ABSTRACT

There are several good reasons to expect the EU to be relatively good at one particular aspect of policy coordination, namely the integration of an environmental dimension into the work of all policy sectors. It has a very extensive and innovative system of environmental policy dating back over 30 years. It has also done a great deal to popularize the idea of environmental policy integration at a global level (Lenschow, 2002; Jordan and Lenschow, 2010). Indeed, environmental policy integration (or EPI) is a long-standing aim of EU policy – older even than that of sustainable development (see Chapter 19). The EU’s political commitment to EPI is relatively strong and precisely expressed in the heading of the 1997 Amsterdam Treaty. Article 6 states that ‘environmental protection requirements must be integrated into the definition and implementation of . . . Community policies . . . in particular with a view to promoting sustainable development’ (emphasis added).