empirical understanding of causes

and conditions of crossnational policy convergence’ (Holzinger, Knill

and Arts 2008: 227). To do so, we adopted a mixed-method approach

(Heichel and Sommerer 2009). In a first step, we carried out a quan-

titative large-n analysis of the extent, the direction and the causes of

environmental policy convergence. In the light of previous research

on environmental policy convergence, this analysis endeavoured (1) to

develop a coherent analytical framework, (2) to include a large number

of countries (in this case almost all EU and Eastern European countries),

and (3) to cover a large number of environmental policy items located

at different levels of the policy process (principles, policies, instruments

and standards). To this end, the quantitative part of the ENVIPOLCON

project comprised forty environmental policy items in twenty-one Euro-

pean countries as well as the USA, Mexico and Japan, over a period

of thirty years. In a second step, forming the subject of this volume,

the results of the quantitative study were complemented by systematic

in-depth case studies.

Key results of the quantitative study are summarised and discussed in

detail in Chapter 2 of this volume. They broadly confirm and in various

respects refine the main findings of the studies reviewed in the previous

section (Holzinger, Knill and Arts 2008: 228–9). First, they demonstrate

that from 1970 to 2000 the environmental policies of the countries under

2 ENVIPOLCON was financed by the EU and carried out by teams at the universities of

Berlin (FU), Hamburg, Konstanz, Nijmegen and Salzburg.


study converged strongly. Second, the study shows that the speed of con-

vergence increased over time during the period of observation. Third, the

quantitative analysis makes clear that the degree of convergence decreases

with the level of specification of the policy dimension. Convergence is

highest with regard to the presence of policies in the countries under

consideration and least pronounced for concrete standards, with con-

vergence on particular instruments remaining somewhere in between.

Fourth, and similar to previous research in the field of international rela-

tions, the study finds no evidence of environmental races to the bottom.

Rather, the study confirms that between 1970 and 2000, environmental

policies in Europe converged in an upward direction. Fifth, the study

finds that environmental policy convergence can basically be attributed

to the effects of two causal mechanisms: international harmonisation and

transnational communication. By contrast, regulatory competition seems

to play no significant role as a causal factor of international environmental

policy convergence.

The remainder of this chapter will further elaborate on these findings

and present an in-depth qualitative investigation of the actual mecha-

nisms through which environmental policies converge.

1.3 Policy convergence and its mechanisms

We define policy convergence as:

any increase in the similarity between one or more characteristics of a certain pol-

icy (e.g. policy objectives, policy instruments, policy settings) across a given set

of political jurisdictions (supranational institutions, states, regions, local authori-

ties) over a given period of time. Policy convergence thus describes the end result

of a process of policy change over time towards some common point, regardless

of the causal processes. (Knill 2005: 768)

For a more precise analysis of processes of convergence, we make use

of three different indicators for assessing policy convergence. Conver-

gence scope refers to how many and which countries and policies are

converging. Convergence degree is about the extent to which policies in

the countries at stake have actually become more similar over time. The

direction of convergence, finally, deals with the question of whether con-

vergence takes place in an upward or a downward direction, i.e. whether

it raises or lowers overall levels of environmental protection (Holzinger

and Knill 2008).3 The unit of analysis of our assessment is the state:

3 In practice, the latter indicator is only relevant for numerical standards, e.g. limit values

for the emission of sulphur dioxide or the maximum concentrations of heavy metals in

surface water, where we can really speak of a convergence at a more or less stringent level,


scope, degree and direction of convergence all refer to national policies.

Consequently, policies adopted at subnational levels do not fall within

the scope of this study. Similarly, rule making by private actors such as,

for example, the Forest Stewardship Council (Pattberg 2005; Dingwerth

2007) is not included in our study, although – as our case studies show –

when adopting or changing domestic environmental policies, govern-

ments often respond to the pressure of private actors such as NGOs or

firms (on the role of private actors in domestic and international environ-

mental governance, see Wapner 1995; Glasbergen 1998; Newell 2000).

As set out above, the quantitative study preceding this book has given

ample evidence of the impressive scope and degree of environmental

policy convergence in Europe over the past decades and confirmed the

generally upward direction of this process (Holzinger, Knill and Arts

2008). Using statistical analysis, furthermore, it represented an impor-

tant first step towards understanding the causal mechanisms behind the

growing similarity of national policies – highlighting legal harmonisation

and transnational communication as the single most important mecha-

nisms through which environmental policy convergence occurred (for a

summary of the findings of the quantitative study see Chapter 2). By their

very nature, however, statistical methods face certain constraints. First,

they need to be selective in the kind of variables investigated, and despite

their growing sophistication they face limits in converting a complex and

multidimensional world into a quantifiable scheme. This is due to the

facts that (a) they will only test for interaction effects already hypothe-

sised and (b) they will underestimate factors that are difficult to quantify.

Second, statistical methods focus on aggregate patterns and regularities.

Exceptions to the rule are of no particular interest unless they grow to a

‘significant’ number. Exceptions, however, may be revealing in exposing

new causal factors or structures that were unknown to existing research

and, hence, untested in the analysis.

Implied in the definition of policy convergence is the process of policy

change at the domestic level, which follows certain logics and mechanisms

that are to be identified. Logically, to be sure, policy change in individual

countries does not necessarily lead to convergence. It may also result

in the persistence or even amplification of differences between coun-

tries. As our quantitative study suggests, however, convergence appears

to be the rule in the environmental field over the past decades, and

non-convergence rather the exception. While statistical methods are very

i.e. either at the ‘top’ or at the ‘bottom’ (Drezner 2001). For convergence regarding, for

instance, the use of certain policy instruments or procedural requirements, it is hard, if

not impossible, to decide what is ‘top’ and what is ‘bottom’.


effective in showing causal effects of the kind ‘if A, then (probably) B’,

they will not find factors that were not expected and they are silent on

the specific pathways and mechanisms of domestic policy change leading

up, in most cases, to policy convergence. Against this background, it is

the principal aim of this study to systematically analyse the processes

by which individual instances of policy change – which at the aggre-

gate level resulted in an overall movement towards cross-national policy

convergence – came about. To do this, we need to combine the statisti-

cal analysis with qualitative studies of individual cases of environmental

policy change. At the same time, in-depth case studies allow us to look

more carefully into those (relatively rare) cases where convergence did

not occur or individual countries appear as ‘outliers’ in an overall pattern

of convergence.

