ABSTRACT
This chapter provides a brief presentation of the background to the REACH regulation and it provides an analysis of how the four selected countries; Bulgaria, the Czech Republic. Poland and Romania have approached the regulation and how their approaches relate to an ongoing process of socialization. The development of EU policy in the field of chemical hazards reflects the increased role of the Commission in environmental policy, which was institutionalized with the Maastricht Treaty when environmental policy was placed in the first of the three pillars in the then emerging pillar structure. The criticism towards the regulation in the four studied countries implicitly referred to the underlying norms of the regulation. The public administration showed a high degree of continuity in how it handled the issue and in contrast to the Poland the Ministry of Environment was throughout the negotiations the lead ministry.
