The shaping of environmental policy in France

Abstract

What shape and content have French environmental policies taken? What are the shaping factors at national and European levels which have produced a particular style and configuration of policy? Drawing on an extensive range of political, legal and sociological materials, the author presents and evaluates environmental policy-making in France at a time when environmental problems are growing in complexity and gravity. This study highlights the range of inputs to the policy process - including popular movements, green parties, interest group representation, EU legislation and international treaties - and evaluates the diverse nature of the outcomes. The book argues that current environmental issues pose new challenges to the French style of governance. Its preference for technocratic proficiency over grass-roots involvement proved workable in the 1970s and 1980s when the environmental agenda was largely framed in terms of pollution control, but is proving less apposite given the new stress on sustainable development, with its implications for lifestyle change. Because new developments involve not only changes in policy-content but also adaptation of policy style, environmental demands are progressively changing the shape of politics itself.