EU Environmental Politics of Policies

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Issue Date
2017-07-28
Language
en
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Abstract
This thesis seeks to understand and explain environmental policies in the EU. The overarching framework for this is currently the 7th Environment Action Programme (EAP). This is a policy plan that lays down environmental objectives that should be met by 2020 and allows for the adoption of more substantive legislation in order to reach those goals. The literature has found out that the Commission and the Netherlands as a Green Sextet Member State have been important for this field of competence. Therefore, this thesis investigates whether or not this was still the case by reconstructing the coming about of the latest EAP and explains how and why their interests have become consolidated into this piece of legislation. By using process tracing, the theories of liberal intergovernmentalism and neofunctionalism are tested in order to find out to what extent they are able to explain the creation of the 7th EAP. This thesis argues that the outcome of the 7th EAP negotiations were similar to the assumptions of liberal intergovernmentalism while the overall process resembled neofunctionalism. The thesis also concludes that soil policies and the acknowledgement of a common responsibility were some of the crucial debates during the informal trialogues.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen