The bad, the abnormal and the inadequate. A new institutionalist perspective for exploring environmental assessment's evolutionary direction

Abstract

The published Environmental Assessment (EA) literature provides an account of the development of EA over five decades of evolving theory and practice, focussing particularly on how EA works and on how it could improve in the pursuit of (greater) effectiveness. This paper explores the idea that unintended bad, abnormal or inadequate consequences or effects may have occurred during EA's evolution, affecting the way in which it has evolved and the shape and direction of EA's evolutionary path. To assist in this exploration, three concepts are analysed: “mala-effectiveness”, “maladaptation” and “maladjustment”. The focus of the paper then shifts to exploring what might determine EA's evolutionary direction, and the role that unintended bad, abnormal or inadequate effects might play in shaping, constraining or adjusting EA's evolutionary path, loosely drawing on ideas from evolutionary thinking and from new institutionalist debates within planning theory. Building on the analysis of the three concepts and on new institutionalist perspectives, a conceptual framework is then proposed to explore EA's evolutionary direction, acknowledging the role of design and evolution dimensions.