Abstract
European forest policymaking is shaped by progressing European integration, yet with notable ideological divisions and diverging interests among countries. This paper focuses on the coalitional politics of key environmental forest issues: biodiversity conservation, timber legality, and climate protection policy. Combining the Advocacy Coalition Framework and the Shifting Coalition Theory, and informed by more than 186 key informant interviews and 73 policy documents spanning a 20-year timeframe, we examine the evolution of coalitional forest politics in Europe. We find that the basic line-up has remained stable: an environmental coalition supporting EU environmental forest policy integration and a forest sector coalition mostly opposing it. Still, strategic alliances across these coalitions have occurred for specific policy issues which have resulted in a gradual establishment of an EU environmental forest policy. We conclude with discussion of our findings and provide suggestions for further research.
Highlights
Forest issues in the European Union (EU) and its Member States (MS) have been subject to policy controversy for decades
The EU Parliament was not involved since its respective competencies were introduced only in 1993 by the Treaty of Maastricht
A political agreement was achieved under the leadership of state actors from the environmental coalition skilfully using the venues of the EU Council Presidencies by France, Luxembourg and the Netherlands
Summary
Forest issues in the European Union (EU) and its Member States (MS) have been subject to policy controversy for decades. Biodiversity conservation and forest management are disputed along an ideological forestryenvironmental division spanning across the EU multi-level
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