New Tools for Environmental Protection Education, Information, and Voluntary Measures (2002) / Chapter Skim
Currently Skimming:
19. The Policy Context for Flexible, Negotiated, and Voluntary Measures
19. The Policy Context for Flexible, Negotiated, and Voluntary Measures
Pages 311-318
The Chapter Skim interface presents what we've algorithmically identified as the most significant single chunk of text within every page in the chapter.
Select key terms on the right to highlight them within pages of the chapter.
From page 311... ...
Addressing them within the "command-and-control" framework seemed too difficult technically difficult because their diffuse nature impeded monitoring nonpoint effluents from particular sources and enforcing controls, and politically difficult because the longstanding public propensity to subsidize rather than regulate farming militates 311
|
From page 312... ...
Command-and-control regulation of point sources had accomplished significant reductions in water pollutant loadings nationwide, but increasingly had come to be regarded as inflexible, inefficient, and stifling to innovation, all of which tend to increase pollution control costs. In addition, changes in the economy the service sector grew faster than manufacturing, and more dispersed modes of manufacturing gained at the expense of traditional, concentrated forms necessitated changes in the standard command-and-control modus operandi (Rejeski and Salzman, this volume, Chapter 2~.
|
From page 313... ...
Flexible Incentives Flexibility in the assignment of responsibility for pollution control and choice of control technology may be introduced via pollution taxes, trading in pollution reduction credits, and similar market-oriented policy instruments. This approach seeks to enforce a given level of environmental performance, while freeing managers to choose the means of compliance.
|
From page 314... ...
The key point is that citizen demand for environmental quality serves as a powerful restraint on environmentally lax policy (Andreoni and Levinson, 2001~. Third, the same citizen demand for environmental quality will motivate the behavior of private firms, which will rationally seek good environmental reputations and if the best way to gain a good environmental reputation is to earn it
|
From page 315... ...
If such a scheme proved workable, farmers would gain the considerable savings in control costs that come with the switch to policy instruments that reward pollution-control performance rather than subsidize specified technologies. Negotiated Solutions and Voluntary Agreements Most people discussing flexible environmental policy have in mind something much more flexible than the flexible incentives described earlier, which while introducing flexibility by assigning the lion's share of the abatement task to lowcost abaters and allowing flexibility in choice of control technology adhere rigidly to the specified environmental performance standard.
|
From page 316... ...
Conclusion Traditional economic theory supports flexible incentives, and "smart" monitoring and enforcement strategies, but is skeptical toward many of the policy innovations discussed earlier. However, recent conceptual advances and a growing body of empirical experience support cautious optimism about voluntary or negotiated agreements, industry codes, green marketing, and performance-based rather than technology-based instruments for nonpoint pollution control.
|
From page 317... ...
These minimal functions of government in the environmental sphere remain essential because it would be naively incautious to rely entirely on good intentions, green consumerism, and social pressures to achieve consistent environmental performance that is costly to polluting firms, consumers, and public agencies.
|
From page 318... ...
2001 Voluntary Environmental Agreements between the Flemish Community and Municipalities. Unpublished paper presented at the Environmental Policy Conference, Ohio State University Environmental Policy Initiative, Columbus, OH, April 16-18.
|
Key Terms
This material may be derived from roughly machine-read images, and so is provided only to facilitate research.
More
information on Chapter Skim is available.