Theoretically, our analysis is based on existing studies of cross-national

policy convergence which suggest five basic mechanisms, or driving

forces, that cause domestic policies to grow more similar over time.

These mechanisms are: international harmonisation, transnational com-

munication, regulatory competition, imposition, and parallel problem

pressure (see Holzinger and Knill 2008; for similar classifications see

Jorgens 2004; Busch and Jorgens 2005c; Holzinger, Jorgens and Knill

2007; Simmons, Dobbin and Garrett 2008). The first four of these mech-

anisms refer to international factors behind environmental policy con-

vergence and are related either to the impact of international institutions

(international harmonisation and transnational communication) or to

the impact of international trade (regulatory competition). Imposition

in the strict sense presupposes the use or threat of physical force, but is

often expanded to conditionality, i.e. the situation where countries are

obliged to act in a certain way in exchange for, for instance, a loan or

membership in an international institution. The fifth mechanism (paral-

lel problem pressure) represents the main alternative explanation, i.e. the

possibility that the presence of similar environmental problems and/or a

similar political demand for action leads to similar, but essentially inde-

pendent responses in different countries.

In this book we are particularly interested in the way international

driving forces behind policy convergence interact with processes at the

domestic level and eventually lead to domestic policy change – or fail to

do so. In analysing these processes we will cover the actions of a wide

range of domestic actors – from national ministries to local authorities

and from scientific experts to companies and NGOs – but only insofar as

they are relevant for the establishment and change of national policies. We

do not deny the relevance of subnational and private sector environmental

policies and we do not deny that cross-national convergence can also take


place there, but in order to avoid further complicating an already complex

story, the present volume – and the entire ENVIPOLCON project, for

that matter (see Holzinger, Knill and Arts 2008) – focuses on policies

formulated by the central state. Thus, where our study focuses on private

actors it is more on their ability to push national legislators towards

cross-national policy convergence than on their quality as ‘alternative’

rulemakers.

As a starting point for the case studies that follow in the next chapters,

we will now discuss the five mechanisms in more detail and explore their

expected impact on the scope, degree and direction of environmental

policy convergence. For analytical reasons, the mechanisms are presented

here in isolation, but it must be stressed that in practice they may be

expected to work in various combinations – it is in fact one of the main

goals of the case studies to find out to what extent and how they do so.

1.3.1 International harmonisation

International harmonisation occurs when states comply with obligations

laid down in international or supranational law such as, for example,

binding multilateral treaties or EU directives or regulations. Thus, this

mechanism does not include so-called ‘soft’ instruments of international

law, such as resolutions and recommendations, as these do not entail

legal obligations for states to act. Due to their predominantly informa-

tive character, these non-binding instruments are subsumed under the

mechanism of transnational communication (see Section 1.3.2).

In principle, international harmonisation is a rather straightforward

mechanism: states jointly commit themselves to common standards

which are subsequently implemented domestically. Logically, depend-

ing on the precise character of the policy, this should lead to some sort of

cross-national policy convergence. However, at least four factors may be

expected to affect the impact of international harmonisation. First, and

in fact rather obviously, international harmonisation only applies to those

states that have actually subscribed to the policy at stake, either by signing

and ratifying the respective international treaty or through membership

in the international institution issuing the policy, for instance the EU.

This is a key determinant for the scope of convergence. Generally speak-

ing, it leads us to expect that countries that are strongly embedded in

relevant international institutions (the EU, OECD, specific international

environmental agreements, etc.) will be subject to convergence through

harmonisation more than those with a lower level of institutional embed-

dedness.


Second, the impact of international harmonisation depends on the

specification of the jointly agreed policies. The level of specification may

range from very general and open-ended objectives to concrete mini-

mum standards or even a total harmonisation of the level of national

environmental protection standards. In the latter case, the degree of pol-

icy convergence is likely to be highest.

Third, compliance is an important factor. Even if states have signed

and ratified a treaty or jointly adopted a piece of EU legislation,

correct implementation cannot be taken for granted. States may have

various reasons for dealing light-heartedly with obligations they once

subscribed to. Implementation costs may be higher than expected, there

may be unanticipated domestic conflicts of interest, or the symbolic

value of signing the treaty may from the beginning have been consid-

ered more important than actually working out all the details. In the

case of international treaties, enforcement powers are generally more

limited than is the case with the EU (e.g. Neyer and Zurn 2001; Miles

et al. 2002; Skodvin, Andresen and Hovi 2006). This is due, among

other things, to the supremacy and direct effect of EU law and the active

monitoring and enforcement of member state compliance by the Euro-

pean Commission and the European Court of Justice, even including

the possibility of imposing fines. Thus – and even though in practice

a considerable implementation gap exists also here (see Jordan 1999;

Knill and Liefferink 2007) – EU legislation may generally be expected

to lead to a higher degree of convergence than other international

law.

Fourth, the process by which a given international obligation was orig-

inally established may provide important clues as to the actual scope,

degree and direction of convergence that can later be observed. For

instance, harmonised policies based on broad international agreement

about the character and causes of a problem and its possible solutions

are likely to be implemented better and, thus, to lead to a higher scope

and degree of convergence than more controversial measures. For the

direction of convergence, moreover, it is important to know how and

to what extent certain countries have been pressing for stricter policies.

National priorities and ambitions together with institutional factors at

the international level (e.g. decision-making rules, or the right to estab-

lish or maintain stricter standards unilaterally) determine to what extent

such ‘pioneering’ behaviour can effectively spark off a dynamic towards

the ‘top’ (Liefferink and Andersen 1998; Janicke 2005). While it is diffi-

cult to formulate precise expectations here, our choice of the case study

approach allows us to go into the specific details of international and

domestic processes underlying policy convergence.


