Institutionalising New Forms of Environmental Policy-making in the EU. The Case of the Emissions Trading Scheme.

Abstract: The Emissions Trading Scheme represents a new departure in the field of environmental policy-making in the EU. With it, the EU has deployed a market-based instrument to meet its Kyoto Carbon Dioxide emissions reduction commitments. This paper will account for its emergence as a concrete policy output. It will first refer to the historical, ideational and interest-based logics which shaped its emergence, within the broader context of environmental policy-making in the EU. Using an integrated institutionalist approach incorporating all three strands of institutionalist thought, it will therefore account for the sequencing of these different logics at different stages of the policy-making process, from agenda-setting through to implementation and evaluation. Accordingly, it will be argued that this approach adds value in accounting for the change in logics which can often lead from good ideas unintentionally emerging as sub-optimal policies in the EU, as is the case with the first phase of the Emissions Trading Scheme.