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Pages 319-336

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From page 319... ... In particular, understanding voluntary agreements will require tentative solutions to the aggregation problem of linking the behavior of individuals to that of organizations. Third, voluntary agreements may provide important opportunities for meeting new environmental policy challenges, but for the most part, the voluntary agreements in place today are dealing with problems of the sort that traditionally have been handled by command-and-control regulation. Read the entire page →
From page 320... ... When care is taken to learn what changes in environmental impact can legitimately be attributed to a voluntary program rather than to other factors, the estimated effects may be less impressive than those contained in first reports that are less rigorous in methodology. Thus in developing and assessing the merits of voluntary agreements in the future, it would be wise to think carefully about methodological and conceptual issues of evaluation. Read the entire page →
From page 321... ... , selection bias can be a particular problem firms who join voluntary programs may be very different from those who do not. Appropriate statistical models can help in dealing with selection bias, but such bias is still a major issue in most evaluations of voluntary agreements (Heckman, 1976, 1979~. Read the entire page →
From page 322... ... Thinking About Program Goals The most obvious goal of voluntary agreements is to reduce environmental impact. But in evaluating voluntary programs, the obvious goal may not be obtained quickly or directly. Read the entire page →
From page 323... ... Participants and managers can benefit from research that helps them do better, but policymakers and society as a whole must be able to assess how well a voluntary agreement approach is working in a given domain. To the extent that voluntary agreements are intended to produce changes in organizational culture and routines, it may be necessary to rethink not only the variables that should be considered as outcome criteria, but also the statistics used to summarize the behavior of participants in a program or agreement. Read the entire page →
From page 324... ... Although research on participation in voluntary agreements is in its early stages, several key issues already have emerged. Voluntary Participation Is Not Wholly Voluntary As Randall (this volume, Chapter 19) Read the entire page →
From page 325... ... Conversely, free-riding may bring informal sanctions from trade associations and other firms. Read the entire page →
From page 326... ... If this is the case, then explaining why firms would participate in voluntary agreements reduces to explaining how voluntary agreements might enhance economic performance. This is the essence of the rational actor model that underpins the analysis in several of the preceding chapters. Read the entire page →
From page 327... ... To date, there seems to be little experience with using voluntary agreements to deal with nonpoint pollutants or with the special problems of the service sector noted by Rejeski and Salzman (this volume, Chapter 2~. The exception seems to be with ISO 14001 and other "green" labeling and certification efforts that are encouraged by consumer demand for environmentally friendly products, demands from large purchasers on their suppliers, or demands of import regulations in important markets. Read the entire page →
From page 328... ... CONCLUSIONS Voluntary agreements may have substantial potential to reduce the environmental impacts of production and consumption activities both directly and by changing organizational culture and capabilities. But as the chapters in Part 3 demonstrate, voluntary agreements come in many forms, and we do not understand many of them very well. Read the entire page →
From page 329... ... In addition, we are only beginning to think through the implications of international environmental regulatory regimes for national and international voluntary agreements. It is almost certain that voluntary agreements will be an important part of environmental policy over the next decade. Read the entire page →
From page 330... ... show that professional and trade associations are important participants in the energy and environmental risk policy networks. 11 In a series of papers, Wernick, Ausubel, and their collaborators document the reductions in environmental impact that have been achieved in a number of industries and suggest that better engineering could substantially alleviate environmental problems (Ausubel, 1996; Wernick, 1997; Wernick, 1994; Wernick et al., 2000) Read the entire page →
From page 331... ... 1984 What Works: Documenting Energy Conservation in Buildings. Washington, DC: American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy. Read the entire page →
From page 332... ... Washington, DC: American Council for an Energy Efficient Economy. Read the entire page →
From page 333... ... THOMAS DIETZ 333 Wackernagel, M., L Onisto, P Read the entire page →

From page 319...

... In particular, understanding voluntary agreements will require tentative solutions to the aggregation problem of linking the behavior of individuals to that of organizations. Third, voluntary agreements may provide important opportunities for meeting new environmental policy challenges, but for the most part, the voluntary agreements in place today are dealing with problems of the sort that traditionally have been handled by command-and-control regulation.