Environmental Policy Process Research Articles

Modeling the Impact of Global Warming on Ecosystem Dynamics: A Compartmental Approach to Sustainability

Environmental degradation driven by human activities has heightened the need for sustainable development strategies that balance economic growth with ecological preservation. This study uses a compartmental model approach to examine the effects of global warming on ecosystem dynamics, focusing on how rising temperatures alter interactions across trophic levels. Three case studies of varying complexity, including a human ecosystem incorporating social and economic factors, were analyzed by integrating feedback loops between greenhouse gas emissions, temperature anomalies, and ecosystem responses. The results quantitatively demonstrate that even minor disruptions in one part of an ecosystem can cause significant instability across trophic levels, potentially driving the system to collapse in a short period. These findings from all case studies highlight the cascading impacts of global warming, underscoring the intricate relationship between climate change and ecosystem stability. Furthermore, this study offers qualitative insights into the potential consequences of climate change on biodiversity and resource availability in real ecosystems, highlighting the vulnerability of such systems and the importance of incorporating feedback mechanisms into environmental policy and decision-making processes. The approach employed in this study offers a more robust framework for understanding ecosystem responses and for developing strategies to enhance resilience against climate change, thereby protecting the long-term sustainability of ecosystems.

Power and interests in environmental policy processes: the Svalbard case

ABSTRACT Climate and environmental changes pose tremendous challenges to ecosystems worldwide. While this underscores the need for more significant conservation efforts, these measures often clash with human activities. Participation and transparency may be key to reducing conflict and ensuring high-quality decisions, but facilitating such processes has proven difficult with many interests and stakeholders involved. This often leads to disputes over environmental policies but may also reflect a more profound debate about the definition of wilderness and who it is for. This article, therefore, explores what interests prevail and why in environmental policy processes and how this relates to perceptions of wilderness. Drawing on Lukes’ (2021) three-dimensional view of power and the case of the political process of new environmental regulations in the Arctic Archipelago of Svalbard, Norway, the author examines how the power to frame the public discourse about wilderness influences the issues and actors included in the discussion (see also McConnell and Hart 2019, 647). The insights provided are relevant not only to local stakeholders on Svalbard navigating the policy process but also to practitioners and academics elsewhere working in environmental governance, protected areas, and environmental policy and legislation.

Investing in Women, Investing in the Planet: Quantifying the Impact of Women's Empowerment on Environmental Sustainability

Objective: This study finds out the correlation between the indicators of women’s empowerment, including variables like gender parity index in tertiary education, female labour force participation and seats held by women in national parliament, and a variable of environmental sustainability such as CO2 emissions (metric tons per capita). The aim is to analyse existing datasets to know the impact of independent variables on dependent variable. Method: The study uses multiple linear regression to evaluate the effects of independent variables indicators of women's empowerment on the dependent variable, CO2 emissions, using secondary data from the World Bank covering the years 1990 to 2022. The Breusch-Pagan and Breusch-Godfrey LM tests are used to look at heteroskedasticity and autocorrelation, respectively, and VIF is used to find multicollinearity. Results and Conclusion: The study concludes that there is a statistically significant relationship between lower CO2 emissions and increases in the percentage of female seats in the national parliament (-3.73) and higher female labour force participation (-6.04). The gender parity index (GPI) in tertiary education, which is -0.2997, does not, however, appear to have a statistically significant impact on CO2 emissions. Implications: This research can serve as a cause for redesigning gender-responsive environmental initiatives and promoting a more sustainable and equitable future. Originality/Value: This study contributes empirical knowledge to the body of literature by showing the potential contribution of women's empowerment in addressing environmental issues and emphasising the significance of taking gender into account in environmental policy and decision-making processes.

International environmental policy processes that dispossessed developing societies of public land resources: A case study of Nepal

AbstractPublic lands including forests and community pastures are still crucial means of local livelihood, social security, and environmental conservation in many developing countries including Nepal. However, these resources are increasingly managed primarily to offset greenhouse gas emissions of developed countries. The new management has exacerbated many local problems: livelihood constriction, social crises, human casualties (deaths and serious injuries), biodiversity degradation, and water scarcity including cryosphere retreating. Drawing data from multiple sources, this study attempted to explain the international political objectives and processes that dispossessed developing societies of public land resources for the benefit of developed countries. It shows that representatives of the developed countries were proactively and strategically involved in agenda formation, solutions negotiations, and decision-making while developing international environmental policies, and succeeded to structure the policies for managing the resources of developing countries for the best benefit of their own countries. The developed countries provided funds and experts, as strategic tools, through international aid agencies to implement the policies of their interest in institutionally weak countries. In Nepal, the aid agencies influenced the thinking of the public and the decisions of the government and other stakeholders through a series of strategic measures. They propagandized false crises, worked with a coalition of powerful international agencies, offered free technical support, and changed national policies proactively to manage the land resources for achieving their missions. Active involvement in policy implementation also helped the agencies to monitor implementation hurdles and apply other tactics to resolve them. Lucrative flash incentives were provided to motivate and get the support of communities, powerful stakeholders, and politicians to implement the policies. Psychosocial pressures were also applied to persuade local communities and their leaders for getting local cooperation in making and practicing new legal institutions (government authority rules or orders, user group rules, and forest management plans) that bind and control local communities for forest protection. The institutions obliged local communities to contribute free labor or cash for developing, modifying, and protecting the forests. These two levels of interventions led to the further development of reinforcing institutions, resource conditions, and social-ecological systems that secured benefits for developed countries and deprived local communities of power to control, produce and access the public land resources in their own backyard for years. This study also showed that international environmental policies and aid agencies have respectively served as institutional weapons and vehicles for materially and institutionally powerful countries to colonize the land resources of weaker countries, without using of physical coercion or deplyment of military forces.

From pollution to prosperity: Investigating the Environmental Kuznets curve and pollution-haven hypothesis in sub-Saharan Africa's industrial sector

Drivers of environmental change and policy processes are pushing the sub-Saharan African region to do more in the struggle against climate change as the region suffers most from climate change impact. To this end, this study investigates how the interaction effects of a sustainable financing model in energy use influence carbon emissions in Sub-Saharan African economies. It is based on the theory that energy consumption is determined by increased economic financing. Panel data analysis of thirteen countries from 1995 to 2019 is used to explore the interaction effect on CO2 emissions, taking a market-induced energy demand perspective. The study employed the fully modified ordinary least squares technique, removing all heterogeneity effects in a panel estimation. The econometric model was estimated with (and without) the interaction effect. The study finds support for the Pollution-Haven hypothesis and the Environmental Kuznets “inverted U-shaped” Curve Hypothesis in the region. It identifies a long-run relationship between the financial sector, economic activity, and CO2 emissions, with fossil fuel consumption in industrial activities increasing CO2 emissions by about 2.5 times. However, the study also reveals that the interactive effect of financial development can significantly reduce CO2 emissions, providing important implications for policymakers in Africa. The study suggests regulatory incentives to encourage banking credit intermediation for environmentally friendly energy sources. This research makes a valuable contribution to understanding the environmental impact of the financial sector in sub-Saharan Africa, an area that has received limited empirical attention. The findings highlight the relevance of the financial sector for policy formulation in addressing environmental issues in the region.

Sustainable environmental and economic relations of Turkiye and republic of South Africa — a focus study for the period 2000-2010

As one of the primary issues facing Turkiye, environmental degradation is one of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG). Therefore, a policy-level reorientation may be required to address this situation. Based on this perspective, during the increase of mutual economic developments between Turkiye and South Africa, the impact of renewable energy (RE) use, financial develoment, urbanization, and agriculture emissions of carbon dioxide should be analyzed separately using a dataset spanning a considerable period of time. South Africa develops its national environmental policy through a consultation process known as the National Consultative Environmental Policy Process (CONNEPP). The process is designed to provide an opportunity for all stakeholders in South Africa to contribute to the development of a new environmental policy. With the end of the apartheid period in 1994, the Republic of South Africa initiated a comprehensive program of economic reform and development going forward and made significant progress in many sectors after 2000. At this time, Turkiye, as situated on a strategic location regarding global trade, was expanding its operations worldwide. The purpose of the research is to analyze the Turkish RSA relations focusing on the first decade of 21st century. As a basis of our methodology, we have researched achieves and business records as tangible verifiable information about this time period. Although the global financial crisis of 2008 affected this country for some time; the development line and ongoing momentum in the automotive industry sector, as well as sectors such as construction, banking, investment regulations, energy, telecommunications, mining and agriculture, are worth mentioning. For this specific research article, we believe that it is imperative to focus the 2000-2010 period which is the basis of today's cooperation which will bring a specific value to the academia.

Introducing a temporal DPSIR (tDPSIR) framework and its application to marine pollution by PET bottles.

Environmental governance is highly sensitive to temporal dynamics, due to the ever-accelerating rate of technological changes, the cumulative nature of environmental impacts and the complexity of multi-level environmental policy processes. Yet, temporality is generally only implicitly included in frameworks used for describing or assessing policy response in the broad context of social-ecological systems, such as the widely used Driver-Pressure-State-Impact-Response (DPSIR) framework. As a result, the application of such frameworks often does not give due attention to questions of temporality, with potential negative impacts on attaining environmental goals. The current work proposes to modify the DPSIR framework to explicitly incorporate temporal aspects. We suggest two extensions of the common framework to account for time lags and allow for early response through a "response shift-left" mechanism. The potential of the modified framework-temporal DPSIR (tDPSIR)-to shed light on these temporal aspects is demonstrated through analysis of the European Union's response to pollution of the marine environment by plastic bottle waste. The analysis emphasizes the pronounced time lags between the initiation of this anthropogenic pressure and effective governance capable of curbing emissions. We discuss how tDPSIR can be applied to a range of environmental issues to populate databases of time lags in environmental governance, which, in turn, can be analysed for systemic patterns and chains of causality.

Enhancing co-production of knowledge: Visualisation and engagement approaches for evidence-based decision making within the Kenya Agroforestry Strategy

Shifting the relationship between science and decision making is a key challenge for sustainable development. We conducted a two-part behavioural study linked to the preparation of the Kenya Agroforestry Strategy. Two virtual workshops followed a data visualisation preference survey of 174 technical officers to compare the influence of a peer-led and a facilitated workshop on inclusive, evidence-based decision making. A post-workshop survey, facilitator or observer reports, coded transcriptions of group discussions, root causes capturing social actor perspectives, and strategy content were analysed. Results from the visualisation preference survey indicate that most respondents preferred more straightforward displays like tables and bar charts over the more complex ridge and box plots. Limited exposure to diverse visualisation formats calls for capacity development and innovative ways to share data in multiple formats. Engaging scientists in co-production processes allows more complex data to be accessed and understood by decision makers. Triangulation across diverse data sources associated with the workshops indicates facilitated groups had greater inclusion of participants and better integrated scientific and social actor perspectives in the strategies they developed. The importance of skilled facilitators and engagement processes are therefore highlighted. Small workshop sample sizes and complex interactions indicate that further studies are needed to validate our findings, but the results of this study provide valuable insights for knowledge translation and social learning as part of co-production to support inclusive, evidence-based decision making in agricultural and environmental policy processes.

Application of parametric trend life cycle assessment for investigating the carbon footprint of ammonia as marine fuel

PurposeThis study aimed to determine whether ammonia can genuinely help to reduce the carbon footprint of maritime activities. Given this, it was decided to investigate the life cycle of ammonia and its impact on the environment regarding the global warming potential.MethodsTo achieve this goal, the parametric trend life cycle assessment was applied to yield a general and reliable observation. The research was combined with a comprehensive dataset of over 2061 bulk carriers and eight different ammonia production methods: steam methane reforming, photovoltaics, electrolysis via wind, biomass downdraft gasifier, biomass circulating fluidized bed gasifier (CFBG) system, underground coal gasification (UCG) with carbon capture and storage (CCS), UCG without CCS, and 3-step Cu-Cl cycle. In addition, an existing ME-LGI (ME-liquid gas injection) engine was selected as the propulsion system.ResultsThe results from PT-LCA revealed that for estimating the carbon impact of ammonia as marine fuel from a well-to-wake (WTW) perspective, it is mandatory to focus on the well-to-tank (WTT) phase. The lowest carbon production pathway for the global warming potential (GWP) is the 3-step Cu-Cl cycle and eventually is the most potential route for using ammonia as fuel in the maritime industry. Finally, this study concludes with some formulas, based on regression analysis, which serves as rapid indications for comparing the overall carbon impact of thousands of bulk carriers equipped with the ME-LGI engine, carrying ammonia as fuel from different production methods.ConclusionsGiven these fuel production routes, the research has also demonstrated that ME-LGI engines can be a groundbreaking way to reduce the carbon footprint of ships. Additionally, the research findings showed that the environmental indicators proposed in this article have the potential to make a significant contribution to the industry. They are anticipated to assist stakeholders in overcoming the discrepancy problem generated by past studies that were so dissimilar from case to case that the scope, boundary of analysis, data, and assumptions they employed were far from current standards and rules. In addition, the GWP according to the ship power was compared and reviewed in terms of the well-to-wake (WTW). Thus, the proposed methodology for developing ammonia ship environmental indicators is to provide valuable insight into environmental policy and decision-making processes.