1.3.2 Transnational communication

Under the term ‘transnational communication’ a broad array of related

mechanisms can be subsumed. These mechanisms have in common that

policy transfer is based purely on communication and the exchange of

information among countries – with ‘countries’ used as a shorthand to

refer to a wide range of public and private domestic actors involved

in transnational communication. The focus on communication distin-

guishes these mechanisms from both international harmonisation, where

a legal obligation is involved, and regulatory competition, where compet-

itive pressure is the key determinant. Under the category of transnational

communication we distinguish the following four submechanisms:4

� Lesson drawing, in which governments use experiences from elsewhere

to solve a domestic problem. It must be noted that lesson drawing

does not necessarily lead to convergence. A foreign model may also be

adapted for domestic use, or even be rejected (see Rose 1991; Meseguer

Yebra 2003).� Transnational problem-solving, in which experts from different coun-

tries jointly develop solutions to a similar domestic problem and then

apply them at the national level.5 Transnational elite networks, expert

networks or epistemic communities play an important role in this pro-

cess (Haas 1992; Kern 2000).� Emulation of policies, in which governments copy a policy used else-

where. They may do so for instance because they believe that the

most widespread solution is indeed the most appropriate (Meyer and

Rowan 1977; Baum and Oliver 1992; Levi-Faur 2002), or in order

to increase the legitimacy of the policy vis-a-vis domestic actors or to

reduce uncertainty (DiMaggio and Powell 1991), or simply to save

the time and costs of developing a solution themselves (Bennett 1991;

Tews 2002; Karch 2007).� International policy promotion, in which international institutions pro-

mote a certain policy approach, for instance through the comparative

evaluation of national policy performance, benchmarking or the dis-

semination of best practices (Humphreys 2002; Tews 2002). The inter-

national institutions involved may be organisations such as the EU, the

OECD or the World Bank, but also NGOs or a transnational interest

4 Our typology is based on the vast literature in this field, to which we can refer only briefly

here. For a more extensive discussion of this literature, see Busch and Jorgens (2007b);

Holzinger and Knill (2008); Holzinger, Jorgens and Knill (2008) and Veenman (2008).5 The crucial distinction from the mechanism of international harmonisation is that no

international legal obligation is involved in transnational problem-solving (even though,

to be sure, this is a conceivable step at a later stage).


organisation (Keck and Sikkink 1998). In addition, individual coun-

tries may promote their own policies and thus stimulate others to follow

them. The main driving force in this mechanism is legitimacy pressure:

countries not following the model run the risk of losing legitimacy in

the eyes of their (international) peers. In this sense, international policy

promotion is closely related to emulation, with the exception that the

main impetus to adopt a policy results from its active promotion by an

international organisation.

Although transnational communication comprises a variety of mech-

anisms, the general expectation to be derived from them is relatively

simple. Lesson drawing, transnational problem-solving, emulation and

international policy promotion all crucially depend on communication

and the exchange of information. International institutions play a key role

in stimulating, facilitating and organising communication flows, either

with the help of non-binding recommendations, or by producing reports,

or just by providing a platform for exchange. Therefore, the scope and the

degree of convergence through transnational communication are likely to

be higher among countries that maintain stronger links to international

institutions. In view of the considerable focus on the dissemination of

‘good examples’ and ‘models’ in transnational communication, further-

more, we may generally expect a dynamic of convergence in an upward

rather than a downward direction. As with international harmonisation,

the case studies will offer the opportunity to study the impact of mem-

bership of international institutions, or institutional embeddedness, on

transnational communication at an issue-specific level.

1.3.3 Regulatory competition

Convergence may occur not only because of international commitments

or transnational communication, but also because countries feel the need

to mutually adjust domestic policies in the face of international compet-

itive pressure. This mechanism is referred to as regulatory competition.

Regulatory competition is supposed to be relevant only for trade-

related policies, notably the regulation of production processes and trad-

able products. This is a restriction to the scope of convergence through

regulatory competition. In addition to this, it must be noted that regula-

tory competition is not relevant for non-market economies. This applies

in particular to the former communist countries before 1990. As Hun-

gary is one of our case study countries, we will discuss this point in more

detail below.

The degree of convergence through regulatory competition may be

expected to be higher if international competitive pressure is more intense


and also if higher costs are at stake for the industries involved. The

most interesting aspect with regard to regulatory competition, however,

is its impact on the direction of convergence. It is generally assumed

that pressure to reduce production costs for domestic industries vis-a-vis

foreign competitors will lead governments to lower standards relating to

production processes (Scharpf 1997a; Drezner 2001). This mechanism

may be expected to work particularly if the relevant industrial sector

is highly internationalised. In the case of industries operating in small,

mostly local markets, different national process standards are more likely

to persist. As regards tradable products, international rules, such as those

set by the EU and the World Trade Organization (WTO), often give

countries room for setting stricter standards domestically and to ban

foreign products not complying with those standards from their markets,

for instance for health or environmental reasons. This causes market

segmentation. Several studies show that, particularly if international trade

interests are high, problems related to market segmentation may be a

reason for other countries to adopt stricter standards as well (Vogel 1995;

Scharpf 1997b; Holzinger 2003).

It should be noted, though, that not all environmental policies entail

higher costs. Classical theories of regulatory competition start from the

assumption of an inherent conflict between economy and ecology. This is

not necessarily the case. Policies aimed, for instance, at reducing energy

consumption or at the introduction of ‘clean’, more resource-efficient

technologies may be both environmentally and ecologically beneficial. In

such so-called win–win situations, interest constellations can be entirely

reversed, industry may actually press for stricter policies in order to enjoy

‘first mover’ advantages (Porter and van der Linde 1995), and a ‘race to

the top’ becomes likely.

Whether regulatory competition will lead to a race to the bottom or

rather to a race to the top, in other words, depends on various factors,

including in particular the specific structure and market dynamic of the

economic sector involved. The case studies will give the opportunity to

analyse those factors in detail. Moreover, they will allow us to study

how and through which actors the mechanism of regulatory competition

actually works in practice. For instance: how do governments deal with

the argument of competitive pressure, how do they respond to lobby-

ing by the affected companies, and what is the role of domestic versus

multinational firms in this regard?

