ABSTRACT
Chapter 4 analyses the transition to a more flexible and responsive type of environmental statehood. With the failures of the conventional approach, a new agenda was introduced through concepts such as sustainability, ecological modernisation, adaptive management and governance (rather than government). This process had contingent connections with the expansion of neoliberal policies and the reform of the state apparatus. The transition benefited from Kant's elaboration on reason, morality and political liberties. These points are illustrated with the assessment of the introduction of a market-friendly management of water in Brazil after the adoption of a new regulatory framework since the 1990s.