Investigation of Cultural–Environmental Relationships for an Alternative Environmental Management Approach Using Planet Smallsat Constellations and Questionnaire Datasets

The values (i.e., importance) that humans place on ecosystems are critical for sustainable socioecological management. Recently, the value pluralism approach with instrumental, intrinsic, and relational values using multiple disciplines that integrate qualitative and quantitative methodologies has been encouraged. However, these values have received little attention in environmental management. This study explored the values placed on cultural practices among groups experiencing different land cover transformations (LCTs) under the rapid shrinkage of the Limboto Lake, Gorontalo Province, Indonesia, using questionnaires and time-series Landsat and PlanetScope smallsat constellations (SSCs). The time series of LCTs and questionnaire data were computed, visualized, and analyzed statistically using the chi-square test for comparing the two village groups. Results show SSCs enabled a detailed analysis due to high spatiotemporal resolutions in tropical regions. This observation would help in monitoring natural disasters (floods) caused by the decreased lake’s water storing capacity, agricultural damage, locality safety, and environmental protection in shorter cycles. Furthermore, we found that relational values originating from traditional beliefs and practices were the domain values in the land steady-type villages. Hence, integrating the cultural–environmental values of localities with prior spatiotemporal analysis into environmental management policy and implementation processes would be a high-potential alternative for environmental conservation.

How the Perception of Public Official on Organizational Culture Influences Procedural Justice in Environmental Policy Processes.

How does the organizational culture of local governments influence the type and extent of procedural justice in environmental policy processes? Using the culture theory developed by Mary Douglas and others, this research seeks to bring a new conception and new measures of organizational culture to the study of policy making by local governments. To contribute to the development of the conceptualization and measurement of procedural justice in the environmental policy processes of those governments, item response theory (IRT) graded response model (GRM) is used to show variations in difficulties and frequencies of adopting distinctive public participation strategies for improving procedural justice across local governments. In this study, original survey data is collected from Illinois municipalities and a finding is suggestive of cultural variables explaining the two dimensions of procedural justice, equal and authentic public participation, while other variables can, at best, explain only the equal public participation. Furthermore, as hypothesized, egalitarianism increases both equal and authentic public participation, individualism increases equal public participation, and fatalism decreases both.

How coordinated sectoral responses to environmental policy increase the availability of product life cycle data

PurposeEnvironmental Product Declarations (EPDs) and Product Carbon Footprints (PCFs) have a significant potential for contributing to consumption-based approaches to climate change. This paper provides an important building block towards a theoretical model of the factors accounting for variations in the availability of life cycle data across countries. It does so by positing a mechanism linking industry associations’ institutional role within environmental policy processes to the availability of product life data and by empirically validating it.MethodsInterviews, qualitative document analysis, web scraping, quantitative text analysis, set-theoretical causal reasoning, and process tracing.Results and discussionEnvironmental policies that stipulate industry-government deliberations and assign a coordinating or mediating role to industry peak associations can stimulate the exchange of environmental information among industrial sectors. The policy instruments of determination of ‘best available techniques’ (BAT) towards standard setting, negotiated collective agreements and carbon pricing all contribute towards the institutionalisation of organised information exchange within industry. This lowers transaction costs for the monitoring, reporting and verification of sectoral environmental data and can thus be conducive to the creation of sectoral life cycle assessment data, with positive knock-on effects on the availability of firm- and product-specific LCA labels.ConclusionsIndustry associations’ institutional role within environmental policy processes can partially explain cross-national variations in the availability of product life cycle inventories.

Current (2020) and Long-Term (2035 and 2050) Sustainable Potentials of Wood Fuel in Switzerland

Wood fuel has become central in environmental policy and decision-making processes in cross-sectoral areas. Proper consideration of different types of woody biomass is fundamental in forming energy transition and decarbonization strategies. We quantified the development of theoretical (TPs) and sustainable (SPs) potentials of wood fuel from forests, trees outside forests, wood residues and waste wood in Switzerland for 2020, 2035 and 2050. Ecological and economic restrictions, timber market situations and drivers of future developments (area size, tree growth, wood characteristics, population growth, exporting/importing (waste wood)) were considered. We estimated a SP of wood fuel between 26.5 and 77.8 PJ/a during the three time points. Results demonstrate that the SP of wood fuel could be significantly increased already in the short term. This, as a moderate stock reduction (MSR) strategy in forests, can lead to large surpluses in SPs compared to the wood fuel already used today (~36 PJ/a), with values higher by 51% (+18.2 PJ) in 2020 and by 59% (+21.3 PJ) in 2035. To implement these surpluses (e.g., with a cascade approach), a more circular economy with sufficient processing capacities of the subsequent timber industries and the energy plants to convert the resources is required.