1.3.4 Imposition

Imposition occurs when external actors – by exploiting economic or polit-

ical power asymmetries – force governments to implement policy changes


which they would not have otherwise (Busch and Jorgens 2007b). It

includes both direct coercive transfer, which implies the use of some

sort of physical force, and conditionality, typically involving international

loans to developing countries which are granted only if certain policies

are adopted (Dolowitz and Marsh 1996: 347; Meseguer Yebra 2003). In

addition, it is sometimes argued that policy adjustments may be imposed

upon countries in exchange for membership of international institutions

(Tews 2002; Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier 2004). Among the coun-

tries included in the present study, this might be the case for Hungary

taking over the acquis communautaire in the 1990s and early 2000s in view

of EU accession, as well as for Mexico in relation to membership of the

North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA). It is difficult in this

context to draw the line between ‘imposed’ adjustment and an essentially

voluntary act of ‘anticipated’ harmonisation. Nevertheless, in order to be

as attentive as possible to this potentially powerful driver of convergence,

we will treat imposition as a separate mechanism in this study.

In the environmental field, imposition of the kind alluded to here typi-

cally involves the transfer of policies from relatively highly regulated states

(old EU member states, the USA, Canada) to less regulated states. There-

fore, apart from strengthening the scope and degree of convergence, the

phenomenon is expected to contribute to an upward movement of the

strictness of policies.

1.3.5 Parallel problem pressure

In the context of this study, parallel problem pressure may be seen as

a null-hypothesis for explaining cross-national policy convergence. The

existence and/or perception of similar problems may lead to similar poli-

cies in different countries without any notable influence of international

factors such as international harmonisation, transnational communica-

tion, regulatory competition or imposition.

The basic expectation with regard to parallel problem pressure is that

more similar countries are more likely to develop similar policies. The

questions are: what produces parallel problem pressure?; which similar-

ities are crucial here? Is parallel problem pressure the sheer presence of

environmental problems? If so, indicators such as environmental quality,

the emissions of certain pollutants, the geographical situation, the pop-

ulation density or the degree of industrialisation might be relevant. Or is

it rather the way these problems are perceived and translated into polit-

ical ‘demand’ for action? In that case, similarity with regard to factors

such as the level of income, the political and institutional structure, the

strength of green parties and NGOs, as well as cultural traditions present

themselves (Lenschow, Liefferink and Veenman 2005).


Table 1.1 Mechanisms of policy convergence

Mechanism Stimulus Response

International harmonisation Legal obligation

through

international law

Compliance

Transnational communication

Lesson drawing Problem pressure Transfer of model found

elsewhere

Transnational

problem-solving

Parallel problem

pressure

Adoption of jointly developed

model

Emulation Desire for conformity Copying of widely used model

International policy

promotion

Legitimacy pressure Adoption of recommended

model

Regulatory competition Competitive pressure Mutual adjustment

Imposition Force, conditionality Adjustment of policy to that

of ‘imposing’ country

Parallel problem pressure

Environmental pressure

Political demand

Parallel domestic

constellation

Independent but similar

responses

Source: adapted from Holzinger and Knill (2005: 780; 2008: 42).

Moreover, assuming that in practice several mechanisms of con-

vergence usually come into play at the same time, the impact of

international triggers for convergence (international harmonisation,

transnational communication, etc.) is likely to be stronger if the prob-

lem at stake occurs and is perceived in a similar vein in a wide range

of countries. Conversely, domestic problem perceptions may be shaped

by international factors, for example by the specific problem definitions

provided by transnationally operating epistemic communities. The rela-

tive importance of the various domestic factors, ranging from general to

highly issue-specific factors, as well as their interaction with the interna-

tional mechanisms of convergence will be considered in detail in the case

studies in this book.

1.3.6 Summary

Table 1.1 summarises the mechanisms of policy convergence identified in

this section and to be used throughout this book. It should be emphasised

once again that these mechanisms by no means exclude each other. One

of the main objectives of the case studies will in fact be to explore to what

extent and in which ways they interact in real-world policymaking.


1.4 Case selection

This book offers an in-depth analysis of individual processes of policy

change which, taken together, promoted or hindered cross-national pol-

icy convergence. As set out above, the large-scale quantitative analysis

which formed the first part of the ENVIPOLCON study showed us that

the scope and degree of environmental policy convergence in Europe over

the past decades has been remarkable. We also learned about the crucial

role that can be attributed to the institutional and – apparently less so –

economic embeddedness of countries in explaining overall convergence

patterns (see Chapter 2; Holzinger, Knill and Arts 2008; Holzinger, Knill

and Sommerer 2008). In the quantitative study, the causal role of institu-

tional and economic embeddedness was tested (a) at the level of national

jurisdictions and (b) at policy level. Roughly speaking, deeply embed-

ded states were expected to adjust their policies more quickly to those

of their political or trading partners than weakly embedded countries.

In a similar vein, policies with high economic implications (e.g. product

standards) and policies that are subject to international harmonisation or

institutionalised communication were expected to converge more quickly

than those isolated from international relations. The in-depth qualitative

analysis offered in this book follows the same general research design –

i.e. beginning with the expectation that international embeddedness

shapes processes of national policy adoption and change – and aims

at elucidating the precise mechanisms at work. This general research

design has important implications for the selection of country studies

and policy items (see Lieberman 2005 on mixed methodologies gener-

ally and Heichel and Sommerer 2009 for a more thorough discussion of

the mixed methodology approach in this project).

1.4.1 Selection of countries for our case studies

In order to maintain the prominence of two explanatory dimensions

for policy convergence, namely international economic and institutional

embeddedness, we selected four countries that can be considered most

different cases with regard to these two dimensions, namely the Nether-

lands, France, Hungary and Mexico. Hence, we chose countries from the

original ENVIPOLCON sample of twenty-four countries according to

their degree of vulnerability to international trade (measured by the ratio

of trade in goods to GDP) and their degree of international institutional

integration (measured by membership in thirty-five European and inter-

national organisations) (for more details on indicators, see Heichel et al.

2008) (Table 1.2). The other countries that were included in the original


Table 1.2 Case study countries

Degree of trade and

institutional factors

Country

selected Expectation

High economic and

high institutional

embeddedness

Netherlands Follows international convergence patterns

Low economic and

high institutional

embeddedness

France Low responsiveness to regulatory competition;

high responsiveness to legal harmonisation

and international communication processes

High economic and

low institutional

embeddedness

(until 1990)

Hungary High responsiveness to regulatory competition;

low responsiveness to international legal

harmonisation and international

communication processes

Low economic and

low institutional

embeddedness

Mexico Low responsiveness to international

convergence patterns

ENVIPOLCON sample will hereafter be referred to as our ‘reference

group’.

