Still saving the earth? The European Parliament's environmental record

Abstract

The European Parliament has been heralded as a champion of environmental policy within the European Union. However, there have been few recent studies of the European Parliament's treatment of environmental legislation, despite the many changes that have taken place within the EU. To correct this oversight all European Parliament amendments to environmental co-decision legislation between 1999 and 2009 have been classified according to their environmental importance and analysed to determine how the chamber's behaviour has changed over time and which factors shape its success. The European Parliament appears to have become both less radical and less successful in incorporating strong green amendments into legislation, and the European Commission emerges as a central explanation for the European Parliament's ability to do so. Despite the Commission's reputation as a partner seeking to advance the environmental agenda, it does not appear inclined to support the European Parliament's attempts to green legislation.

Keywords:

• European Parliament
• environmental policy
• co-decision

Acknowledgements

This article is an output from ESRC Award No: RES-000-22-2304. We would like to thank the referees, Richard Corbett, Michael Shackleton, David Earnshaw, Roger Scully and Simon Lightfoot for their helpful comments and suggestions.

Notes

1. The Presidency of the Council of Ministers rotates every six months. The state holding the Presidency is responsible for chairing working group meetings in the Council and taking the lead in negotiations with the Parliament. This system persists despite the innovation of a permanent European Council President in the Treaty of Lisbon.

2. The dataset of coded amendments is available on www.ESDS.ac.uk

3. Copy of the VIF tables are available from the authors at [email protected]

4. Personal interview, January 2009.

5. Thanks to Richard Corbett and Michael Shackleton for this observation.