Coevolution of Networks and Beliefs in U.S. Environmental Risk Policy

Networks are an important part of the environmental policy process as they influence the ability of actors to synthesize information and learn to manage complex risks. According to the Advocacy Coalition Framework, the dynamics of policy network formation lead to structures exhibiting belief‐oriented segregation—that is, a high correspondence between shared beliefs and policy‐relevant interactions. These structures may be produced through at least two pathways: belief homophily, where actors actively seek out connections with others sharing their belief system, and policy‐oriented learning, where connected actors become more similar in their beliefs. The cross‐sectional design of much policy research does not allow an examination of these potentially complementary forces that shape belief systems and networks. These dynamics are studied using data on policy beliefs and networking in the U.S. environmental risk policy subsystem across two time periods, 1985 and 2000 (N = 223). Results indicate strong homophily effects, but relatively weak learning effects in the evolution of this policy network. This study helps pave the way for additional research on the dynamics shaping policy networks and beliefs, and helps to clarify the differences between individual versus organizational contributions to policy network evolution.

MAIP: model to identify actors’ influence and its effects on the complex environmental policy decision-making process

Whether a new policy is adapted to a new social-ecological reality depends on the complex interactions that play out from the policy process itself. The established theories of the policy process do not directly or explicitly address the actors' ability to influence. This study attempts to fill this gap by developing a model of actors' capacity to influence (an actor-centered perspective) which allows us to analyze the casual relationship between actors' influencing capacity and its effects on policy decision-making. This paper provides an in-depth study of the 2010 Brazilian Solid Waste Policy, a policy process characterized by high conflict that took almost 20 years to be approved by Brazilian Congress. It maps the actors' capacity of influence over the course of ten years to understand how this influence is related to policy dynamics (change and stability) and policy contents (policy instruments adopted). The study involves document analyses and interviews with relevant stakeholders. The findings identify the important role of influential actors in causing moments of paralysis and in fostering instrumental design. The insights on actors' capacity of influence and its effects contribute to our understanding of the complex dynamics of the environmental policy process.

What is the foreign policy role of northern countries in the current environmental turmoil?

This paper studies ‘the coming anarchy’ which occurs unpredictably due to environmental issues using foreign policy as a tool for modeling in environment sector. The post-cold war was a cause and effect but also a ‘wake-up call for states to consider threats of non-traditional security factors as a repercussion of social change such as economic and environmental decline. The implication/role of foreign policy in environmental realm is the states' driven goals to reprieve its extent to environment-driven stress so that its prosperity and national security may be raised in other to tackle the international dimension with other nations. The author explains how environmental policy tries to resist the anarchy caused by the environment turmoil and how states compete for harnessing their national interest responded to by way of hegemony. Evidence is provided using environmental policy process regardless of the Northern countries without forgetting a view point on perspectives and theories.

Understanding the Citizen Science Landscape for European Environmental Policy: An Assessment and Recommendations

Citizen science is increasingly upheld with the potential to underpin all aspects of the environmental policy process. However, to date, contributions of citizen science to environmental decision-making remain sparse and not well understood. Evidence points to a gap between the potential relevance of citizen science for policy and its actual implementation. We lack a comprehensive assessment of the current impacts of citizen science projects on environmental policy, and an identification of the scientific, engagement, and governance characteristics of projects that facilitate successful contributions to policy. This paper addresses that knowledge gap through identifying the characteristics of citizen science projects that support policy. We present an inventory of 503 citizen science projects with environmental policy relevance, and an in-depth analysis of 45 case examples with quantitative assessment of characteristics of the citizen scientist, scientific, socio-economic, and policy dimensions. Our results demonstrate that citizen science can underpin all steps of the environmental policy process, and that a diversity of approaches can be used to achieve this. However, governmental support, scientific excellence, and NGO-leadership facilitate policy linkages. We discuss the main challenges and opportunities identified by project leaders in linking citizen science and policy and present a set of recommendations for promoting the better integration of citizen science in the different phases of the policy cycle. Central among these are clarifying policy needs, facilitating access to citizen science data, and improving their evaluation and recognition by decision-makers. Publisher's Note: A corrigendum relating to this article has been published and can be found at http://doi.org/10.5334/cstp.308 .