This choice of countries is atypical for comparative environmental pol-

icy research. Small-n studies tend to focus either on a more homogeneous

group of countries (‘most similar cases design’, e.g. all small countries, so-

called pioneers or laggards, post-communist countries etc.) or a diverse

set of countries which have one central characteristic in common (such

as EU membership) but differ with regard to their political and economic

systems (e.g. liberal market economies versus coordinated market

economies). Such country selections are based on a comparative design.

However, on the basis of our original research question (policy conver-

gence) and the leading hypotheses (international economic and institu-

tional embeddedness matter), our choice of countries follows another

system, as each country represents one ‘type’ with respect to the degree

(maximum/minimum) of international trade and institutional interlink-

age. As such they are ‘crucial cases’ for a systematic test of hypotheses

and assumed regularities. In addition, with the choice of two EU member

states, Hungary as an EU applicant and later candidate state in the 1990s,

and Mexico outside the EU, we may gain some insight into the special

effect of the EU as an economic and institutional linkage-framework.

The following short country profiles will serve (a) to provide some

background information on the Netherlands, France, Hungary and Mex-

ico and (b) to illuminate the identification of our case study countries in

methodological terms.


The Netherlands has a small but traditionally open economy and is one

of the largest exporting countries in the world (OECD 2010). Its main

trading partners are Germany and Belgium. The classical approach to

operationalising economic interlinkage is trade dependence (e.g. trade

volume in relation to GDP). In order to account for the competitive

pressures on product and production created by environmental regula-

tion, it seems sensible for the purposes of this study to exclude from

measurement the trade in services. In the Netherlands the ratio of trade

in goods (exports plus imports) to GDP has grown from 97 per cent in

1970 to 116 per cent in 2000. Only Belgium has a higher trade/GDP

ratio over the period investigated in this study (1970 to 2000).

One option to protect the industry in a country like the Netherlands

from competitive pressure might be to reduce the level of (environmen-

tal) regulations – in convergence terms this would contribute to a race to

the bottom. Alternatively, the Netherlands might push for international

harmonisation in environmental policy. In this regard, the high level of

institutional embeddedness of the country is a relevant factor. As a found-

ing member state of the European Union, which is dealing with a great

number of environmental regulatory matters, which has a high obligatory

potential (i.e. is in the position to create regulatory harmonisation among

its members), and which is characterised by exceptionally close commu-

nicative contacts between its members, the Netherlands is well situated.

Yet, the country’s institutional embeddedness is broader and not limited

to European integration. The data collected for the quantitative part of

the ENVIPOLCON study identify the Netherlands in the year 1970 as

the second most highly embedded country in the entire reference group,

second only to France; in 2000 it was only exceeded by France, Germany

and Italy (see Heichel et al. 2008).

In contrast to the Netherlands, France is among the world’s largest

economies, but relies traditionally much less on foreign trade relations.

The French post-war growth strategy after the Second World War was

based on a dirigiste model labelled as ‘etatisme’. The state ‘aimed to

accelerate the pace of modernization and economic restructuring by

channelling resources to critical industrial sectors’ (Levy 2000: 308)

and it pushed so-called ‘grands projets’ by combining ‘subsidies, captive

markets, and the transfer of technologies developed in public research

labs’ (Levy 2000: 316). Following recessions in the 1970s and 1980s,

economic policy in France gradually became inspired more by liberal

economic ideas and ‘increasingly based on foreign trade’ (OECD 1997:

38). Nevertheless, with a trade in goods to GDP ratio of 50 per cent in

2000, France remains on the low end of economic embeddedness and

hence comparatively invulnerable to regulatory competitive pressures.


Institutionally, however, France is one of the most deeply embedded

countries in the world. The ENVIPOLCON dataset identified France as

continuously in the lead among the twenty-four countries included in the

ENVIPOLCON reference group. As for the Netherlands, membership in

the European Union accounts for much of this embeddedness, but even

compared to countries such as the UK or Ireland, France ranks highly,

revealing a more encompassing international engagement. Hence, in the

French case we hope to observe the effects of institutional factors on

environmental policy convergence in (relative) isolation from economic

pressure.

Already in the period of the socialist market economy, Hungary was

characterised by relatively high levels of international trade relations. The

primary framework for the country’s international economic relations

used to be the Council for Mutual Economic Assistance (CMEA or

Comecon), which was created in 1949 as a response to the Marshall Plan.

Until the late 1980s, the state had a monopoly on foreign trade which was

planned as any other economic activity. But economic reforms under the

Kadar regime also led to increasing trade relations outside the Eastern

bloc. In the 1980s, Hungary exported into 143 countries and received

imports from 103 countries (Abraham 1987: 31). After the ‘revolution’

in 1989, small- and large-scale privatisation began almost immediately.

Especially with regard to large-scale privatisation Hungary opted for a

strong influence of foreign capital. The liberalisation of foreign trade was

completed in 1991 (Lavigne 1999: 122ff). Hence, the ratio of trade in

goods to GDP ratio which was already 63 per cent in 1970 and 80 per

cent in 1980 – approximately double the value of France – jumped after

a slow-down in the 1990s to a remarkable 108 per cent in the year 2000.

While the mere numbers identify Hungary as an economically embedded

country, hence presumably vulnerable to regulatory competition, prior

to 1989 the free market dynamics that are thought to trigger regulatory

adaptation cannot be assumed. In fact, Hungary was selected less as

a prototypical case than in order to study the effects of the economic

transition.

Also in terms of institutional embeddedness we need to distinguish the

periods before and after transition. In the closed context of the socialist

world, Hungary was a member in only a limited number of international

organisations. Since the 1990s, its institutional embeddedness has risen

quickly. Hungary became a full EU member only in May 2004, but the

preparation for accession and hence the pressure to comply with EU rules

as well as the intense communicative contacts with other member states

started to build up already from the early 1990s and need to be taken

into account in analysing patterns of environmental policy adaptation and


change. In fact, the focus on Hungary allows us to gain some insight into

the special effects of the EU related to economic as well as institutional

interlinkage. It will be particularly interesting to see whether the EU

operates primarily as a framework for environmental harmonisation, i.e.

through its obligatory potential, or whether mechanisms of transnational

communication are more important in explaining convergence.

