The Promises and Pitfalls of Devolution: Water Pollution Policies in the American States

Abstract

This article investigates state reactions to the relatively decentralized federal policy structures that are now in place for non-point source water pollution control and assesses the extent to which state policies are living up to the promises of the policy devolution agenda. It develops and presents measures of state non-point source policy activism for all fifty states and analyzes the likely sources of variation in state policies. In so doing, it finds evidence that the “promises of devolution” are not being fulfilled across all states. The analysis also yields insights that can contribute to the development of new and more flexible federal-state policy arrangements in a policy area that has been characterized by command-and-control regulation. Copyright 2005, Oxford University Press.