Following REDD+: Elite agendas, political temporalities, and the politics of environmental policy failure in Guyana

This article follows the journey of Guyana’s Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation (REDD+) programme, from its promising emergence in 2009 as an ambitious, Norway-funded scheme worth US$250m to its near-abandonment by all actors ten years later. It is based on primary fieldwork conducted in Guyana in 2016 and 2017 and a deep review of the theoretical and empirical literature on REDD+ policy processes and the Norway–Guyana agreement. The article shows how, contrary to the mainstream understanding of environmental policy as a disinterested search for a rational, scientific solution, decisions governing REDD+ policy in Guyana were rather shaped throughout by the political objectives and calculations of a small number of opportunistic elite actors. It further shows how even the modest incarnation of REDD+ in Guyana (which ended up resembling more of a results-based aid programme than a Payment for Ecosystem Services scheme) was continually affected by political factors beyond the control of policy managers. These included fluctuations in the world gold price that led to an increase in mining activity and deforestation, the departure of a key international investor which caused the collapse of the flagship REDD+-funded Amaila Falls hydropower project, and legislative gridlock in Guyana generated by a hung Parliament. While not suggesting that REDD+ (or similar Payment for Ecosystem Services schemes) can never work, the article nonetheless illustrates the ways in which political objectives and unforeseen events can overwhelm substantive policy efforts towards fighting climate change. The findings also illustrate the dangers of prioritizing short-term ‘success stories’ over longer-term and more consultative environmental policy processes.

Environments Past: Nostalgia in Environmental Policy and Governance

A variety of factors shape environmental policy and governance (EPG) processes, from perceptions of physical ecology and profit motives to social justice and concerns with landscape aesthetics. Many scholars have examined the role of values in EPG, and demonstrated that attempts to incorporate (especially) non-market values into EPG are loaded with both practical and conceptual challenges. Nevertheless, it is clear that non-market values of all types play a crucial role in shaping EPG outcomes. In this article we explore the role of nostalgia as a factor in EPG. We examine literatures on environmental values, governance and affect in light of their relationships with environmental policymaking, first as a means to decide whether or not nostalgia can be rightly described as an ‘environmental value’. We suggest that, from a philosophical perspective, nostalgia is by itself environmentally neutral, and is not usefully described as a ‘value’. However, as an emotional state that longs to preserve or recover something of the past – whether fading or no longer present – that is fondly remembered, nostalgia does represent a potentially strong ‘motivator’ for EPG decisions. Despite this somewhat ambivalent assessment of nostalgia as an environmental value, we argue that nostalgia and nostalgic longing to return to ‘better’ or ‘cleaner’ environments can lead to potentially significant impacts on ecosystems and landscapes, both positive and negative depending on what it is that people want to preserve or restore. Thus we conclude that we neglect understanding the role of nostalgia in EPG at our peril: first, because preservationist goals have always been an important part of environmental responsibility; and second, because many people will be swayed regarding environmental action through a mobilisation of nostalgia by political leaders and interest groups alike. We end our article with suggestion of avenues for further empirical investigation.

Collaborative governance or private policy making? When consultants matter more than participation in collaborative environmental planning

ABSTRACTThe study of collaborative governance constitutes an established sub-literature within environmental policy and management scholarship. Among the lessons of this literature is that collaborative planning outputs are shaped by the mix of collaborative participants in question and the commitment participants exhibit towards joint planning efforts. This paper argues that a focus on the composition and commitment of collaborative participants ignores an increasingly prevalent actor in environmental planning – private sector contract consultants. We examine the relative influence of stakeholder attendance and the consulting firm providing support and facilitation in the case of integrated water resource management (IWRM) planning in the state of Georgia. Using attendance data derived from meeting minutes for ten concurrently operating regional IWRM councils, we document that neither the strength nor the commitment of collaborative efforts correlate with the content of planning outputs. Instead, the variation observed among regional plans can be largely explained by taking into account the consultant firms that were contracted to advise IWRM councils. Our discussion addresses the practical implications of relying on professional consultant services in environmental policy processes, and the theoretical imperative of incorporating consultant influence when explaining collaborative governance processes, outputs, and outcomes.