Mexico is the prototype of a weakly embedded country. Although ‘the

Mexican economy is the eighth largest in the OECD and the largest

in Latin America’ (OECD 2003: 15), Mexican economic policy was

long based on the import substitution model, i.e. a protectionist for-

eign trade policy and government support for the national private sector.

In the 1980s, Mexico introduced wide-ranging economic reforms by

privatising many state-owned enterprises and by liberalising the finan-

cial sector. Responding to crises in the financial system, Chile and then

Mexico were the first countries to open their economies. In the 1990s,

Mexico signed the North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA),

which entered into force in 1994, and other free trade agreements.

As a result, Mexico became the most important exporting country in

Latin America. While its ratio of trade in goods to GDP was merely

17 per cent in 1970 and 38 per cent in 1990, the ratio rose to 63

per cent in 2000, which however remains low comparatively speaking.

Consequently, the competitive pressure from environmental regulation

might be considered low, although increasing during the last decade

observed.

Also in institutional terms, Mexico’s international embeddedness is

comparatively weak even after NAFTA membership, suggesting low envi-

ronmental harmonisation pressure and limited effects of transnational

communication. However, according to the OECD the country ‘has

adopted an ambitious approach to environmental governance’ based on

the sustainability principle in recent years (OECD 2003: 15) and ‘it has

acted in line with other OECD countries [in responding to the interna-

tional environmental agenda], though it has not always been obliged to

do so’ (OECD 2003: 30). Considering its (still) low degree of interna-

tional embeddedness, this performance needs to be studied carefully to

identify the mechanisms at work.

As a country that is weakly embedded in both economic and institu-

tional terms, Mexico constitutes something like a control case. As such it

can draw our attention to alternative explanations for policy change and

policy convergence. The selection of Mexico as the only non-European

country in our sample is justified because – with the possible exception

of Albania – a country with similarly low levels of both economic and

institutional embeddedness could not be found in Europe.


At first sight the case studies in two countries, the Netherlands

and Mexico, may be ‘overdetermined’ with regard to explaining their

responses to international convergence stimuli. Due to both high

economic and high institutional embeddedness, economic and commu-

nicative mechanisms as well as effects of legal harmonisation may be

expected to apply to a maximum extent in the Netherlands, whereas

neither of them can be assumed to be strong in the Mexican case. It

must be kept in mind, however, that in the case studies the countries are

coupled with carefully selected policy items. By choosing policies that

are more or less prone to be affected by competitive pressure, that are

subject to international legal harmonisation or not and that are discussed

in international organisations and transnational networks to different

degrees, our case studies will be able to isolate the relevant causal factors

(see Section 1.4.2). At the same time, the choice of ‘overdetermined’

countries allows us to investigate possible interaction effects. A country

as widely embedded as the Netherlands, for instance, may respond

to regulatory competition pressure either domestically by protecting

industry from excessive cost through regulatory leniency or by seeking

international policy diffusion or even legal harmonisation – or in fact

a combination of those. In other words, we will gain further insight

into the mechanisms that apparently prevent a race to the bottom in

environmental policy. The Mexican case studies, on the other hand, may

point us to additional or alternative explanations such as policy-specific

international effects (as the low degree of embeddedness may not be

valid across the board) or subtle effects that might be linked to the

country’s aspirations rather than to its status quo.

1.4.2 Selection of policy items

The case studies conducted in this volume cover seven environmental

policy issues: lead in petrol, motorway noise emissions, noise emission

from lorries, industrial discharges into surface water, contaminated

sites, as well as the introduction of the principles of precaution and

sustainability. As the case studies serve various functions, these policy

items were selected in an equally careful and systematic manner as the

country sample.

First and at the most basic level, the policy cases serve descriptive

purposes. For every policy item we will describe how it emerged and

changed over time in the four selected countries. Consequently, each

case study will consist of four parallel historical accounts of the emergence

and change of a policy item. Such investigation of crucial country cases

within one policy case allows us to identify the various mechanisms at play


and learn about the conditions under which convergence occurs (a) with

respect to the international dimensions mentioned and (b) with regard to

domestic and policy-specific factors such as institutional opportunities,

actor constellations, problem pressure, technological innovation, and so

on. In tracing the detailed processes of policy change, such descriptive

policy case studies will illuminate the precise mechanisms that connect

one or more causal factors with the policy outcome over time. For policy

selection this purpose primarily calls for cases that have a history to trace

in most, if not all, countries.

The second function of the policy case studies is theoretical. Similar to

the country selection, the choice of policy items should be guided by the

task of testing hypotheses regarding policy convergence.

In order to test whether – and if so how – embeddedness in interna-

tional trade relations contributes to policy convergence, we need to focus

on environmental policy items that are impacted by trade and the poten-

tial of regulatory competition. As elaborated above, both product and

production process standards can be subject to such pressure, whereas

other environmental measures – such as nature protection – should not be

directly affected by regulatory competition. Importantly, the effect of reg-

ulatory competition should be visible not only at the level of presence of a

policy, but more deeply with respect to the direction of convergence, i.e.

the level at which standards are set. Particularly with regard to standards

relating to the production process, and except for economic-ecological

win–win situations, regulatory competition suggests pressure to conver-

gence at a fairly low level of protection, i.e. reducing the cost for industry.

For product standards, as we have seen, such a race to the bottom can

by no means be taken for granted. Instead, normally a tendency to con-

verge well above the lowest common denominator can be observed. The

mechanisms responsible for the absence of downward or even upward

convergence must lie outside the economic realm, and our two product-

related case studies may offer some interesting insights (see Table 1.3).

In order to study trade-related dynamics we have to assume the absence

of legal harmonisation at least for part of the period under investigation –

i.e. to pick policy cases accordingly. In fact the impact of legal harmon-

isation on policy convergence is analytically straightforward, despite the

implementation gaps that might delay this process. Therefore our selec-

tion of policy items prioritises non-obligatory items. Among the seven

items, only two were subject to harmonisation in the period covered by

this study: noise emission standards from lorries (from the 1970s) and

lead in petrol (from around 1980). The fact that both policy items are

product standards reflects that states – and industry – prefer legal har-

monisation with regard to traded goods over the uncertainty implied in


Table 1.3 Selection of policy items according to trade-related expectations

Trade factor Expectation Cases selected

Product standards

(settings)

Convergence (no general

expectation as regards

direction)

Product (P):

lead in petrol, noise emission from

lorries

Production

process

standards

(settings)

Convergence to the bottom Production process (PP):

Industrial discharges into surface

water (various heavy metals)

Non-trade-related

standards

Non-convergence Neither product nor process (NPP):

motorway noise emissions,

contaminated sites, precautionary

principle, sustainability principle

regulatory competition. The case studies will inquire more deeply into

this mechanism and also pursue the dynamics of policy change once

harmonised – yet only minimum – standards have been set.

