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Environmental Federalism in the European Union and the United States

Author

Listed:
  • David J. Vogel

    (Haas School of Business)

  • Michael W. Toffel

    (Harvard Business School, Technology and Operations Management Unit)

  • Diahanna Post
  • Nazli Z. Uludere Aragon

Abstract

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

Suggested Citation

  • David J. Vogel & Michael W. Toffel & Diahanna Post & Nazli Z. Uludere Aragon, 2010. "Environmental Federalism in the European Union and the United States," Harvard Business School Working Papers 10-085, Harvard Business School.
    • Handle: RePEc:hbs:wpaper:10-085
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    Cited by:

    1. Ivan Bozhikin & Nikolay Dentchev, 2018. "Discovering a Wilderness of Regulatory Mechanisms for Corporate Social Responsibility: Literature Review," Economic Alternatives, University of National and World Economy, Sofia, Bulgaria, issue 2, pages 145-174, June.
    2. Hiroyuki TOSA, 2021. "The Politics of Human-induced Climate Change Denial and Cognitive Bias in Risk Assessment," GSICS Working Paper Series 39, Graduate School of International Cooperation Studies, Kobe University.
    3. Zhang, Bing & Chen, Xiaolan & Guo, Huanxiu, 2018. "Does central supervision enhance local environmental enforcement? Quasi-experimental evidence from China," Journal of Public Economics, Elsevier, vol. 164(C), pages 70-90.
    4. Kruger, Joseph, 2005. "From SO2 to Greenhouse Gases: Trends and Events Shaping Future Emissions Trading Programs in the United States," RFF Working Paper Series dp-05-20, Resources for the Future.
    5. Céline Gainet, 2010. "Exploring the Impact of Legal Systems and Financial Structure on Corporate Responsibility," Journal of Business Ethics, Springer, vol. 95(2), pages 195-222, September.
    6. Stefan Renckens & Grace Skogstad & Matthieu Mondou, 2017. "When Normative and Market Power Interact: The European Union and Global Biofuels Governance," Journal of Common Market Studies, Wiley Blackwell, vol. 55(6), pages 1432-1448, November.
    7. Kjell Hausken, 2019. "Principal–Agent Theory, Game Theory, and the Precautionary Principle," Decision Analysis, INFORMS, vol. 16(2), pages 105-127, June.
    8. Philipp Haessler, 2020. "Strategic Decisions between Short-Term Profit and Sustainability," Administrative Sciences, MDPI, vol. 10(3), pages 1-31, September.
    9. Sobin, Nathaniel & Molenaar, Keith & Cahill, Eric, 2012. "Mapping goal alignment of deployment programs for alternative fuel technologies: An analysis of wide-scope grant programs in the United States," Energy Policy, Elsevier, vol. 51(C), pages 405-416.
    10. Bernard Hoekman, 2014. "Business and Transatlantic Trade Integration," CESifo Forum, ifo Institute - Leibniz Institute for Economic Research at the University of Munich, vol. 14(04), pages 28-32, January.

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