As a logical consequence of the above, the policy items in which both

trade and harmonisation pressures are assumed to be absent – i.e. motor-

way noise emission standards, contaminated sites, the precautionary

principle and the sustainability principle – will serve to explore in depth

the various mechanisms of transnational communication: lesson draw-

ing, transnational problem-solving, emulation and international policy

promotion. They will allow us to investigate in detail the relationship

between the degree of international institutional embeddedness and the

impact of transnational communication in the four selected countries. To

begin with, we hope to identify empirically the distinct mechanisms that

are distinguished in the literature. Furthermore, the case studies may

help to pinpoint the conditions under which these different communica-

tive dynamics develop and to what effect.

In addition, our policy items distinguish between the mere presence of

a policy, the choice of policy instruments and the setting or ‘calibration’

of these instruments (see Table 1.4). This gives us yet another entrance

for elaborating on the differential impact of the various mechanisms, such

as regulatory competition or transnational communication. With regard

to the latter, for instance, with reference to the literature on epistemic

communities (e.g. Haas 1992), this distinction will enable us to trace pol-

icy change and convergence to the substance of the discussions in these

communities, which is more likely to focus on the problem diagnostic

and the identification of appropriate instruments than on detailed pol-

icy settings. Interestingly, however, institutionalist theory suggests that


Table 1.4 Characteristics of policy items

Chapter/policy item Presence Instrument Setting

Chapter 3: industrial discharge in

surface water

× × ×

Chapter 4: lead in petrol × × ×

Chapter 5: traffic noise emissions

(a) lorries

(b) motorways

× × × × × ×

Chapter 6: contaminated sites × × –

Chapter 7: precautionary principle × – –

Chapter 8: sustainability principle × – –

receptivity to change – and thus potentially to convergence – is likely to

be lower at the level of fundamental ideas and instruments than at the

level of policy settings (e.g. Hall 1993; Sabatier and Jenkins-Smith 1993).

The interplay and potentially contradictory logics of international con-

vergence stimuli on the one hand and domestic responsiveness (involving

institutional preconditions as well as the political and economic frame-

work and policy-specific problems) on the other will get careful attention

in the case studies. In order to follow long-term domestic processes, the

case studies in principle cover the period 1970 to roughly 2000, with the

exception of course of those issues which entered the political agenda

only at a later date, such as the concept of sustainability.

As indicated, this book pays particular attention to the role and effect

of international convergence stimuli: economic, legal and communica-

tive. The general research design in selecting country and policy cases is

built to test related hypotheses and further explore the underlying policy

processes. However, case studies investigating in great detail the process

of domestic policy adaptation – which in the greater picture contributes

to international convergence trends – are prone to find a more com-

plex explanatory constellation than that suggested in the overall design.

In order to identify alternative or complementary explanations we will

systematically look for findings that run counter to our initial hypothe-

ses. For this purpose, using the outcomes of the quantitative part of the

ENVIPOLCON study, we have consistently chosen policy items that

at least in one of our selected countries seem to contradict our main

hypotheses. In which sense they do so depends on the specific case at

hand and will be elaborated in the individual case study chapters. In this

way, we have systematically built into our case studies a critical assess-

ment of the dominant mechanisms and an active search for alternative

explanations.


1.5 Outline of the book

In Chapter 2, Katharina Holzinger, Christoph Knill and Thomas Som-

merer summarise key findings of the quantitative part of the ENVIPOL-

CON project. This quantitative overview of environmental policy con-

vergence in Europe provides the wider background for the in-depth case

studies, which stand at the core of this volume. On the one hand, this will

help the reader to understand the choices and considerations underlying

the design of the qualitative study, such as the selection of countries and

policy items. In this sense, the opening sections of each of the case study

chapters will refer back to Chapter 2. On the other hand, Chapter 2 will

provide a context for putting the wealth of empirical findings presented

in the case study chapters into perspective.

In Chapter 3, Stephan Heichel, Jessica Pape and Jale Tosun open the

series of case studies by discussing standards for industrial production

processes. The chapter focuses on the discharge of four heavy metals –

chromium, copper, lead and zinc – as well as changes of the biolog-

ical oxygen demand (BOD) of rivers and lakes. Binding international

regulation for these specific substances did not exist in the period from

1970 to 2000. Nevertheless, standards in the four countries consistently

increased. The authors show that this was related to a combination of

harmonisation of the broader regulatory framework, transnational com-

munication and domestic problem pressure – each to a different degree in

the four countries under investigation. A race to the bottom with regard

to environmental laws and subsequent emission standards due to com-

petitive pressures did not occur. However, the case study finds strong

evidence that regulatory competition has played a significant role in the

implementation phase: especially in Hungary and Mexico, the adoption

of high protection standards was made possible or at least facilitated by

the prospect of an intentional implementation gap.

Chapter 4 deals with the case of the lead content of petrol. Petrol is

a tradable product. Its lead content has been subject to international

regulation, more particularly a series of EU directives, since the 1970s.

Per-Olof Busch argues, however, that rather than international harmon-

isation, it was strong domestic concern about the health effects of leaded

petrol, occurring in various countries more or less in parallel, which

caused national policies to converge. This process was strengthened

by transnational communication, particularly within scientific networks.

Harmonisation, then, mainly served ‘to pull the laggards aboard’, and

within our sample particularly France. Considering the relatively low cost

of reducing lead in petrol, regulatory competition only played a marginal

role. The chapter exemplifies the general caveat often brought forward


against statistical analysis, namely that scholars should be careful not

to confuse correlation with causation. While there is a clear correlation

between international legal harmonisation and the domestic regulation of

lead in petrol, the case study ultimately locates the driving force behind

domestic policies in domestic health concerns intensified by non-coercive

processes of transnational communication.

Under the umbrella of ‘traffic noise policies’, Chapter 5 covers two

closely related issues: noise emission standards for lorries (i.e. a product

standard, subject to harmonisation by the UNECE and the EU since the

1960s), and noise emission standards for motorways (i.e. neither prod-

uct nor process regulation, not subject to harmonisation in the period

1970–2000). Dieter Pesendorfer presents the former issue as a clear-cut

case of international harmonisation, with each step following techno-

logical progress and inhibiting individual countries from going further

for reasons of competitiveness as well as legal complications. National

policies regarding noise from motorways, according to Pesendorfer, were

determined mainly by the combination of domestic problem pressure

and the level of economic development. Policy convergence in this area

increased from the 1990s, mainly as a result of transnational communi-

cation, particularly transnational problem-solving in the EU context and

lesson drawing.

Policies regarding the clean-up of contaminated sites have not been

subject to international harmonisation. As they are neither about trad-

able products nor about production processes, they are expected not to

be directly affected by regulatory competition. In Chapter 6, focusing

on instrument choice in this area, Sietske Veenman partially confirms

this by showing that transnational communication was in fact the most

important mechanism accounting for convergence, particularly lesson

drawing in international expert networks. Considerations of competi-

tiveness hardly played a role in designing domestic policies, but stimu-

lated their introduction in a general sense, as transnational companies

asked national governments especially in Hungary and Mexico to intro-

duce a calculable regulatory framework for contaminated sites. Veenman

also points to the relevance of various domestic factors, including spe-

cific problem pressure but also the level of economic development and

existing institutional structures, for explaining how international driving

forces of convergence ‘land’ in individual countries. Finally, the chapter

illustrates an interesting case of international ‘norm competition’ where

the Netherlands, one of the pioneers in this issue area, was increasingly

pressured to give up its costly public liability scheme and follow the

majority of countries which had shifted the clean-up costs to the owners

of contaminated sites.


The precautionary principle, addressed by Dieter Pesendorfer in

Chapter 7, likewise is not directly trade-related. It is mentioned in var-

ious international treaties including, since 1992, the EU Treaty, but

there is no formal obligation of transposition into national law. Neverthe-

less, Pesendorfer shows that through the strong impact of transnational

communication, in particular transnational problem-solving and inter-

national policy promotion, no country could escape the international

discourse around precaution that became dominant from the mid 1980s

onwards. However, countries that were weakly embedded in interna-

tional institutions (Mexico and Hungary) tended to be more selective in

adopting the different aspects of the precautionary principle than long-

time members of the EU. In the domestic process in all four countries,

moreover, the principle’s possible consequences for competitiveness and

economic development did play a surprisingly prominent role. However,

rather than refraining from introducing this internationally acknowledged

principle, countries increasingly changed their interpretation of the pre-

cautionary principle to include cost–benefit considerations. Thus, adop-

tion of the principle was, at least in part, made possible by a gradual

weakening of its regulative strength.

Rapidly after its introduction in 1987, reference to the concept of sus-

tainability (not directly trade-related, no obligatory international regula-

tions) was incorporated into the environmental laws of many countries,

including France, the Netherlands, Hungary and Mexico. In Chapter 8,

Per-Olof Busch and Helge Jorgens primarily explain this by the strong

promotion of the concept by international institutions such as the UN,

the World Bank, the OECD and the EU, combined with the open-ended

and partly symbolic character of the concept. Interestingly, among our

four countries, legal recognition occurred first in Mexico. This is argued

to be due largely to the wish to gain legitimacy in the eyes of other coun-

tries and foreign investors. This process of early emulation was followed

by subsequent slow implementation of the principle and an emphasis on

the economic and social aspects of the concept. Furthermore, interpreta-

tion of the encompassing sustainability principle was in all four countries

strongly influenced by existing regulatory traditions.

The concluding Chapter 9 summarises the main findings of the case

studies in the light of the research questions formulated in Chapter 1.

It analyses the role of the different mechanisms of convergence individ-

ually, but also focuses on the various ways in which they interact. This

analysis also extends to the submechanisms of transnational communi-

cation (lesson drawing, transnational problem-solving, emulation, and

international policy promotion) which, it is argued, tend to appear in

typical sequences. Moreover, the interaction with domestic factors such

as domestic problem pressure, the state and structure of the national


economy, and the national institutional context and regulatory traditions

is found to play an important role in explaining domestic policy change

and cross-national convergence.

Without, in the most literal sense, jumping to conclusions, a few spe-

cific findings of the case studies deserve to be highlighted already at

this point. First, the cases show that transnational communication and

international harmonisation often work successively: for various reasons,

many countries react to communicative pressures by adopting policies

long before international authoritative standards are being agreed upon.

These voluntary policy adoptions, in turn, create international policy

momentum and pave the way for subsequent agreement on binding mul-

tilateral standards. Second, while regulatory competition did not stand

out as a clearly observable factor in convergence patterns, the analy-

sis suggests that domestic concern about the economic implications of

environmental standards may instead take the form of a fairly flexible

interpretation and implementation of those policies at the domestic level.

This mechanism occurs underneath the surface of formal policy conver-

gence and is hence largely invisible to quantitative analysis. It can be

observed not only in developing countries such as Mexico and Hun-

gary, but also in rich and highly industrialised countries such as France

and the Netherlands. Third, it is demonstrated that a country’s involve-

ment in international or transnational settings can take various forms,

ranging from a deliberate leadership role (in our sample, the Nether-

lands) to outright resistance to international discourses and policy models

(France). Between these two extremes, there are countries that tend

either to actively seek (Hungary) or passively receive (Mexico) interna-

tional models. These national profiles, moreover, turn out to be fairly

persistent across different issue areas. Apparently, not only the extent to

which countries are formally embedded in international settings, but also

national idiosyncrasies have to play a crucial role in explaining patterns

of convergence through transnational communicative channels. Finally,

and more specifically, various domestic factors influence the way in which

environmental problems and proposed solutions are perceived and thus

are crucial determinants of policy change and convergence. These factors

include ‘passive’ components, such as the domestic experience with simi-

lar problems and policies, the specific domestic problem structures, and a

country’s financial, scientific and technological capacities and resources,

but also more ‘active’ ones, notably the activities of policy entrepreneurs.

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Introduction: Theoretical Framework and Research Design

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